The Olive-Egger thread!

[ronott1]

I couldn't find the image in the "my recent images" tab, but I could link to it from my old post. It also wasn't saved on my IPad (I'm out of storage!), but I just now saved it temporarily in hopes it will work this way:

Looks good!

I store stuff in my drop box folder and can access it from my tablet and computers.

 

[lovenati]

I'm thinking of crossing a maran with a crested cream legbar to get an olive egger...but I'm new to chickens and would really rather just buy an olive egger from a breeder...but it looks like every breeder I check out is sold out for 2015. HELP. any ideas?

 

[chicken pickin]

I'm thinking of crossing a maran with a crested cream legbar to get an olive egger...but I'm new to chickens and would really rather just buy an olive egger from a breeder...but it looks like every breeder I check out is sold out for 2015. HELP. any ideas?

If you already have a Marans and a Cream Legbar, that would be in my opinion your easiest/best option.

If your don't currently have the above breeds, then ordering Olive Egger chicks or hatching eggs works very well also. Olive Eggers are extremely easy to make and very popular right now, there is no reason why you shouldn't easily find eggs, chicks or even started pullets.

If you cross a Cream Legbar hen to a Black Copper or Blue Copper Marans you will get Sexlink Olive Eggers

 

[Manningjw]

Ummm....I don't think so.

I believe that an EE is always less likely to have 2 blue egg shell genes than a pure Ameraucana because it's a cross breed.

EEs aren't always a cross breed. They simply don't fit the breed description of either Ameraucana or Araucana but are supposed to carry the blue egg gene. Like I originally said, it depends on who is doing the selecting. Ameraucana should ALWAYS have 2 copies of blue, just like they should ALWAYS have two copies of bearding gene but often don't(on both counts) which suggests someone didn't keep a good record of their crosses. If you are throwing non-bearded birds or birds that lay white eggs you don't have pure bred stock. Again it's all about who is doing the breeding/selection.

My EE's are certainly cross breeds, and I know that they only have one blue egg gene because I am breeding them to non-blue egg laying birds to increase production. Mine are as much as 4 generations from their original pure stock of Blue Ameraucana cross to White Leghorn but I am maintaining blue egg and green laying birds with my selection process. Each generation I have to make sure that the pea comb genes and blue shells are still linked before I breed them again. Because i know that my original birds the pea comb and blue shell genes remained on the same chromosome, there is a 93% chance each time I breed that they will remain linked. If a bird has a pea comb and no blue egg I will know that the allele for blue shells crossed over to the chromosome lacking pea comb.

 

[Manningjw]

Exactly.

I got 2 EE's last spring, one has a pretty strong blue egg...the other lays green.
Will cover them both with a Welsummer cockerel this year and see what we get.

Edit: sorry I am probably telling you what you already know, but I nerd out over genetics I just love it so I hope you don't mind me rambling! Mendel is my chromeboy (I need to get that shirt)

That's great, at least you know both have a minimum of 1 copy of blue egg shell gene. If you do a cross try to keep track of which hen produced which offspring. If you find in the F1 cross that any birds with pea combs do not carry blue shells(or green considering you are putting Welsummer over it) then you shouldn't breed that bird again because at least one of her pea comb containing chromosomes did not carry the blue gene. Now if you find that you get 100% pea combs and 100% green shells from one hen, you know they are linked and in each successive generation there is a 93% chance they will remain linked.

 

[aart]

Quote: .....and genetics make my brain lock up, so I probably shouldn't speak of it at all.

I hope to keep the eggs separated during incubation/hatching and banded thru point of lay to see what comes out.

Last spring I hatched a fairly dark brown egg(we think from an amberlink) covered by EE cock, luckily offspring was female and she prolifically lays a pretty nice 'olive' egg. She is pea combed(I think) and also covered by the Welsummer cockerel, so will hopefully have some females from that cross to look at too.

Fun to experiment with but am a rank amateur just playing with chickens while they feed themselves and me thru egg sales and harvested cockerels.

 

[jeremy]

Can't wait to have olive eggs again. I'll be breeding Wheaten Marans to Wheaten/Blue Wheaten Ameraucanas this season to produce some olive laying babies.
Wheaties are my favorite.

 

[Manningjw]

Can't wait to have olive eggs again. I'll be breeding Wheaten Marans to Wheaten/Blue Wheaten Ameraucanas this season to produce some olive laying babies.
Wheaties are my favorite.

Good luck! I am planning to add them back to my flock too. I haven't owned wheatens yet. I have a personal affinity towards blue myself! Blue with some red leakage I think looks amazing, kind of like a black sex link but instead of black it's blue.

My only olive egger, and second best egg layer was taken by a racoon a few months back. Fortunately, I had 6 of her fertile eggs in the fridge that I hatched - which I was pretty excited to have been that successful with refrigerated eggs! My next generation should be a bit deeper than this one.

 

[jeremy]

Lovely egg!

I've had Wheaten OEs before & loved them, because of a move & going back to school I had to rehome a lot of my birds... but I'm settled again and want color in my egg basket again.

One of my Wheaten OEs from the past...



Her egg is the one at 6 o' clock in this pic.

 

[bamadude]

Can't wait to have olive eggs again. I'll be breeding Wheaten Marans to Wheaten/Blue Wheaten Ameraucanas this season to produce some olive laying babies.
Wheaties are my favorite.   

our wheaten Marans cockeral is a good looking bird. I was hoping to hatch a pullet too. Oh well.