- Sep 12, 2012
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A Maran mix, Brahma mix, Cochin mix... he could be anything. One breed could give him the breast markings, and another give him the feathered legs.
And what someone said about EE's earlier is correct. EE's are essentially ANY breed not recognized by the APA (including some varieties of recognized breeds, like splash Ameraucana) that carries the blue egg gene. Blue egg layers combined with brown egg layers actually gives you green eggs, so they DO still have the blue egg gene, and are considered EE's.
Some people like to include PINK egg layers with the EE group, but some purebred light Brahmas will lay pink eggs. So their actual breed is Light Brahma, not EE. And since EE's include mixed breeds, you CAN still have an EE with a single comb, yellow legs, or any combination of traits from other breeds. Take two leghorns, and cross them with ameraucanas. Now take those offspring and cross them with each other. Fifty percent chance that each bird will inherit the blue egg gene, along with the same percentage of chance that they'll develop beards, muffs, yellow legs, green legs, slate legs, yellow beak, dark beak, and on and on. But EACH OF THOSE TRAITS is on a separate location of the DNA sequence, so that leaves a VERY good chance that the traits will overlap. You could have everything from one that looks like a pure leghorn, to one that looks like a pure ameraucana, and ALL VARIETIES in between.
If you remember the old Punnet Squares from school, you might remember that the more differences two animals have, the more possible COMBINATIONS of those traits in the offspring. Beyond two sets of genotypes, I always got confused. But try THIS SITE and you can see some of it in action. At the bottom of each column, is the area for feathered feet, frizzle feathering, comb type, beard, muffs, etc. Select all dominant for the male and all recessive for the female. Then it will show you results. Click "Genotypes M" in the tabs at the top and click "Continue with this male". Then click the tab to the right of that one that says "F". Click "Continue with this female" and when it takes you back to the first screen, click "Calculate".
Look at all of the possible combinations that come up. You'll notice a LOT of the traits overlap, or some of them come up completely by themselves as the only thing they received from one parent, or the other. Blue egg color (while not an option on this list) may be something the chicken receives from the Ameraucana side, but EVERY OTHER AMERAUCANA TRAIT was recessive to the leghorn traits. That means it will end up looking and acting like a leghorn... but laying blue eggs. So just because it doesn't have a rose comb, or slate legs, doesn't mean it won't lay blue eggs.
But, egg color actually IS a dominant trait that just tends to "mix" like human skin colors, and either lighten or darken the egg. That's why we have green eggs. Neither color actually forces the other to be recessive, they simply "mix". So the chances of getting eggs with the blue tint in them somehow, is actually pretty high.
