Bluest Eggs

[Guest]

Which Ameraucana generally lays the bluest egg, LF or bantam? My thought is that bantams do since they are more closely related to the South American birds that the breed was developed from. Any thoughts on this? How did the LF variety come about? Were other breeds involved to get the larger size?

Jeff

[bantamhill]

Jeff,

I hate to be vague, but it totally depends on the Ameraucana strain of large fowl or bantam. I have had both that laid beautiful eggs and those that laid very ugly eggs. The most important piece to keep in mind is that the egg shell genetics of the cock bird are as important as those of the hen. Around here the bantam white, silver and black are currently the best and the large fowl wheaten and silver are the best.

Michael

[John]

Jeff,

Bantams and large fowl make up two breeds of Ameraucana, with several color/pattern varieties in each breed.  All were bred up using Easter Eggers to get the egg color and other breeds to get the other characteristics.
As Michael said egg color depends more on the varieties than the breeds.  
Check out the History page on the website.  There is a link near the bottom of the page to the Home page.  Also check out some of the old topics using the \"search\" option, for background info.  Here is one from a while back: http://ameraucana.org/abcforum/index.php?a=topic&t=78

[Guest]

Thanks Michael and John. I enjoyed the link to the old posts on this topic. So is the only way to get bluer eggs without any green tint to them is to choose and hatch the bluest eggs over several generations? I\'ve read that mixing in white egg layer genes into the mix creates a washed out blue color. Has anyone tried this to confirm? I\'m glad that people have done most of the breeding work so that no more outcrosses are necessary to get good birds in the recognized varieties. I would like to see some other varieties perfected though. Is anyone close to being able to present them to the APA for recognition?

[bryngyld]

Close is pretty darn relative.  Every proposed variety is closer today than it was yesterday.  ^_^  Bascially if you just pick your favorite variety, there will be someone working on it and would love to have your join up.  I would love to have someone work on blue laced red with me.  I cringe when I think all my eggs are in the same basket, so to speak.  Black and blue gold are further along, but still needing much work!  The barred variety has been discussed much...

[John]

choose and hatch the bluest eggs over several generations?

I think that is best.  Outcrossing may also be helpful using another Ameraucana variety with bluer eggs.  The breeder has to do his homework first to select the variety(s) will be best to cross with the variety that needs to be improved.
I wouldn\'t suggest crossbreeding...crossing with another breed that lays white eggs.  It could be a real project to get back to where you started.
The variety that could be recognized now is splash, in LF and bantam, with enough support.  I\'ll push to have lavender bantams and maybe LF recognized in a few years.  The bantams are looking great and are in the hands of several breeders that I know of.
http://ameraucana.org/abcforum/index.php?a=topic&t=138
http://ameraucana.org/abcforum/index.php?a=topic&t=752