Are green egg genes dominant?

[lemurchaser]

This summer I bred my easter egger blue/wheaten hen with a blue marans rooster. I hatched out 8 chicks from green eggs and got 3 females. Those girls have just started to lay and I'm getting brown eggs. Now, I'm not positive who's laying, but they are the only ones that look like they might be laying. They are in with 7 other chickens who are molting.

The three olive eggers I have to choose from are a solid black (with irridescent green hints) with muffs and dark legs, a mottled white/brown/black with muff and willow legs, and a red with a blue muff with pink legs. Will the pink legged girl be more likely to lay brown eggs? I'm getting a dark brown egg from someone. I really thought the green egg color would come through. Did I do something wrong in my creating "olive eggers"?

 

[BeardedLadyFarm]

Do these pullets have pea combs or straight combs?

You would expect the pea combed girls to lay green/olive eggs, and the straight combed to lay brown. This is usually the case, though there are exceptions.

 

[AllCoop'dUp]

I'll be watching this to see what the egg-perts say...

I have a couple of green egg layers, but I want BLUE!!

 

[draye]

This summer I bred my easter egger blue/wheaten hen with a blue marans rooster. I hatched out 8 chicks from green eggs and got 3 females. Those girls have just started to lay and I'm getting brown eggs. Now, I'm not positive who's laying, but they are the only ones that look like they might be laying. They are in with 7 other chickens who are molting.

When mixing with brown egg layers of any breed you have a chance of getting hens that will lay brown eggs, even the ones (as some will tell you different) can and will sometimes lay brown eggs. Best chances of getting green eggs is breeding back to EE or Ameraucana or Araucana roosters.​

 

[Dipsy Doodle Doo]

Hi! I copied this a while back (written by folks who understand the genetics better than I).

Blue Egg Genetics

The gene for blue eggs O is dominant, birds that have either O/O or O/o+ will have the gene.

This gene is located extremely close to the pea comb gene P, again a dominant so either P/P or P/p+ will be pea combed.

These genes are nearly always inherited together. So any pea combed pullets are very likely to lay blue/green based eggs.

Green to Khaki eggs are blue eggs with a surface coating of brown pigment.

Daughters of:

A blue egg O/O male mated to a white egg female o+/o+ could be expected to lay paler blue eggs.

A blue egg O/O male mated to a brown egg female o+/o+ could be expected to lay green eggs.

A blue egg O/o+ male mated to a white egg female o+/o+ could be expected to lay some blue eggs and some white eggs.

A blue egg O/o+ male mated to a brown egg female o+/o+ could be expected to lay some green/khaki eggs and some brown eggs.

Don't know how the 'dark egg gene' (if there is such a thing) would come into play.
Good luck with your project!

Lisa
edit: Got it, thanks!​

 

[Sonoran Silkies]

The only gene linked to the blue eggshell gene is the pea comb gene. PhiladelphiaPhlock is on the right track. Another possibility is that the brown is so dark and thick a coating that you cannot see the blue eggshell at all. In this case, you should be able to see the blue on the inside of the shell.

Dipsy's repost is pretty much accurate, although there are some slight corrections which I believe were posted near the original (P/p+, not P/r+, and changing the egg colours that the males would lay to the colours their daughters might lay

)

 

[Dipsy Doodle Doo]

Hi! So I should change this

This gene is located extremely close to the pea comb gene P, again a dominant so either P/P or P/r+ will be pea combed.

to *what* to be more accurate?
Thanks!

Lisa
edit: Got it, thanks! And changed it here as well.

This gene is located extremely close to the pea comb gene P, again a dominant so either P/P or P/p+ will be pea combed.​

 

[ChickenWisperer]

The only way to gurantee olive eggs is to cross Ameraucana or Araucana with Marans (or another dark egger breed).


Was your hen an EE? She must have only been heterozygous for blue egg gene. If so, and you crossed her to a marans roo, only 25% of those chicks would have laid olive eggs.

 

[A.T. Hagan]

This is a good thread for me to get something straight.

I am of the understanding that if I cross a bird with the blue egg gene with a White Leghorn that the egg laid by the resulting offspring will still be blue, but the W.L. influence will bleach them out to a paler shade. But if I make the same cross using a Brown Leghorn their white egg gene works somewhat differently and won't affect the shade of blue as strongly.

Is this true? I'd like to cross a Brown Leghorn with my EE girls to see if I can improve their laying ability.

I'll also be crossing them with a dark brown egg layer for olive eggers later on, but that I'm pretty sure will work the way I think it will.

 

[ChickenWisperer]

A.T. Hagan :

This is a good thread for me to get something straight.

I am of the understanding that if I cross a bird with the blue egg gene with a White Leghorn that the egg laid by the resulting offspring will still be blue, but the W.L. influence will bleach them out to a paler shade. But if I make the same cross using a Brown Leghorn their white egg gene works somewhat differently and won't affect the shade of blue as strongly.

Is this true? I'd like to cross a Brown Leghorn with my EE girls to see if I can improve their laying ability.

I'll also be crossing them with a dark brown egg layer for olive eggers later on, but that I'm pretty sure will work the way I think it will.

I'm not sure about all of that, but I'd like to hear what somebody more versed in the subject says.

Keep in mind that the EE's may not be homozygous for blue eggs.​