Looking for gentle, attractive, prolific brown or easter egg layers

[billmac]

We started out with RIR. Prolific, big beautiful eggs. But absolutely savage to each other, and didn't really lay for more than 2 seasons. We got some buff orpingtons. Beautiful, gentle, but rubbish egg layers. Sporadic layers with small eggs.

I'm thinking of Buff Americaunas, or perhaps getting a RIR rooster to mate with my buffs, but with my luck I'd end up with savage chickens that were also rubbish layers.

My wife loves the buffs, so I'm trying to find something that looks as pretty but are better egg layers.

I don't really know a source of buff americaunas.

 

[nicalandia]

Gentle, Attractive and prolific layers just dont mix into one bird...

you can can Attractive and prolific or gentle and attractive but not the three...


the Most prolific brown egg layer is the Hyline Browns... about 330 eggs per year.. but they are not attractive, they can be very tame if you get them used to your handling

 

[LTygress]

I disagree. This is Skeeter, an Ameraucana. He is INCREDIBLY gentle, and obviously attractive. And his momma laid almost every single day for four years. Although he's purebred, it would be easy to cross him to a gentle brown layer for the "easter egger" mix.

 

[nicalandia]

Quote:
Ameraucanas dont have willow Green shanks.. they have Slate blue shansk, and last I check no Silver columbian color has been accepted on the Ameraucana SOP and neither Ameraucana/EE are concidered Prolific layers, they are good layers, just not production type But I do agree he loos very nice to the eye

 

[LTygress]

His legs and beak actually are blue. The lighting in the photo didn't work well on that.

The feather color is indeed off. But so were his parents. I was told they didn't match the standard because of color (which I think is a bit silly), but that they were purebred. And his egg was definitely blue as well, not green. And his mother was definitely a prolific layer!

However, since easter eggers are typically mixed breeds anyway, it shouldn't be difficult to get a gentle, PROLIFIC layer, with good appearance. As a matter of fact, I have crossed Skeeter here with Leghorn hens to work on exactly that - a breed of PROLIFIC colored egg layers. And using him in the breeding program leaves a very good chance that they'll be gentle too.

 

[flgardengirl]

I have some Olive Eggers (Ameraucana x Marans) that are super sweet and great layers. They look kinda like black Ameraucanas (peacomb,beards and muffs) and quite pretty. They lay large green eggs and are way better layers than my Ameraucanas which are really affectionate but not the greatest layers. My EE's are always flighty but the Ameraucanas are not. The Marans are generally pretty friendly so I think the Olive Eggers kinda got the best traits. Olive Eggers can be bred in any color with a little work

I am surprised that you had bad luck with Orpington egg laying. I have Orps in several different colors and they have all always been good layers for me of large light brown eggs. Maybe you just got some bad genes somewhere.

Some other very sweet chickens I had that laid nice big brown eggs were Golden Comets. They aren't the prettiest but not horrid looking. You could do a search and see if you liked their looks.

 

[3riverschick]

I disagree too. My Light Sussex are gentle, attractive, prolific . Good for eggs and meat.
Plus, if you want to breed them, they are eWh based locus. A big plus because their underfluff is white to the skin.
There is no color balancing of the underfluff needed to create correct top color. This color balancing problem is
reserved for eb ( brown) locus based breed like the other Columbian based breeds. The only eWh based
Columbian breed I know of are the Light Sussex, Columbian Marans, and Japanese Bantam.
Best,
Karen
in western PA, USA

 

[nicalandia]

Quote:
you can add Delawares, Columbian Rocks,

 

[3riverschick]

Quote:
Originally Posted by 3riverschick

Columbian breed I know of are the Light Sussex, Columbian Marans, and Japanese Bantam.
Best,
Karen
in western PA, USA
=======================
nicalandia wrote :
you can add Delawares, Columbian Rocks


Yes, except they are eb based. I was just quoting eWh based Columbian breeds.
Best,
Karen

 

[nicalandia]

Quote:

=======================
nicalandia wrote :
you can add Delawares, Columbian Rocks


Yes, except they are eb based. I was just quoting eWh based Columbian breeds.
Best,
Karen

Delawares and Columbian Rocks are not eb, they are wheaten Light Sussex, Delawares and Columbian Rocks all hatch out yellow, you would have a Terrible time telling the difference between them if you didnt own one previously as they would look like a yellow puff of love...LOL