The Olive-Egger thread!

[mommachick1]

I'm a newbie to Olive Eggers, so please excuse my ignorance in my question I'm about to ask. I hatched an Olive Egger cockerel this Spring, that's 17 weeks old now, and he's just gorgeous. I'm trying to decide if I should keep or sell him since I have so many right now. His Father was a French Black Copper Marans and his Mother was a Wheaten/Blue Wheaten Ameraucana. Here's his pic (at 14 weeks), and we call him "Oliver", original I know. LOL! My question is, I have BBS Silkied Ameraucana girls, regular BBS Silkied Ameraucana girls, BW/Wheaten Ameraucana girls, FBCM girls, and Oliver's sister that looks like a BCM (clean legged) & is an Olive Egger. Should I keep him for breeding? If I have an OE Roo and cross him with the girls I listed above will they produce OE laying chicks, or should I always breed back to a pure Marans or Ameraucana for optimum Olive egg color? So confused...........

 

[jeremy]

You can breed him to any of the above mentioned hens and get varying shades of olive/green egg laying offspring. Breeding him back to Ameraucanas will lighten the egg color from a deeper olive to a lighter olive. Breeding him to a Marans hen could deepen the color of the eggs, depending on how dark of an egg your Marans hen lays.

One word of caution- he has what appears to be a single comb. This could indicate that he is not carrying the gene responsible for blue eggs, so technically he would (in theory) only be giving dark egg genes, the same as a pure Marans rooster would. That said he still can produce olive laying offspring, but you will end up with more single combed offspring which in turn could lead to more offspring that just lay dark colored brown eggs.

There are those who will argue that he could still be carrying the blue egg genes even though he has a single comb, and that very well could be true, however there's also the possibility that he isn't because of his single comb. So if you don't like those odds my advice would be to breed him to your hens this season and then select one of his sons with a pea comb and then continue your breeding with him.

That way you can be almost certain that your new rooster will be passing along both blue and dark brown egg genes to his future offspring.

Just my two cents...

 

[mommachick1]

You can breed him to any of the above mentioned hens and get varying shades of olive/green egg laying offspring. Breeding him back to Ameraucanas will lighten the egg color from a deeper olive to a lighter olive. Breeding him to a Marans hen could deepen the color of the eggs, depending on how dark of an egg your Marans hen lays.

One word of caution- he has what appears to be a single comb. This could indicate that he is not carrying the gene responsible for blue eggs, so technically he would (in theory) only be giving dark egg genes, the same as a pure Marans rooster would. That said he still can produce olive laying offspring, but you will end up with more single combed offspring which in turn could lead to more offspring that just lay dark colored brown eggs.

There are those who will argue that he could still be carrying the blue egg genes even though he has a single comb, and that very well could be true, however there's also the possibility that he isn't because of his single comb. So if you don't like those odds my advice would be to breed him to your hens this season and then select one of his sons with a pea comb and then continue your breeding with him.

That way you can be almost certain that your new rooster will be passing along both blue and dark brown egg genes to his future offspring.

Just my two cents...

Thank you sooo much, for the advice, I wasn't sure if I should keep him or not, and what he would contribute, I know he's handsome and everyone says I should keep him cuz of that reason, but I have limited space/pens to keep a bunch of different breeding groups. I am thinking about keeping a BBS Silkied gene (Black) Ameraucana cockerel as well, and could also breed him with my BBS & BCM (have Blue & Black) pullets for a possible OE, which sounds like it might be a better pairing & also maybe get a Silkied OE? Just thinking out loud....

 

[jeremy]

Thank you sooo much, for the advice, I wasn't sure if I should keep him or not, and what he would contribute, I know he's handsome and everyone says I should keep him cuz of that reason, but I have limited space/pens to keep a bunch of different breeding groups. I am thinking about keeping a BBS Silkied gene (Black) Ameraucana cockerel as well, and could also breed him with my BBS & BCM (have Blue & Black) pullets for a possible OE, which sounds like it might be a better pairing & also maybe get a Silkied OE? Just thinking out loud....

The Silkied Roo X Marans would/could produce olive laying offspring, however none would be visibly silkie feathered... yet.

You would have to then breed those offspring together, the chicks hatched from their eggs would then have the potential to be silkie feathered.

The silkie feathered gene is recessive and requires two copies of the gene to be visually expressed, one passed down from each parent bird.

So in two generations yes you could have olive green egg laying, silkie feathered birds.

 

[Hangtown Farms]

I'm a newbie to Olive Eggers, so please excuse my ignorance in my question I'm about to ask. I hatched an Olive Egger cockerel this Spring, that's 17 weeks old now, and he's just gorgeous. I'm trying to decide if I should keep or sell him since I have so many right now. His Father was a French Black Copper Marans and his Mother was a Wheaten/Blue Wheaten Ameraucana. Here's his pic (at 14 weeks), and we call him "Oliver", original I know. LOL! My question is, I have BBS Silkied Ameraucana girls, regular BBS Silkied Ameraucana girls, BW/Wheaten Ameraucana girls, FBCM girls, and Oliver's sister that looks like a BCM (clean legged) & is an Olive Egger. Should I keep him for breeding? If I have an OE Roo and cross him with the girls I listed above will they produce OE laying chicks, or should I always breed back to a pure Marans or Ameraucana for optimum Olive egg color? So confused...........

If you breed him I would suggest breeding to a pea combed olive egger or ameraucana and using the pea combed offspring. he is a nice looking fellow

 

[Peach2u]

Mr.Friendly here is an OE F1 Splash maran X EE. His off spring lay a mix of greens and med brown. So I know he carries 1 set of blue. When I breed him to the double blue gene girls they are !00% green {many shades} layers. I bred him to OE. Other F1's {blue copper maran x double blue EE's. The result was 75% med/dark olive 25% med brown. I have bred him strait to BCM. The offspring so far have been med/dark brown with speckles. There is a 25% chance of a super dark olive from that mix. But all I have gotten so far is the brown laying hens. I did get a odd split combed roo from it last year. It was in the shape of a V So maybe he was the 25% my luck ;-) I have 5 BCM eggs under broody's right now. So hoping for that 1 OE jackpot!
The point being, this guys comb is not pea. It is tall and lumpy. Yet he is a single blue carrier.
I
It was raining and like all smart chickens he was standing in it!

Spotty Scotty with the V comb. He was a handsome guy. But half the size of my currant rooster. Size matters in a free range yard. He was smaller than most of my hens! He was a Blue copper Maran x EE.

 

[jeremy]

The point being, this guys comb is not pea. It is tall and lumpy. Yet he is a single blue carrier.
I

No it's not a perfect pea comb, but it isn't a perfect single comb either. He has what some refer to as a "modified" pea comb.

So you can still link the fact that the's throwing blue gened offspring to his pea-esque comb.

 

[wescottwomen]

How old do my chicks have to be before you could tell from pics if 1 they are a roo or hen and 2 if they carry the gene?

 

[kacklinkelly]

Not sure about the gene.

Once ours was a few months old and feathered out, there were
some people who questioned her photos until she actually layed an olive egg. She hardly lays any eggs (5 over
the past 3 months) and acts very protective over the flock. Not sure what I have, but a keeper
regardless. Am glad I hung onto her, because I almost got rid of her when some people first told me she
looked like she had sickle (I think that's what they are called) feathers.

 

[wescottwomen]

Kk ty