The Official Forum of the Ameraucana Breeders Club > Ameraucana Marketplace
Silver Standard Description
Guest:
John, I\'m not sure whether I would agree or not that matching saddles and hackles are \"natural\" but it does seem that the Light Brown Leghorns are definitely not that way, and the Silver Leghorn appears to be the silver version, with a clear saddle. The word is that the ABA Silver description for Leghorns was taken from the British approach, and in Britain there is but one Brown Leghorn, with striping in hackle and saddle. Little wonder that the Silver description had similar effects. I believe that the clear saddled Light Brown Leghorn is the ideal attainable pattern after which the Silver (which you may recall started out as Silver Duckwing and was changed) was modeled.
I think the question is whether Ameraucanas (and perhaps their Araucana cousins) should have more appropriately been patterned after what later came into being as the Silver Dutch or Silver Phoenix colors - with male hackle AND saddle striping. Not sure why the Leghorn was chosen as the Silver Ameraucana reference, but it could have been a slip-up.
John, good note on the slight contradiction between the Silver Leghorn LF and Silver Ameraucana pictures. I suspect that in the fast and furious rush to get out the color Standard, Jackey painted the male, the sponsor said \"sure, that looks good\" and in it went, without some critique or back-check to see how it matched the Silver Leghorn text. It is interesting to note that in the Light Brown Leghorn there is mention of \"some\" stippled feathers in the saddle.
If the determination is made that Silver Ameraucanas really don\'t come with clear saddled males, then perhaps a re-orientation of the reference to the Dutch Bantam color for Silver might be desirable. The Phoenix has its own custom Silver description which could be considered as well, although as I mentioned before, it is pretty much the same as the Leghorn.
Sam Brush
John:
Please note that I don\'t show much and am not very familiar with other breeds. Most of what I writing are just the thoughts and observations of a chicken farmer.
The silver Leghorn pattern, with striping on the lower hackle and none on the saddle, reminds me of the same thing I see with wheatens that are supposed to be free of hackle striping but often have it. It looks to me that they had the same problem with the light brown variety (like a wheaten with some striping in the lower hackle) and couldn\'t breed all the striping out so lived with it. I see that Jeffrey, on p. 192 of Bantam Chickens, says \"there is black striping in hackle and saddle of the light brown\".
No, I didn\'t know silver Leghorns started out as duckwing, but I think I can see why they changed it. It sounds like the Leghorn was supposed to be silver duckwing and they changed the description because they had the same problem we have with the wheatens.
As I study it and get more involved with the subject, I would like to see the Ameraucana standard go with striped saddles and hackles regardless of what the others do. If we don\'t go with striping throughout both areas I would rather go with a silver duckwing pattern, than to settle for a few striped hackle feathers that make the birds look like we weren\'t able to breed them properly.
grisaboy:
I just went tromping out to the chicken coop with my flashlight to take a look at saddle feathers. (I almost stepped on a great big frog). The silver male that I think has the best color, has a lot of striping in his saddle.
I like the wording of the silver Dutch bantam. It describes the saddle as \"Same as the hackle, but with less stripping than than hackle.\" (I think maybe it should be striping). But any way that is pretty clear, and pretty obtainable as a breeder. The female still calls for finely stippled gray, free from shafting. ( So I still would have some work to do there.)
I am not an Araucana breeder, but I was kind of hoping that the Araucanas would stick with the silver duckwing color with the clear hackles and saddle. This further distinguishes the Ameraucana and Araucana breeds.
Best Regards
Curtis
Guest:
Hi Sam, and others, i forget to say who I am, this is \"mom, AKA Rita, Sean\'s Mom, But he has chosen the name for his farm, \"McKee\'s Fowl Farm\", so that is shy I signed in with that name here. Sorry for any confusion.
Here is a suggestion, as I am not sure why each breed has a differant disctiption for it\'s own color?? makes no sense to me. Each breed should have distinctions for sure, body type, feather type, skin, eyes etc etc
however shouldnt each color be distinct, and the breeder breed his or her fowl to match a color??
Like when we have a Blue variety, they are all \"blue\"
and A Buff is Buff, and Silver is silver, and Black breasted red is black brested red, etc
I am still kind of new, and Ameraucan breeders are few and far between, so any \"color\" advice has come for others in the mix, thus making an even more confusing problem??
It certainly would make goals easier and less confusing to set and achieve?
Thus you can see why our \"silvers\" are what I call silver..and yep..probably way off then from the standard, as personaly I don\'t like the silver duck-wing look, and have concentrated on darker silvers, which by the way have very little shafting now in the 6th generation, however the males are nearly all black, with very little hackle oand saddle silver, and what they have is deffinately stripped.
I know their will always be some variance in color, as a plymouth rock has a natural barring, to their feathers, and others a natural shafting..but this is one thing that helps them be distinct..if the were all alike, and folks are doing way too much ot it, it requires out breeding to other breeds to bring in trates, that man thinks needs be introduced??
Why not just go with what the breed actualy produces, and discourage out crossing fot \"improvement\"
John:
I know there are a few others members of this forum that breed LF silvers.
What pattern/color do your silver males have on their saddles and how should the Standard read?
Navigation
[0] Message Index
[#] Next page
[*] Previous page
Go to full version