I've browsed MPC's website and I thought only Favaucanas were their baby but they have several blue egg and olive egg projects. I think it's a good idea because the Ameraucanas by themselves have so much lacking -- the breed really needs help. I've had 3 pure Ameraucanas from different breeders and my longest lived one only made it to 3 yrs and was a poor layer for how much she ate. Sweet temperament, good flockmate, nice family pet, but delicate health and not much use as a layer after her first year. Even egg sellers start processing their EEs after the first molt because so many of the birds eat more than they're worth in egg returns.
A sturdier, healthier, better blue egg layer or olive egger is a nice step in the right direction. Even Cream Legbars are having difficulty forming a good reputation for blue eggs since breeders seem to be concentrating more on SOP looks with egg production kinda taking a back seat. We gave up on Marans for dark eggs after being disappointed in the color and low production of the one we had and from reading a lot of other reviews I'm not alone in that experience. Wherever dark eggs are coming from it hasn't been the rule in the general Marans populace and too random to rely on the "Marans" name to guarantee even a mildly dark egg like is touted in descriptions of the breed. I don't envy breeders trying to reach these near-impossible standards which I think are set way too high to attain consistently.
Welsummers were considered the "other" dark egg layer but in recent years the output produced so many different shades and spots that now they are advertised as acceptable in all colors and patterns from dark to light to large or small spotted eggs because there is no consistency in dark egg layers. Our Marans would lay a half dark/half light brown egg one day, an all light egg a couple days later, and maybe 3 days later a light or brown egg with irregular speckles/splotches -- never the same egg each time she layed -- you'd think she was 3 different hens from collecting the eggs she layed -- but never did we see the kind of dark egg from her that shows up in photographs. To get a dark egg the eggshell has to move slow enough to absorb enough of the hen's dark pigment to color the eggs before it's layed. To me, a healthy bird is more important than trying to genetically engineer broodiness out of a breed or enhance a bird to lay eggs of abnormal size, color or abnormal frequent production.
I will probably wait a few years to watch the progress on the MPC blue egg projects before I consider investing in another blue egg layer. The project sounds more promising than the iffy chances of getting some random egg color from straight-run EEs. I think MPC is going in the right direction breeding such diversity in their blue eggers but it probably makes some pure Ameraucana or Cream Legbar breeders a little miffed?
