Lavender Ameraucana Breeders .... UNITE

[kaybee123]

I have a 4 month old BW Am that hasn't even attempted to crow. I actually hope he doesn't as I am keeping him until he does. Hes with me in the city and then crow time means he goes to my mom's in the country. No Roo's in the city here.

 

[DMRippy]

He is Lavender and silver.  A reg silver would be black with silver but he is lavender with silver. 

He is not complete silver though.

I am sure you are right...but he was pretty. I didn't see any silver qualities in the pullets. they were just lavender.

 

[Hangtown Farms]

I am sure you are right...but he was pretty. I didn't see any silver qualities in the pullets. they were just lavender.

you are right. he was handsome none the less.

 

[chrissyr]

First off, welcome to the wonderful world of Rare Breed chickens!

I ordered my Lav Ameraucanas in August of last year. By reading the form I was aware that he does not hatch birds until March-April - and if he didn't have a good hatch he would offer a refund at the end of April or I could wait until the next year. Some people have waited two years for their orders. That is acceptable practice with a rare breed, and it will be the same with most of them. I was fine with that, these birds cannot be purchased from a mass-produced hatchery so I knew I would have to wait until they were available. He does not hatch by the thousands - and he is selective in which chicks he will send. So not all hatches will meet his standards, and he will not ship.

Also, consider the quantities you are ordering and how many chickens they have of each breed. You have a small window of collection for the eggs - about a week. If they are breeding for a certain trait or color they will have maybe 10 good hens they want use to continue that line. To keep exact records the rooster must be put in with the hen, the eggs collected and marked and then hatched. This is not 100 chickens all running around with 4 roosters and being bred by whoever. Those 10 hens can lay about 70 eggs but usually lay more like 50 before the earliest eggs will need to be set or they might not hatch. If you get 70 eggs (amazing) that can give you between 0 and 70 chicks, with averages being about 45. Now, of those 45 - there will only be some that are actually correct (that's what a "work in progress" means - and these birds ARE still in progress). So - you might have 25 good chicks - IF you had a good laying AND a good hatch! If anything was off.. if your birds didn't lay the maximum number of eggs, if some were infertile, if the incubation process hit a glitch.. all those can drop a hatch below the number needed to send chicks. And you cannot send two different ages of chicks, they must be shipped within a day of hatch - or they will have to be sent Expre$$ Mail with something to keep them alive. Hatched babies have the egg yolk to live on, and they can live for 3 days. The post office doesn't allow water or wet food in the boxes - so shipping live older birds is a challenge AND very expensive!

If you were not informed that there would be a wait until spring for your chicks, then I understand your confusion. Having been around chickens and hatchings for years I was aware that not everybody hatches all year round, and I understand the play of chance when it comes to hatching eggs.

Its why the saying is "Don't count your chickens until they hatch".

I hope this helps you understand the "rules" of ordering chicks a bit better. Hopefully you will get your chicks soon - but I don't know of many breeders that can take an order for a rare breed and produce them in 21 days (the length of time to hatch an egg). Usually they are backed up with orders like mine which I placed months and months ago...

ChickNmamma: Was searching this thread:I have 3 lav americaunas in my flock. young (2 pullets and I believe 1 roo). Just want to say I LOVE your profile pic with the gorgeous roo! I don't know what breed he is but sure is purty

Just had to say it out loud, cause he deserves a shout out

 

[ChickNmamma]

ChickNmamma: Was searching this thread:I have 3 lav americaunas in my flock. young (2 pullets and I believe 1 roo). Just want to say I LOVE your profile pic with the gorgeous roo! I don't know what breed he is but sure is purty

Just had to say it out loud, cause he deserves a shout out

Thank you chrissyr

He was the reason I came on BYC. I bought him as a "Bantam Americana" from a Hatchery - and he was nothing like what I expected. I wanted to know what he was - and what that color was. I find it beautiful too.

I never did find out what he was - he is probably a cross/mix of some kind. Still a handsome boy! The color is closest to some of the Red Pyles, with lacing and blacktail. Just very unusual.

 

[Penny Hen]

Interesting, I've never heard that about the guineas

My friend that suggested getting them for bug control has always had them all free ranging together without problems. To be honest hers don't even stay entirely on their property. Mine so far though barely want to leave the run. They fly out over the fence only to spend the rest of the day stupidly banging their head into the fencing repeatedly trying to get back in

One actually broke his own neck and died running away from me as I tried to catch him to help him into the run. I tried to raise them in a way that would tame them but it didn't happen. They are total psycho freaks...

Hatchery guineas are like that. Also guineas from lines that have next to no human contact. I have seen guineas that come from lines that have been hand raised (like you would a pet chicken) for about 3 generations that hold trust in their humans and are not psycho freaks.
There is an inherited memory/instinct that takes several generations to collect and override the wild instinct. The experiences of the parent is passed to the young in genetic coding. In Mustangs off the range it takes about 5 generations to loose the wild reflexes and that is only if nothing happens to support the wild reflexes. Example: my friend had a mustang stud that was the foal of my mustang mare. She was breeding him to her mares. She went out to feed them in the winter with hay in the back of the truck. Now I had raised this stallion and he was extremely pushy but didn't seem to pass this on to his foals. Correction. "Extremely pushy" is an understatement. If you didn't dominate him every second he would forcibly take control sometimes in ways that would get you hurt.

This day she had her 13 year old niece with her. They got in the back of the bed to throw the hay out. Now Cactus Pete (the stud) had this disconcerting trick of rushing up to you and flipping around for you to scratch his butt. If you had never seen it before you would swear that he was preparing to kick your brains out. Even so I had to fight my own reflexes a couple of times when he did it and make myself stand still. Well the niece screamed and Pete kicked the truck. The niece screamed again and Pete whirled around with eyes flashing and teeth bared. My friend, standing above him in the pickup bed spread her hand and tried to calm him with her voice. He came halfway up into the pickup truck and bit her breast. Thank God he released it instead of tearing it off but she carries the scars to this day. He then proceeded to kick the pick up some more before herding all the mares off to the other side of the field.

Now can anyone guess why he went bonkers?.......

Don't feel bad if you can't because it took me a week and a half of reviewing everything I knew about Mustangs and the conditions they live in on the range to put it together.

1. What is the Mustang's No. 1 predator? The cougar/mountain lion.
2. What does a mountain lion sound like? A screaming woman.
3. Where/how does a mountain lion attack? They leap from above.
4. What is their first attack weapon? Spread claws.
5. What is their second and fatal attack weapon? teeth

What happened? A scream (from the niece). They were standing above him and my friend spread her fingers and held up her hand and opened her mouth to talk to him. Claws and teeth from above. That was when he attacked. She could not have pushed more of his wild instinct buttons if she had tried. Now because those instincts are reinforced it could be longer than just 5 generations for any offspring born after him to loose that.

Now this information has not gone through the rigors of scientific research yet. But I have consulted with many horsemen who work with Mustangs and they all agree on what they see. I have come to believe that this genetic memory is present in other species as well. Most notably you can find information from people who breed wolves and wolf-hybrids. In fact I had tried to explain to my friend (who raises Wolfhounds) the likeness between Mustangs and wolves: that you had to think like one of them so you didn't accidentally trigger wild instincts. She thought she understood what I meant but she didn't. By the way if you are worried about the fate of Pete, he was given to a horse trainer who had him gelded and eventually broke to saddle for his daughter. Once the high testosterone levels cleared his system he wasn't such a control freak. I was glad because he had the makings of a great horse (athletic and totally fearless) but I wasn't able to take him there because I had a disk in my neck go bad and had to have surgery.

But to link it back to the guineas I believe it possible to establish bloodlines of tamer guineas if you have the patience to hand raise them like pets. Mustangs after a few generations of not having their wild instincts triggered are not so reactive. Now if you are more than four hours late in bringing them their feed you are still likely to find them grazing on your front lawn when you come home, but the more extreme reactive responses diminish. I currently have a couple of Olive Eggers that hatched under duress. Out of 150 eggs only three hatched because of a power failure. They are very nervous and skittish which is very different from the others that are from a different hatch. I believe it was because of the conditions which they hatched that they believe the world is out to get them. I even named the pullet Chicken Little for the way she is always sure the "sky is falling".

Has anyone else noticed behavior like that from survivors of a distressed hatch?

 

[chrissyr]

Thank you chrissyr

He was the reason I came on BYC. I bought him as a "Bantam Americana" from a Hatchery - and he was nothing like what I expected. I wanted to know what he was - and what that color was. I find it beautiful too.

I never did find out what he was - he is probably a cross/mix of some kind. Still a handsome boy! The color is closest to some of the Red Pyles, with lacing and blacktail. Just very unusual.

You are welcome ChickNmamma. Wow, from a hatchery- I never would have guessed. He is truly gorgeous and very flashy!! Love him

 

[faykokoWV]

just had someone message me looking for chicks in CA - any of you from out that way??

 

[DMRippy]

I thought I had lost my lavender roo. I found him hanging by his leg. he had string wrapped around his spurs and leg.....then he managed to get it wrapped around his roaring pole so when he got down.... his leg didn't go with him. he hung there all day. poor guy. anyway he was walking pretty well today yeah!

 

[faykokoWV]

I thought I had lost my lavender roo. I found him hanging by his leg. he had string wrapped around his spurs and leg.....then he managed to get it wrapped around his roaring pole so when he got down.... his leg didn't go with him. he hung there all day. poor guy. anyway he was walking pretty well today yeah!

oh no! I hope he has a full recovery. I had a tom turkey get a string wrapped around his neck. Its was a fine string so I didn't notice it at first, just noticed he was standing in the same spot for an hour before I investigated further. He survived and did ok, but I think there was some brain damage as he had trouble walking after that. He made it for two months, then he passed yesterday. Fingers crossed your roo is OK