You made the right choice. I like the hens and the roo in the fourth photo, though I like the color on the third roo. Ameraucana they are not, but nice EEs.
Here are my two flock roos. They are both mutts.
The Salmon Faverolle/EE cross is kept only for his color. He throws tricolors when crossed with RSLs. Beautiful calico babies. But his form is lacking substance in the breast, and is narrow in the hips, same faults as I attribute to your pretty Tate. His babies are not showing that fault in the first generation.
Throws
The other roo is a Light Brahma cross:
This boy throws silver laced and Columbian pattern birds. I LOVE his build. He is, to me, what a large fowl rooster should be without considering color patterns or breed.
He throws:
And out of this genetic quagmire, I get birds that look very much like Ameraucana, very much like RSL but with puffy cheeks, some that look much like pure Light Brahma without single comb, some that look like cochin, and some that are genetically "scrambled eggs" that get culled because all the wrong features are assembled.
It should be a LOT easier to improve a line of purebred stock if you have complementary features in the hens and roos.
While it's easier to change the roo and faster and cheaper to expand the breeding pool that way, I select my birds based on the mother. I am currently only doing this for turkeys, as I have too few EE hens and too many RSL hens to be able to selectively breed. But with the turkeys, I select the best hens in my flock. They need to be large without being disproportionate. The conformation has to fit the APA standard, with legs, head, back angle, breast, keel and shank length, good eye, finely formed head. Color is secondary but must be compatible with the breeding program. The tom has to be a good bird, but his color and vigor are the key factors.
Over a couple of generations I've been able to bring my Narragansetts up to where they ought to be, enough where I was able to get top dollar for breeding pairs. My foundation sire was a Porter's tom, and while his color was perfect and his temperament was great, his conformation was marginal and he was at the small end of the APA standard. Crossing him with the best unrelated hen I could find gave me a nice selection of babies, but a sorting accident on processing day took away my best two hens. So I bought another hen, who contributed size, but none of the other factors. I am raising two of her babies, and if they are girls they will hold over. They will provide me with three turkey varieties thanks to the color genetics.
