Easter Egger club!

[FlyWheel]

The origins of all the blue egg layers are the Quechua, from South America. This thread is quite thorough in talking about the history of the breed: https://www.backyardchickens.com/t/402512/quechua-tojuda-ameraucana-easter-eggers-in-vino-veritas

In short, they came from South America, were exported around the world and crossed with all sorts of breeds, were brought to the U.S. and refined into a few different breeds. Remember, with chickens it's not so much that the parents are "purebred" as the offspring follow the standards of the breed. That's why you can have two purebred Ameraucana or Araucana and when crossed together, the offspring might not qualify for the breed (in the case of two colors being mixed that don't match the standard, or off-colored legs, or what have you). Of course, the longer you breed a line for a certain standard, the more likely you'll keep getting that standard with each generation, which is how you get a "breed".

The thing with Easter Eggers is that they're a land race (as someone else explained earlier) which means as long as they look generally alike then they still fit in with other Easter Eggers. The part that's confusing is that a lot of the traits that define an Easter Egger, fluffy cheeks, green legs, blue eggs, are dominant traits and are therefore spread to their offspring widely, making half-breeds look a lot like an EE so they're still called EE.

The other thing is that by default, any Araucana or Ameraucana that doesn't meet the standard is an Easter Egger since they fit into the "land race" description.

Clear as mud?

The way I understand it from here and other sites, in order for a 'breed' of chicken to be officially recognized as such, the off spring of like parentage must breed true, meaning the offspring will maintain similar traits, at least in a certain percentage of the off spring. Am I right so far? Now if I'm still correct, an Easter Egger is any off spring of any 'blue' egg layer and any 'other color' egg layer, OR the offspring of two Easter Eggers, creating off spring that may or may not have the characteristics of it's parents and could lay a variety of different colored eggs, as opposed to all off spring laying the same color, with only small variations of tint or hue.

As for the accusation of deliberate deception, if the hatchery actually calls their EEs Ameraucanas or Araucanas using the correct spelling then there is no argument; it is being done to defraud the buyer. However who is to say the particular hatchery doesn't use the word Americana, Americauna or some other mis-spelling of the breed name spelling because their particular EEs were actually bred from one of those true breeds? If the buyer has enough knowledge about the actual breeds, would they really be stupid enough to be fooled by an obvious misspelling?

Unless the accuser actually works with or is in some other way legally connected to the hatchery, then their accusations of deliberate fraud are little more than libel.

Regardless, even the loudest rantings of an amateur poultry newsgroup is not going to change this practice. But to avoid further rantings I will use "Easter Egger" or EE rather than my preferred Americana.


BTW, by definition, any artificially created breed can be called a 'land race'.

Quote:

1. a local cultivar or animal breed that has been improved by traditional agricultural methods.

 

[Chkinkeeper7474]

Rose is overdue for her 5 week portrait. She is so gosh darn beautiful! Her white plumage is just brilliant and very soft.

She is beautiful!!!! I also have a pure white EE. She will be almost 4 weeks soon.

 

[love laugh farm]

OH how i want a white EE! SOOOO pretty! M EE lady Casey is certainly pretty but the white ones i loooove!

 

[pamperedamber]

Be aware that you will need an outlet for unwanted hatched roos whether it's for your freezer, or someone who takes in unwanted cockerels. And have a home lined up for your flock should an emergency happen - stuff happens and it would be easier to re-home pure breeds but that's just a head's up to consider.

Thank you for the advice. I have a couple of friends that are wanting to start next spring with a few of my Easter Eggers or what ever they will be from my little experiment and I will be keeping alot of them as well. Most of the people I know want colorful eggs they don't care about the breed. The extra cockerels will be dinner.

 

[FlyWheel]

Quote: She is beautiful!!!! I also have a pure white EE. She will be almost 4 weeks soon.

OHH, can I have one too? Please?? Pretty please?? With live mealworms on it????

 

[Gryphon]

The way I understand it from here and other sites, in order for a 'breed' of chicken to be officially recognized as such, the off spring of like parentage must breed true, meaning the offspring will maintain similar traits, at least in a certain percentage of the off spring. Am I right so far? Now if I'm still correct, an Easter Egger is any off spring of any 'blue' egg layer and any 'other color' egg layer, OR the offspring of two Easter Eggers, creating off spring that may or may not have the characteristics of it's parents and could lay a variety of different colored eggs, as opposed to all off spring laying the same color, with only small variations of tint or hue.

As for the accusation of deliberate deception, if the hatchery actually calls their EEs Ameraucanas or Araucanas using the correct spelling then there is no argument; it is being done to defraud the buyer. However who is to say the particular hatchery doesn't use the word Americana, Americauna or some other mis-spelling of the breed name spelling because their particular EEs were actually bred from one of those true breeds? If the buyer has enough knowledge about the actual breeds, would they really be stupid enough to be fooled by an obvious misspelling? 

Unless the accuser actually works with or is in some other way legally connected to the hatchery, then their accusations of deliberate fraud are little more than libel.

Regardless, even the loudest rantings of an amateur poultry newsgroup is not going to change this practice. But to avoid further rantings I will use "Easter Egger" or EE rather than my preferred Americana.


BTW, by definition, any artificially created breed can be called a 'land race'.

 

In most cases, yes the offspring must resemble the parents except in cases where that's not possible, like "blue" genetics where a splash and black will make a mix of blue and black offspring (and some breed registries don't accept blue as an accepted color just for that reason). Breeding and making a breed is interesting, such as the case of Delawares where to this day there are very very few birds that meet the standard, and a member of this forum decided to re-create the breed by using some of the original lines (or as close as she could get) to re-create the Delaware from scratch. As long as they meet the standard then they're Delawares. If you're a good breeder you of course want to continue to strive for the breed ideal, and that's done with having offspring that are as close to that ideal as possible which means they resemble each other.

I'll go with the assumption you're talking to someone else about the buyer fraud since I didn't have anything to say about that.

As for land race, ANY breed can be called a "land race", but you'd sure tick off the breeders if you did so.

 

[kacothran]

Just got this black EE yesterday! She's our third EE and as sweet as can be! Any ideas for a good name? Our other chickens are Crazy Daisy, Buttercup, Sweet Pea, and Stormy

 

[NomanChicken]

 

[texasgal]

Hello all,
I've got 10 green eggs from this girl in my incubator now. They go on lockdown tomorrow. I thought I had lost her to a fox, but discovered her on her nest in the woods. When I tried to relocate her safely to the coop, she abandoned the eggs. So I put them in the bator. Kinda excited because she is the only EE I have this color. My roo is an EE, so we'll see what we get!

 

[Sylvester017]

The way I understand it from here and other sites, in order for a 'breed' of chicken to be officially recognized as such, the off spring of like parentage must breed true, meaning the offspring will maintain similar traits, at least in a certain percentage of the off spring. Am I right so far? Now if I'm still correct, an Easter Egger is any off spring of any 'blue' egg layer and any 'other color' egg layer, OR the offspring of two Easter Eggers, creating off spring that may or may not have the characteristics of it's parents and could lay a variety of different colored eggs, as opposed to all off spring laying the same color, with only small variations of tint or hue.

As for the accusation of deliberate deception, if the hatchery actually calls their EEs Ameraucanas or Araucanas using the correct spelling then there is no argument; it is being done to defraud the buyer. However who is to say the particular hatchery doesn't use the word Americana, Americauna or some other mis-spelling of the breed name spelling because their particular EEs were actually bred from one of those true breeds? If the buyer has enough knowledge about the actual breeds, would they really be stupid enough to be fooled by an obvious misspelling?

Unless the accuser actually works with or is in some other way legally connected to the hatchery, then their accusations of deliberate fraud are little more than libel.

Regardless, even the loudest rantings of an amateur poultry newsgroup is not going to change this practice. But to avoid further rantings I will use "Easter Egger" or EE rather than my preferred Americana.


BTW, by definition, any artificially created breed can be called a 'land race'.

I'm relatively new to backyard chickeneering and did a lot of reading, questions, and research in the past 5 years on chicken breeds. It's interesting after all these decades that discussions are still sometimes emotionally sparked by the USA EEs, Araucana, Ameraucana, Amer-I-cana debates. Some are so very passionate about the distinctions and I believe a lot of the original breeders especially wish the confusion is not perpetuated by the hatcheries and private breeders. But it's great posts like these that clarify the history and distinctions of the birds and their varied ancestry. I'm still learning things about my silly Ameraucana from breeders on these posts who have had EEs and Ameraucanas for decades! These birds IMO are so different from what most people think a chicken should be like and they fascinate me. Friends of ours and we are always swapping stories and experiences about our EEs and Ameraucanas.