I think it depends on the definition of EE. I always thought that the *only* defining characteristics of an EE were: 1. Carries the blue egg gene and 2. Does not meet the SOP for any breed. So by that definition, your sport baby would not be an EE. After all, if EEs are mutts, then breeding EE x EE means nothing in the same way that breeding RSL x RSL does not equal RSL because the offspring are not sex-linked--they're missing that one defining characteristic that makes them a RSL.So what would he have been called, if both parents were ee's? Another thought is why are ee's sold as possibly laying a pink (lightly tinted brown egg) or brown eggs? Just some questions that are floating through my head, I would love to hear your thoughts on this.
As far as the way EEs are sold--they are usually sold as an Ameraucana or an Americana or an Ameraucana/Araucana, so to my mind that means the hatchery isn't selling anything to any standard whatsoever. Seems like by a hatchery standard, they could throw all their extra chicks in a bin and call them ALL Ameraucana/Araucanas, since they don't have any defining characteristics whatsoever any more! Leg colors don't matter, beard/no beard doesn't matter, feather pattern doesn't matter--heck, I've seen posts from people sold hatchery EEs that carried straight combs, so even comb doesn't seem to matter. There's got to be SOMETHING that makes a bird an EE vs. some other kind of mutt, and if you don't require the blue egg gene, then any mutt you ever look at might as well be an EE. After all, you can get Ameraucana x Ameraucana that throws an EE, why can't you get EE x EE that throws a mutt?
<here endeth the rant, LOL>
I don't know. At the end of the day, I don't really care that much about the definition. But it would make genetics a lot easier to talk about, and it would make it easier for people to know what they're getting, if there was a definition of EE.
