The Ameraucana Thread: Where everything and anything about the breed can be discussed (APA, Non-Stan

[salt and pepper]

This is her egg

It's a very light tan, if this helps. Thank you for the advice! The only problem with getting good birds, is finding sexed pure ameraucanas with out spending an arm and a leg.

 

[Outrun Acres]

This is her egg

It's a very light tan, if this helps. Thank you for the advice! The only problem with getting good birds, is finding sexed pure ameraucanas with out spending an arm and a leg.

It's hard to put a value on something based on dollars and cents. It costs the same amount of money to feed quality show birds vs. substandard birds. If you have to breed many generations of birds to get one with the qualities you desire you will definitely spend much more money than you would have if you started out with good stock. If you want to buy started sexed birds you are going to spend more money upfront regardless of the quality of the bird. The breeder has a certain amount of feed into that bird regardless of show lines and is going to charge you accordingly.

It seems to me the "cheapest" way to go is to spend the money to buy a quality bird you really want. If you buy unsexed chicks you are going to spend at least $40-$60 in feed before you can start to guess at determining the sex of the chicks, plus the initial purchase price and possibly shipping costs. The same thing goes for hatching eggs. Plus you have no idea if any of them are going to be show worthy or how many chicks will hatch and even survive for that matter! So overall I think it would be much cheaper and faster to purchase a started bird that fits the SOP that you would be able to show. I know that started show quality birds can be much harder to find and that is why a lot of people purchase hatching eggs and chicks. Some of us also just enjoy the entire process of hatching and raising our own chicks.

That being said, why not take her to a show? It might be fun to get an educated (Hopefully educated! Sounds like that may be a bit difficult according to tailfeathers account above!) opinion from a judge. It's harder for us to critique your girl solely from a picture. The judge my give you some really good advice as to if you should continue to show and/or breed your bird, or to head in another direction. I would just go into it with a very open mind and not focus on winning a ribbon, but rather on increasing your knowledge and experience with the breed. It all sounds like a fun learning experience to me.

 

[CherokeeFlats]

Good morning. I'm new to the thread. I have Silver Ameraucanas and EEs and Leghorns. I currently have my Silver hens in with my silver male. He has some wheaton in his background so I'll be curious to see what he and the hens produce. They were a birthday present from the husband along with a new incubator

so I'm pretty excited to use it and see what I get.

 

[ChickNmamma]

This is her egg

It's a very light tan, if this helps. Thank you for the advice! The only problem with getting good birds, is finding sexed pure ameraucanas with out spending an arm and a leg.

Well that is the color of egg that I imagine would result from loosing the blue egg gene from a nice blue egg. Its not the Brown I was thinking of, and breeding back to a homozygous for blue egg gene rooster would give you blue eggs again for the first generation of girls. Subsequent generations would throw that color again though and you would have to breed back to that rooster and test all children until you are back to homozygous for blue eggs again. Hopefully the breeder you got the bird from will be doing that if they want to breed for egg color. If they were breeding for the number of eggs maybe not, although I am unsure of the correlation between the brown coating and the egg production.

Its up to you which way you go with this, but it might be interesting to see how she does at a show. If she wins.. then she might be worth playing with the egg color. If not, she is a very pretty bird who lays eatable eggs...

 

[Outrun Acres]

Good morning. I'm new to the thread. I have Silver Ameraucanas and EEs and Leghorns. I currently have my Silver hens in with my silver male. He has some wheaton in his background so I'll be curious to see what he and the hens produce. They were a birthday present from the husband along with a new incubator

so I'm pretty excited to use it and see what I get.

Welcome to the thread! What a nice husband you have. We would love to see pictures of your birds. What type of incubator did he get you?

 

[TW1Kell]

Outrun, I really like your advice, in this post. Show the bird, don't worry about a ribbon (tho placing well is the point and gives your line it's "name/reputation"), and learn from the whole thing.

I have a little bantam Roo that I, as well as my neighbors, think is gorgeous. I'm sure he's a mutt as there is no real way to trace his lineage as he is a "wild bird", but I do intend to carry him to our little show (Tupelo, MS) and put him in it. I just want to see how it all works, and see what they have to say about him. I am told he looks like an OEG, but who knows? I mean, fun and exposure to other "Chicken Folk" is what I'm looking for. Do I expect him to ribbon? Nope. I just want someone to look at him with a more experienced eye, and tell me what they think. Maybe someone will say, "That's a (insert breed here)" , or, "He's a pure mutt, and I don't know what he is!", and I'll have an idea of what he is.

That's what a poultry show is, to me. I realize that many have way more time and money in their birds, and it really means something to them to place in a show. I appluad those who are striving to keep the breeds pure and straight. I just have difficluty with that, in my area, as there are very few pure-bred birds, near me. My Amies would probably be frowned on by Amie breeders, and I have no way of proving what they are, either, as they came from private people with no other claim than they sell chickens from home, flea markets, etc. Very few people enjoy their birds more than I do, and I want purebreds, as well. Some of us just have no feasible means of obtaining these clean-lined birds due to gheographical placement, financial considerations, etc. We just enjoy our birds, and breed true, as far as we can.

 

[salt and pepper]

Thank you for all the advice =) I'm looking up poultry shows right now!

 

[CherokeeFlats]

Welcome to the thread! What a nice husband you have. We would love to see pictures of your birds. What type of incubator did he get you?

Here are 3 of my Silver Hens


Here's another pic of my Silver Hens

Silver Hens again


Silver Roo

He got me a Brinsea Octagon 20 ECO. I cant wait to use it!!

 

[Outrun Acres]

Here are 3 of my Silver Hens


Here's another pic of my Silver Hens

Silver Hens again


Silver Roo

He got me a Brinsea Octagon 20 ECO. I cant wait to use it!!

Wow! Great pictures! That is a perfect example of my dream birthday. Lol! I have always wanted to be surprised with an animal for my birthday. That may sound silly but it was something I always dreamed about as a child, and it still hasn't happened, dangit! I don't know much about silvers but they look beautiful to me.

I have heard lots of wonderful things about the Octagon 20 ECO! I am sure you will have very successful hatches especially if you are hatching out your own eggs.

 

[Outrun Acres]

Outrun, I really like your advice, in this post. Show the bird, don't worry about a ribbon (tho placing well is the point and gives your line it's "name/reputation"), and learn from the whole thing.

I have a little bantam Roo that I, as well as my neighbors, think is gorgeous. I'm sure he's a mutt as there is no real way to trace his lineage as he is a "wild bird", but I do intend to carry him to our little show (Tupelo, MS) and put him in it. I just want to see how it all works, and see what they have to say about him. I am told he looks like an OEG, but who knows? I mean, fun and exposure to other "Chicken Folk" is what I'm looking for. Do I expect him to ribbon? Nope. I just want someone to look at him with a more experienced eye, and tell me what they think. Maybe someone will say, "That's a (insert breed here)" , or, "He's a pure mutt, and I don't know what he is!", and I'll have an idea of what he is.

That's what a poultry show is, to me. I realize that many have way more time and money in their birds, and it really means something to them to place in a show. I appluad those who are striving to keep the breeds pure and straight. I just have difficluty with that, in my area, as there are very few pure-bred birds, near me. My Amies would probably be frowned on by Amie breeders, and I have no way of proving what they are, either, as they came from private people with no other claim than they sell chickens from home, flea markets, etc. Very few people enjoy their birds more than I do, and I want purebreds, as well. Some of us just have no feasible means of obtaining these clean-lined birds due to gheographical placement, financial considerations, etc. We just enjoy our birds, and breed true, as far as we can.

Everything about chickens is fun and enjoyable to me as well. I like the fact that there is always more to learn. I have never taken a bird to a show, but may do so next year. It can be very difficult to find show stock depending on where you live. I luckily have a breeder basically down the road (about an hour drive) that I am going to purchase some hatching eggs from on sunday. I also will be purchasing more hatching eggs from a different line in a month or two. The second set of eggs will have to be shipped so we will see what happens with those. The fact that my incubator is an LG also makes the hatching experience a bit more interesting. I have ranged from 45-86% hatch rates in it with my own eggs, so hopefully all goes well this time around. I think the reason chickens produce so many eggs is because their life-cycle is really quite fragile. So given geographical, financial and "species fragility." It can prove to be quite difficult to get the birds you want. Lol. Thankfully, I live in a poultry "hotbed" and am able to find a variety of breeds fairly close to where we are located.