Before you buy "Ameraucanas"....

[lazy gardener]

Re: back yard EE. I wouldn't hesitate to get my EE from a BY flock IF the rooster and the hen were both EE. Blue is a dominant egg color, so if 2 EE are being bred, the egg color will be what ever the parents carry. The green comes from a brown wash applied to the egg shell as it's traveling through the reproductive system. Debid, I wonder if perhaps you meant that the eggs bred from an EE hen and an other breed of rooster would not produce a blue egg? I'm guessing that that cross would yield more of a darker green/olive color, depending on the egg color of the breed in question. The bigger question regarding bringing in chicks from an other back yard flock is: are you also bringing in disease? NPIP can only test for so much. No matter where your stock comes from, there's always a disease risk. Buyer beware, and take reasonable precautions, but don't let fear keep you from enjoying having a poultry flock.

 

[lazy gardener]

Re: back yard EE. I wouldn't hesitate to get my EE from a BY flock IF the rooster and the hen were both EE. Blue is a dominant egg color, so if 2 EE are being bred, the egg color will be what ever the parents carry. The green comes from a brown wash applied to the egg shell as it's traveling through the reproductive system. Debid, I wonder if perhaps you meant that the eggs bred from an EE hen and an other breed of rooster would not produce a blue egg? I'm guessing that that cross would yield more of a darker green/olive color, depending on the egg color of the breed in question. The bigger question regarding bringing in chicks from an other back yard flock is: are you also bringing in disease? NPIP can only test for so much. No matter where your stock comes from, there's always a disease risk. Buyer beware, and take reasonable precautions, but don't let fear keep you from enjoying having a poultry flock.

P.S. I love my EE, and from the reading I've done, feel that they are a better layer than an Ameraucana. The true Araucana is rumpless, and carries a lethal gene, which means that a fairly high percentage of chicks die before hatch. Not a breed I care to deal with!

 

[debid]

Re: back yard EE.  I wouldn't hesitate to get my EE from a BY flock IF the rooster and the hen were both EE.  Blue is a dominant egg color, so if 2 EE are being bred, the egg color will be what ever the parents carry.  The green comes from a brown wash applied to the egg shell as it's traveling through the reproductive system.  Debid, I wonder if perhaps you meant that the eggs bred from an EE hen and an other breed of rooster would not produce a blue egg?  I'm guessing that that cross would yield more of a darker green/olive color, depending on the egg color of the breed in question.  The bigger question regarding bringing in chicks from an other back yard flock is: are you also bringing in disease?  NPIP can only test for so much.  No matter where your stock comes from, there's always a disease risk.  Buyer beware, and take reasonable precautions, but don't let fear keep you from enjoying having a poultry flock.

P.S.  I love my EE, and from the reading I've done, feel that they are a better layer than an Ameraucana.  The true Araucana is rumpless, and carries a lethal gene, which means that a fairly high percentage of chicks die before hatch.  Not a breed I care to deal with!

Blue is dominant in that it expresses if present. Most EE hens have blue + brown which is why they lay green. Cross one of them with a brown laying breed rooster and you get about 50% green, 50% brown laying offspring. Even if they have an EE rooster, he isn't likely to be pure for blue so maybe they get a mix of blue/green/brown with the bulk of offspring laying green. I still get better odds, by far, from either a breeder who knows what they're doing or a hatchery.

 

[Ridgerunner]

I think that is the key. If you have a breeder that knows what they are doing, you can do really well. But some people don’t even know that it is best to just hatch the blue or green eggs.

I got my blue egg genes from backyard flocks. Because of my breeding project and which breeds I’m crossing I’ll still be getting no better than 50% colored egg layers with my flock for two more seasons. But after that the percentage of green egg layers will increase. This is the last year I need to hatch any brown eggs.

 

[lazy gardener]

Thank you for more precise clarification.

 

[lazy gardener]

Thank you for more precise clarification. So, if I hear you correctly, a roo who came from a blue egg, with a hen who lays a blue egg may still throw something other than blue? Perhaps 25% BB, and 50% B with recessive trait which would lay a blue egg, but still be able to pass on the recessive trait, and 25% would not be blue? Am I thinking straight, or still muddy here??

 

[Ridgerunner]

I think you are right on. Let’s do this for clarity. The recognized symbol for a Blue egg gene is an upper case “O”. The upper case shows it is dominant. The symbol for a recessive white is a lower case “o”.

If a rooster is O,o and a hen is O,o each will randomly give one of those genes to the offspring. In half the cases the rooster will give an O. That may be paired with the hen’s O or o, giving you either O,O or O,o. If he gives an o, that may be paired with an O or an o from the hen giving you an O,o or o,o. So ¼ of the time, you get O,O, ½ the time you get O,o, and ¼ of the time you get o,o.

O,O or O,o will give blue or green eggs because O is dominant.

If a rooster has o,o and the hen is O,o you get half O,o and half o,o. Half colored.

If the rooster is o,o and the hen is O,O you get O,o. All colored.

You can keep playing with this all you want but hopefully you got the idea. You can look up Punnett Squares if you want to see this graphically.

There is a trick to greatly improving your odds of getting a chicken with a blue egg gene. The blue egg gene is real close to the pea comb gene on the DNA. They are so close on the DNA that 97% of the time the pea comb gene and the blue egg gene stick together. This only applies when there are no other pea comb genes or blue egg genes in the genetic mix, but I’ll take 97% as a real good guess. So try to pick offspring that have the pea comb for pullets and for cockerels.

There is even another trick with this. The pea comb gene is partially dominant, not fully dominant. That means if the chicken has one dominant pea comb gene and one recessive not-pea comb gene, you’ll see the effects of the pea comb gene, but it will not be a pure pea comb. I call it wonky and it’s a bit hard to describe, but think of a slightly raised line up there. So if you get one with a pure pea comb instead of a wonky pea comb, you have pretty good odds of having one pure for the blue egg gene instead of one split blue and white.

 

[lazy gardener]

Thanks for taking the time. I remember the Punnett squares, we called them Venn diagrams from biology class. Got any pics of true and wonky pea comb?

 

[txladybugz]

Purebred Ameraucanas are hard to find locally! When asking about them in the feedstore the sales lady didn't seem to know the difference between a purebred or an EE. I did not argue with her & I ended up buying some EE chicks. I have to say they were more robust then the other heritage purebreds I bought. My goal is to pick up a purebred rooster from a local breeder to breed with my EE hens? This should produce some healthy blue laying hens (however mixed breed), right?

 

[Ridgerunner]

It should give you blue or green eggs. Could be either.