I will disagree with you there, when you say the egg-color is not mentioned in early writings about the breed. In AC Croads book I found mentionings two places straight away. On the top of page 30 she writes: "they were due even in that case to the Langshan parentage, rather than the other.
The Silky also lays a pinkish egg ; and where not brown, that is the colour of the
Langshan's egg". On page 90 you can also find: "Another equally important addition to our ranks is Mr. G. Mander AUender, of the Aylesbury Dairy Company. In
January, 1887, Mr AUender sent an account of the poultry kept
on the Company's farm at Horsham to " Live Stock Journal." He
gave the highest place as a generally useful fowl to the Langshan,
he said they kept them in larger numbers because they found
them on the whole more profitable than any other breed of fowls ;
he pointed out that " although the Langshan did not lay a large
egg, it gave one that was very acceptable, its beautiful and varied
tints rendering it an ornament to the breakfast table."
There are a few other mentionings of the phenomen other places, and in other old boks as well.
When Mikaela first showed me the same photo as you can see a bit earlier in this thread on Facebook, I answered:
" Purple is not the right color, peach is more like it. The color (dusting, like on a plum) is strongest after the egg is laid, and if you collect a few, you will notice you fingertips gets slightly colored. Showing eggs is quite a big sport over here. To breed for egg-color is quite complex, but can be done, if you have enough room to do so, as you usually end up with a lot of strains on your way to do so, especially if you breed birds for showing as well. When you breed for geno-type (which is the all-important way forward to preserve and improve the breed) you will end up with a small number of hens that lay better than the others. You will then notice that a small number of these also lay a more plum-colored egg than others. Very often these are also the best-looking birds for type and stamp. Eye color and under-foot color is very important NEVER to forget in building these strains. Combs and wattles, not so important at that stage of building strains. Just avoid allowing them to become too big. By just breeding from the best stamped hens, that lays best, and also has a fairly good color on the egg, and of course keep the best cocks from the best strains you build up, you will notice improvement in everything, as the genes in the Langshan is VERY strong, and they will kick in more and more often, but it takes time, as nearly nobody has bred like this over the last 100 years. It is easier with blacks than with whites from a white strain. Example: I ignored most smaller faults, and created a strain of whites that fairly regular produced hens that laid an average of 200 eggs a year, and by selective breeding also grew in size, type and fertility. The egg-color was too light, but you could spot that peacy/plumcolor on more and more eggs, even if that was not the aim of building that strain. But the genes are so strong, when you improve the breed as a whole, and keep the old values, it will fall into place. Of course, you shall then breed side-strains that you breed show-birds from, but you will then be using slightly different criteria, because in breeding for showing, you often end up going for pheno-types, and even if you end up with a few stunning individuals, dont get tempted to use them in building your main geno-type strains. You will end up with 6-8-10 strains by starting this, so it is a good idea to involve another person (or more) that wants to breed like you. The American Langshan is clearly bred just like the Croad type, the Modern Langshan was was a different type again, but was true Langshans, just bred systematiccaly for different looks. They looked like they were going to become a main breed, but, they fizzled out over the years, and are now almost disseapeared. All of the above will also be good breeding-systems for the Bantams, but type is even more important here, as they are a new, fairly composite breed, with a fairly small proportion of true Langshan in them, so the genes will not be quite as strong as you find them on the large fowl."
I am sorry I do go on a bit, but I am so passionate about the preservation and improvement of the breed, I hope they will bury a nice Langshan with me when the time comes, that will give the archeologists of the future something to think about?
