Easter Egger's and Ameraucana's = same thing

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ChocolateMouse said:
Er, lets ignore for a hot minute that breeds of chickens are all nearly identical genetically. Language exists for the sole purpose of communication. If I say "That sculpture is called "The Bean" because it looks like a bean, meet me here tomorrow" and you show up then I have successfully used language to communicate a meaning, even if the Sculpture is actually officially named Cloud Gate. (A real scenario that exists.)

Colloquial definitions matter as much as official ones but language takes time to evolve. Now I can give something a name, I can call you a zinkydoink, and say that it means "a human with a W avatar on backyardchickens" but unless the term zinkydoink is used by enough people in that context it's meaningless. You zinkydoink.

So! A breed, as defined by the chicken keeping community at large, is a chicken that has a specific written and nationally adopted standard and controlled genetics sufficient that they regularly breed true.
A landrace, as defined by the chicken keeping community, is a group of chickens that are not controlled genetically but maintain a specific genetic pool based on location and traits. Icelandinc Jaerhons were a landrace. Ameracuanas were a land race. But they didn't meet the rest of the definitions for breeds so they weren't breeds.
And a mixed breed is multiple types of chickens mixed together.

But that doesn't mean we don't use other terms to describe other chickens with similar genetics to meet peices of a specific definition. ISA browns, sexlinks, black star, golden comet, cornish cross, broiler, melanistic, frizzle, naked neck, showgirl; like easter egger, none of these are actually breeds BUT they do have loosely defined traits. Why are none of these breeds? Because they don't breed true most of the time, have a written definition AND controlled genetics. All three are required to meet how the chicken keeping community defines a breed.

If you disagree with the common parlance of chicken keeping and declare that the definitions of breed, landrace, mixed or specific varieties are completely invalid because of semantics and some Wittgensteinian need to define language by your own rules even though nobody else follows them... There's literally no way to have a conversation with you as a human being. Because you're walking out in public and saying "I'M ZINKYDOINK!" and everyone else around you is staring at you like you're a crazy person.

NOW with all that in mind a little thought experiment; how long does it take for language around chicken breeds to change?

The answer in the case of Ameraucanas is more than 36 years. We're still counting. Because of a little history. Ameraucana USED to be the colloquial term for the mixed breed/landrace chickens. They were a very popular *variety* of chicken but had not met the definition of breed *as we as chicken keepers commonly define it*. (Again, if you use some other arbitrary definition nobody else uses you're just zinkydoink and we literally can't speak.)
During this timeframe many hatcheries started selling them. Much like sexlinks and ISA browns, they were never a breed but were commonly listed under 'breeds' because it's not like a hatchery is going to make a separate section for "breeds", "hybrids" "Landraces" and "Varieties". They were popular.

But then some silly people got it into their heads that they wanted to be able to show these birds and develop specific traits in them. So they took a bunch of the "ameraucanas" who had the traits they wanted and bred them all together for 15 or so years and then went to they APA and were like "Hey. We wanna make this an official breed. Most people already call these Ameraucanas so that's what we wanna call them" and the APA went "OK!" and then there was a written definition and the birds bred true and there was a controlled population and it was a 'Breed' not a landrace/variety/hybrid/etc.

But in that moment, there was a problem. How could you tell which birds were bred to the standard, and which weren't? So the ones that weren't, since they could come in all sorts of colors and lay all colors of eggs, got a new name because that's easier than filling out the paperwork to change a breed name and the landrace/mixed breed birds got renamed "easter eggers".

But much like how calling you zinkydoink is meaningless right now, that change takes TIME and enough people who change the way their language is used to actually make that change. Ameraucanas didn't get recognized until 1984. And the hatcheries were just kind of like "*shrug* We've been calling these landraces Ameraucanas for decades and we aren't going to stop now" and refused to make the transition. Many still HAVEN'T. But they ALSO refused to breed to the APA standard.

So for many many years, including today, you have old lines of a landrace formerly known as ameraucanas being sold as "Ameraucanas", and a completing definition of the APA purebred chickens that are called "Ameraucanas".

But there's still differences between the two (breeding true, defined color, consistent egg color, combs and muffs and beards, etc.) so a lot of people adopted easter egger to refer to the landrace to actually make the definition work. And it just so happens that a mixed breed/hybrid ameraucana meets what we define the landrace to be too, through its phenotype. Since there IS no defined genotype for the landrace, because they AREN'T A BREED, mixed breeds got lumped into there too.

And the reason people get up in arms about it is because they buy an Ameraucana using the national definition of the APA standard, and get an "ameraucana" using a definition that only a few people still use from 40 years ago when they were a landrace. Or people who put work into showing and breeding to a standard get asked why their chickens with literal decades of work behind them cost more than some landrace that may or may not share the same traits. And that's frustrating. At this point it feels like deliberate miscommunication designed to make money off of other peoples work in breeding specific traits and working towards a standard, and it leads to a lot of disappointed customers and breeders.
Click to expand...
On a serious note...best discription I've ever read on the "why" in this conversation. Thank you for your input.
 
Thanks, though, I mean, it's basically what most people were trying to say just much more long winded.

Breeds are defined and have literal decades of work put into making them consistent. And if that consistency matters to you it sucks to buy something that is a landrace with varying traits. And there's no way to tell them apart without different words for it.

And if you google "The Bean" or "The Bean Chicago" you'll get a wiki article for a sculpture called "Cloud Gate". So there's that.
 
Ok. Would you say this is an Ameraucana?
CF36BC7B-EE4F-444A-A351-C333DEEA8B11.jpeg
 
Yikes, this thread is a bit heated at points! 😳 My best argument for Ameraucana vs EE is skin color. Ameraucanas have white skin while EEs frequently have yellow skin. Regardless of variety/appearance of the feathers of the birds, skin color is a pretty defining characteristic and EEs are often not consistent. Not even going to touch on the history of the breeds and naming process, but at the current state there are definitely some variation that proves that they are not the same breed even though origins may be similar
 

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