Hey green eggs people, a question?

[Skinny rooster]

So I have a question for people who are familiar with green egg breeds. A few years ago I bought a beautiful rooster, breathtaking colours. I knew he had a lot of Americana in him but not pure. He was also part bantam and I wanted him to put with my Wyandott bantam hens who lay white eggs. Results were little super layers who gave green and blue eggs. Last year I bred back the father to those daughters. Now the next generation has started laying and I can see the stronger green colour. Here comes the question. I am thinking of breeding these hens to my Wyandott standard rooster since they are already together, the Wyandotts have a very light brown egg. Will I get olive eggs or green eggs or brown or both. How is the green colour carried. All comments welcome, unless you're mean lol, then head first into the manure pile you will go!

[Robbie]

You will still get green or bluish green eggs, or brownish greenish eggs in various shades, but it's unlikely you will get an olive egger. To get olive eggs, you usually need to breed a green or blue egg layer to a very dark brown egg layer (e.g a dark egg laying Marans) and then back cross those f1 chicks to a very dark brown egg layer again.

[kenya]

Probably green or brown egg layers no olive eggers though, remember your rooster supposedly makes a major impact on egg colour so if you want olive eggs you better cross back to an ameraucana rooster to concentrate the blue then go for a darker egg layer such as a Wellsomers or marans to get your olive eggs. I'm not a big fan though of the marans as they are relatively poor egg layers compared to some.

[Skinny rooster]

Oh ok got it, actually that works out fine, I don't want the olive eggs, just green will be fine. Even though the mothers were part bantam, the eggs were huge so people asked to buy them. The next generation however went smaller I assume because of related parents. The Wyandott is not that big so should be able to breed them safely. Plus he will have his own hens and it will be easy to tell the eggs apart.

[windwalkingwolf]

https://scratchcradle.wordpress.com/201 ... gg-colors/

[WLLady]

sounds like your boy carries the blue only, and the girls were brown only, so first gen = green (blue with brown painted over the top). since blue genes and brown genes (and there's more that one gene that is responsible here, so it's not really a cut/dried issue...) are separate loci in the genome (aka, blue is NOT a mutation of brown), breeding back green and blue to dad giving you only green back means that all girls were carrying brown....because dad must be blue/blue. so....these kids will all be blue plus brown (green). since the next breeding you want to do would be brown only (wyandotte) then you will probably get some green (about the same or maybe a touch darker green, but no way olive) and brown eggs back, since the kids aren't going to be homozygotic (sorry for the sciency word) for both blue and green. some will by carrying one blue gene, some will carry both, some will carry one brown and some will carry 2 browns. dad can only carry 2 browns, and no blues...moms can donate blue and brown, blue, or brown...so you will get combo of brown (dad) + blue/brown, blue, brown which give green and brown eggs possible. What you will do as well, is select for the more wyandotte like bird shape and colour probably, because you started with wyandotte girls, then bred back and will be breeding back to wyandotte again, so you will be reinforcing the wyandotte body/colour/size/type.

if you do want olive eggs you could take a nice green layer and go back to a dark welsummer, or better a 5 or darker marans....then you'll get dark brown or dark olive green (depending on mom's passing blue to the kids).

sorry for the sciency word in there, hope that doesn't land me in the pile!

[Killerbunny]

OK so another question Wyandotte boy over pure ameraucana girls would be blue layers??? and then???

[Robbie]

QR_BBPOST OK so another question Wyandotte boy over pure ameraucana girls would be blue layers??? and then???

The females from this cross would lay green eggs. Egg colour is not sex linked, so it doesn't matter which way the cross goes. Of course you can't tell unless test breeding is done what shade of brown the male will pass on, but if he's a "regular " Wyandotte rooster he descends from brown egg laying hens.
The only way to get a true blue egg shade by crossing an ameraucana (that lays blue eggs) with another breed, is to cross it with a white egg layer. For example, a production leghorn. It would not matter if you crossed the leghorn rooster with an ameraucana hen, or if you did the cross the other way, an Ameraucana rooster and a leghorn hen, the female chicks from either of these crosses would lay a blue egg (but probably a light blue). The male chicks would pass on the ability to lay a blue egg to the next generation.
It works the same way if you cross a brown egg layer breed, male or female, with a blue egg layer, male or female- the female chicks would lay a green egg, and the male chicks would pass on the ability to lay a green egg to the next generation.
The ability to pass on blue eggs, and the ability to paint the eggs brown, are separate . So a chicken can pass on the ability (rooster) or (hen) lay white eggs (no blue, no brown paint), brown eggs (paint only), blue eggs (blue, no paint) or both = green eggs (blue eggshell, plus brown paint).
Blue eggs are blue all the way through the shell, brown eggs are only white eggs "painted" brown- the brown is only on the outside of the shell (when you crack open a brown egg, you can see that the inside of the shell is white. If you crack open a green egg, you can see that the inside of the egg is blue.
(PS: There are so-called pink eggs, where the brownish tint goes all the way through the shell ).

[Killerbunny]

Green would be nice.

[SandyM]

I have 2 green egg layers. They are the thickest of shell quality. They eat all the same as the other flock members, but my EE's give one heck of a thick shell.