The Olive-Egger thread!

[algopurple]

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You made me think of silkies when you said that! I HATE that gross thing that grows on their heads. Just looks un-natural.

Ok, back to our regular scheduled program.

 

[Wynette]

Algo, you crack me up!

 

[Happy Chooks]

Yes, I believe he's an F1 olive egger. I just PM'd Mary to be sure, since she hatched him. My understanding from Ruth's breeding is she breeds a Marans rooster with Ameraucana hens.

Well I have both BCM's and Ameraucana's so maybe I'll breed him to both and see what I get. He's the same age as the BCM's and 2 weeks younger than the Ameraucana's. It will be a fun to see what I get. And him mated to my black Ameraucana's will give me 50% blue and 50% black offspring. I wonder if the cross with the BCM's will give a blue olive egger with coppering. That would be pretty.

 

[alicefelldown]

I have 3 chicks (6 wks) from a F1 Olive mom and a BCM dad. Gender is still tricky, but I think I have at least 1 pullet. They hate being held - just like their mother unfortunately.

Mom laid the olive in this pic (with flash) - dad was full sibling to the marans eggs here:

Pics from 2 wks of age. (Updated ones soon - I can't find my USB cable) They have kept a lot of the white tips on their feathers and are so interesting to watch as they grow up.

I also have two chicks from a light mint EE mom x BCM mix, which, quite against my will, are looking and acting like boys. They will need to be re-homed eventually - anyone interested?

 

[Illia]

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Very nice! Always good to see more Olive Eggs on this thread.

Can't wait to see people's F2 and F3 birds start to lay.

 

[Wynette]

Kelly, my Shilo is blue with copper hackle feathering - she's really pretty! I took a pic of her when she was just starting to get the copper hackle feathering in - not sure how well you can see it, it was a bit too dark for pics in that pen:

 

[Happy Chooks]

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Oooooh, she is really pretty! I can see the copper in her hackle feathers.

Okay, maybe I will keep him and try this out. So if I mate an F1 olive egger to a BCM or Ameraucana, would the offspring still be considered F2 olive egger? Or something else?

 

[Wynette]

THat's a good question, Kelly. I don't think the F2 and F2 within olive eggers really mean much of anything, truth be told, since it's a mutt breed. I personally use F1 and F2 so that I know how many breedings to my Marans roo I've done with the girls. To me, and F2 would (should??) indicate that the offspring has been bred back twice to darken egg color (i.e., F1 would be a 1st generation blue, blue-green, or lt. green layer or rooster, F2 would mean THAT offspring was bred back), and that offspring "ought to" lay very dark olive eggs. JMO! What do the rest of you think?

 

[Happy Chooks]

It sounded to me that it should be F2, being crossed back to either BCM or Ameraucana. But hey, what do I know? This is a first for me, breeding chickens.

But I didn't know if it was considered F2 only if you mated an F1 olive egger to another F1 olive egger. So how do you indicate the difference between the two?

As long as I get a variety of egg colors, I'm happy, but I don't want to label it something it's not.

 

[Wynette]

Well, again, with olive eggers, there's really no strict/correct tags for generations since they're mutts. For me, personally, I "label" F2 olive eggers are those that are 2nd generation down the chain in achieving dark, olive-green eggs. Since we are calling them olive eggers, an egg such as the one in my avatar really not qualify as being called olive, since it's just medium green color. So, regardless of what "F" you label them, the goal should be for them to produce dark, olive-green eggs, right? Or else they wouldn't be called "olive eggers." Maybe it's just a good way for you to designate how many generations you've been working on them? Not sure. Come on guy, more opinions on this needed!