Were blue eggs unnaturally created?

[nicalandia]

It's a natural occurrence mutation so natural that it as happened at least twice in Chicken History, the Chinese Lushi Breed of Chicken has the same mutation but on a different sector of the Oocyan allele, the mutation is caused by the same retrovirus.

 

[lysmandor]

Viruses can transfer DNA between organisms that they infect, and can also cause mutations - some chickens acquired the gene for blue eggs at some point via virus infection (natural virus infection, not human caused). Then we bred together chickens with those genes

This happens all the time! It provides a lot of the random mutations that make individuals different, and the random mutations that are important for evolution/changes over time.

 

[Ruthster55]

A lot of blue eggers have origin in South America.

People like blue (or green) eggs and let those chickens breed. Blue eggs are seen as farm eggs, as different from store eggs. People sometimes ask for blue eggs rather than the “ordinary” brown or white eggs.

(Brown eggs are more popular in commerce in South America than white eggs. Blue eggs are rare in commerce because ISA Browns or Production Reds lay a lot of large brown eggs and rarely go broody).

If ppl knew that blue eggs are related to a retrovirus, they would probably be grossed out!

No, there aren’t molecular bio labs in backyards or patios.....

 

[nicalandia]

A lot of blue eggers have origin in South America.....

More like ALL known European and American blue eggers with the Oocyan mutation can be trace back their lineage back to South America, that is a proven fact.

https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC3747184/

The Chinese allelic mutation is not found on any known European/American blue eggers

 

[Ruthster55]

More like ALL known European and American blue eggers with the Oocyan mutation can be trace back their lineage back to South America, that is a proven fact.

https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC3747184/

The Chinese allelic mutation is not found on any known European/American blue eggers

Really interesting! The influence of the South American blue eggers extends not only to backyards far from Chile in South America but also to Central and North America and Europe! I guess the conclusion was correct that people like blue eggs even if they don’t want to think about a retrovirus!

(no, I’m not down on all the genomics, but I got the general conclusion).

Disclaimer: I have blue, light brown, and slightly green eggs in a mixed flock located in northern South America. A couple of hens in breeding coops lay white eggs.