Why so against EE?

[PortageGirl]

Quote:
Totally accurate points here by SpeckledHills!!!! There's really no such thing as a purebred chicken guys! If you could breed two white leghorns together, and they somehow produced a chicken that met the breed standard for a Rhode Island red, you can in total honesty call it a Rhode Island red. What THAT chicken produced would be a total surprise though.

A good breeder would go through much checking, crossing several bloodlines etc, to make sure their chicken's progeny would CONTINUE to breed true, or as true as they can tell. Genetics is not a perfect thing and with chickens it's less about a 'breed' and more about a well defined 'type'.

I think most of the hatcheries try their best to deal with producers of decent fowl of all types. Keep in mind, few actually have the producing flocks on site, they deal with chicken farmers who also try their best, they probably just don't have the time or room to do totally extensive testing, so they go for the best they can. Really, hatcheries provide an extremely valuable service to many, many of us. Back in early days, people did much the same in their own back yards... they couldn't afford to get TOTALLY picky, just did the best they could.

I have 4 EE's/Ameraucana/whatever you want to call thems... pea combs, muffs, one with a beard, others not, pretty colors, slate legs, fierce eyes too, love them all for their funny personalities and attitudes, though mine are the WORST about hiding their eggs as much as they can, I'm constantly watching them to see where they head to in that sneaky 'I've got a secret' way when I let them out of the coop. I live in the woods on a dead end road, they have a lot of choices!

 

[SteveH]

Quote:
I think its partly due to the fact that they are a very young breed [ wasn't it 1984 they gained APA approoval ] and their popularity made them attractive to those wanting to make a buck . The originators had spent many years of effort and continue to breed them to a recognizable standard , only to see others instantly profit by selling crossbred or nonstandard types under the name they chose for their breed , or change the spelling and call the imposters Amer i canas . The dedicated breeders continue to try and improove the breeds and varieties or even standardize a new color ; but have to contend with those that insist anything that may possibly lay a blue or green egg is an Araucana/Americana , or insist that crossing a black Ameraucana with a wheaten Ameraucana [ instantly scratching off their many years of work getting these two varieties to breed true ] still produces Ameraucanas . I respect them for developing the breed and gaining APA recognization ; but actually prefer some traits that would disqualify them according to the SOP . I have no desire to disrespect the breed or dedicated breeders by trying to capitalize on the popularity of the Ameraucana breed they worked so hard to develope .

 

[averytds]

You're probably right. They may be young, but they aren't the only breeders slaving over and investing in their work. The same thing still applies for every other breed out there. If they just took the same road of all the others (and many AM breeders have), meets SOPs=SQ all others=PQ, that would clear up just about everything. Let's face it, that's the real difference between the two. EEs are PQ Ameraucanas. Merely the dedicated breeders culls or if they like what they see, project birds for a new color. Not being disrespectful, just honest.


To be totally honest, while I've seen a cage marked as a DQ "wrong breed" the others were DQ'ed because of color (feathers, legs, eggs) which is as it should be and how it works for every other breed, but I really don't see as much animosity IRL about the subject as I do online.

I swear I've spoken to at least twenty exhibition Ameraucana breeders in the last couple months looking for specific birds for our breeding project. Really nice people. Not a one has said "OMG! You want to do what and call them what?! You can't do that! How dare you disrespect me and all my hard work!

" I got to hear about other ongoing AM breeding projects. Got some suggestions/advice/well wishes for our project. Some expressed interest in acquiring some of our project birds in the future. Had a few that had some things come up in their lives that they had to combine their flocks color wise and stop breeding/showing for awhile. So no they couldn't sell me the SQ birds I was looking for right now, because all their offspring would be EEs aka PQ Ams.

Maybe they're like Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde IRL vs online, but I seriously doubt it. The EE/AM controversy so far seems mostly isolated to online. The more breeders I meet/talk to outside of the interwebs, the more isolated I think the animosity really is.

 

[mandyp]

OK, I have 2 that I know are EE's. The hen lays a light green egg & the roo is her son. Both have slate colored legs & muffs on their ears. I have 2 that I hatched out of pretty blue eggs that were sold to me as purebred Americauna chicks. They are 2 weeks old & already have pronounced ear muffs. What color are the chicks supposed to be?? One of mine is a beautiful solid white with slate legs & the other is black with slate legs.

 

[PoultryPedia]

My understanding is that the following are the most distinguishing traits of Standard-bred Ameraucanas:

* Lay blue eggs -- SIGNIFICANT NOTE: In actual practice, I have found that although SB Ameraucana breeders aim toward blue-egg layers, chickens whose genetics are still being refined and are laying green-blue or olive-green eggs are not disqualified at shows.
* Presence of muffs and beard, and absence of ear tufts.
* Four toes.
* LEG TYPE: Clean-legged/unfeathered
* COLOR OF LEG SHANKS AND TOES: Slate, dark slate or black with (when birds are adults; it's okay for chicks to have different leg colors while growing) with pinkish white (not yellowish) footpads. Also, pinkish white spots on toes are not disqualifications.
* SKIN COLOR: White.
* COLOR OF COMB, FACE, WATTLES AND EARLOBES: Red in males, pale red in females (Non-opaque white permissible in earlobes of females of certain Varieties.).
* EYE COLOR: Reddish bay. Brown is also permissible, but a demerit.
* BEAK COLOR: Shade of horn, or black in specific Varieties.

 

[maryk117]

I have read all the pages of this thread and found the discussion very interesting. This spring my daughter and I wanted to buy some chickens and a friend told us they were selling Easter Eggers at one of the local tack shops. Well I skittered on down there and they had the cutest little chipmunk chicks! The sales person was telling me that they were "americonda" chicks. I tried to inform her that they were most likely Ameraucana chicks and she proceeded to try to tell me otherwise...I wasn't going to argue because I knew what I wanted and what I was getting. Probably unfortunate for the next purchaser of "americondas" LOL! We started out with eight because the friend that told us about it in the first place was not ready to take hers so we took care of them for a while. They were all supposed to be pullets and we ended up with one cockerel. Here are some pictures of what the girls look like:

, , , ,


I have also recently purchased a straight run of Blue Wheaton Ameraucanas, so I do like both!! Let me know if you want me to post those pictures, too.

 

[LeBlackbird]

Quote:
Actually, EEs were derived from Ameraucanas and Araucanas, not the other way around

 

[Jessica Rabbit]

Quote:
Actually, EEs were derived from Ameraucanas and Araucanas, not the other way around

funny, most people don't even realize that Araucanas were called EE as a nickname.......hence the Araucana was the ORIGINAL EE

People get very uptight about the true background of their fowl and if they have learned something that might be flawed they refuse to allow for change to correct that error......oh well.....


even this site states however loosely that EE came first and it was put to a vote to standardize and the future name of the "standard" should me Ameraucana.
http://www.ameraucana.org/history.html

http://www.backyardpoultrymag.com/issues/2/2-3/John_W_Blehm.html

here is yet ANOTHER site that says the same thing about Ameraucanas coming from EE.....
http://www.chickeneggspert.com/breeds/ameraucana/4006.asp


Almost EVERY SINGLE Ameraucana site shows that they were derived from EE and set to a standard.

 

[cubalaya]

the people with standard ameraucanas seem to think that their birds are better than people that have non standard ameraucanas (ee). when you tell them where their birds came from, they dont want to hear the truth. you post a pic of your ameraucana on here and they comment: 'easter egger mutt', 'thats no ameraucana', 'ee'. if glenn drowns of sandhill preservation center can call them nonstandard ameraucanas, i can too. easter egger is a nickname.

ameraucana police????????????