Breeding for Egg Colors?

[RememberTheWay]

Okay- so I understand if I wanted to breed speckled olive eggers I can breed a Crested Cream Legbar to a Welsummer Rooster and get speckled olive eggers on the first generation cross. My question is about the offspring from that cross. If I decide to continue a line of Speckled Olive Eggers would I better off breeding that offspring back to their WS father OR breeding the SOE's to a blue egg father- say a true Ameraucana? What would be the end result for each choice?

Does anyone have pictures of what their eggs turned out like doing similar crosses and back crosses?

Pictured is the egg my WS roos mom lays, just for fun and attention

 

[Amer]

Breeding back to the Welsummer father would produce speckled brown and green eggs. Back to the Ameraucana would produce paler green eggs and blue eggs.
Most ideal for creating Olive Eggers would probably be continuing to just breed Welsummers and Ameraucanas together.

 

[RememberTheWay]

Breeding back to the Welsummer father would produce speckled brown and green eggs. Back to the Ameraucana would produce paler green eggs and blue eggs.
Most ideal for creating Olive Eggers would probably be continuing to just breed Welsummers and Ameraucanas together.

I'm actually using cream legbars and have hatched out several of their offspring which I am currently growing out.

Is it even possible to stabilize a line of speckled olive eggers? Meaning that future generations breed true for the speckled olive eggs?

 

[Amer]

I'm actually using cream legbars and have hatched out several of their offspring which I am currently growing out.

Is it even possible to stabilize a line of speckled olive eggers? Meaning that future generations breed true for the speckled olive eggs?

Yes you can, you just have to test breed them (or genetically test them) to ensure that they are homozygous for the blue egg gene. And hatch from your most speckled eggs.
But ideally this would be done by breeding olive egger to olive egger rather than breeding back to the parents.

 

[RememberTheWay]

Yes you can, you just have to test breed them (or genetically test them) to ensure that they are homozygous for the blue egg gene. And hatch from your most speckled eggs.
But ideally this would be done by breeding olive egger to olive egger rather than breeding back to the parents.

Exactly the information I was looking for. So breeding sibling to sibling? Do you know how long it takes to get them to only breed olive eggers without the chance of browns?

 

[Amer]

Exactly the information I was looking for. So breeding sibling to sibling? Do you know how long it takes to get them to only breed olive eggers without the chance of browns?

@DarJones is breeding blue egg laying Wyandottes, he can probably answer best.

 

[Amer]

He used a company to test for the blue egg gene.

 

[NatJ]

Do you know how long it takes to get them to only breed olive eggers without the chance of browns?

To get them pure for the blue egg gene will take at least two generations (Legbar x Welsummer is one generation, mixes x mixes or mixes x legbar is the second generation.) Some breeding strategies would make it take more than two generations.

In that second generation, you can use DNA testing to identify birds that are pure for the blue egg gene. After that, if you only breed from birds that are pure for the blue egg gene, all chicks will be pure for it too.

If you take a Legbar x Welsummer olive egger, and breed back to a Cream Legbar, about half of chicks should be pure for the blue egg gene, and half will have the blue egg gene but carry the gene for not-blue eggs. But crossing back to the Legbar will give chicks that lay lighter eggs, with fewer or no speckles, as compared with crossing back to Welsummer or crossing the mixed olive eggers with each other.

If you take the Legbar x Welsummer olive eggers and breed them to each other, about one quarter of chicks should be pure for the blue egg gene. One quarter will not have the blue egg gene at all (so they will lay brown eggs), and the other half of the chicks will have one blue egg gene and carry the gene for not-blue eggs. This cross gives you fewer birds that are pure for the blue egg gene (as compared with the backcross to Cream Legbar) but they should have a higher amount of genes for brown and speckling, so the eggs will be more olive and speckled instead of blue and non-speckled.

If you take the Legbar x Welsummer olive eggers and breed back to Welsummer, no chicks will be pure for the blue egg gene. Half will have the blue egg gene while carrying the gene for not-blue eggs, and half will just lay brown eggs because they have no blue egg gene at all. But they should all have more of the genes for darker brown (turns blue/green eggs into olive), and probably more speckling in their eggs as well.

To get true-breeding Olive Eggers that produce speckled eggs, after crossing Legbar x Welsummer, I would probably breed those chicks back to Welsummer for at least one generation, and maybe even take the green-laying pullets and breed them back to Welsummer for another generation. Then I would pick pullets that lay green/olive (as dark and speckled as possible), and use genetic testing to find which of their brothers has one blue egg gene (rather than no blue egg gene.) Breed the pullets to their brother, then test chicks until you find pullets and at least one cockerel with two blue egg genes. Those are the first of your true-breeding olive eggers: pure for the blue egg gene, and probably pure for a bunch of the dark-brown genes as well because of the repeated backcrossing to Welsummer. Breed those Olive Eggers among themselves, always hatching the nicest-colored eggs in each generation, and pretty soon you will have a nice large flock.

Once you have a true-breeding flock, if you are worried about inbreeding, cross one of them to an unrelated Welsummer to get some new blood. Breed the mixed chick to one of your Olive Eggers, use DNA testing to choose the chicks that are pure for the blue egg gene, and add those chicks to your flock. Use Welsummer instead of Cream Legbar because the blue eggshell is controlled by just one gene and there is a test for it. The brown and speckles are controlled by more genes and there is no test, so you want to cross to the breed that is good on those points! (This is assuming that you don't care about feather color or body shape or any other points, just eggshell color. If you care about other details, you will want to consider them when choosing a breed to outcross with.)

If you like the crest of the Cream Legbar, or the autosexing ability, just make sure at least one bird in each generation has the crest and at least one has barring. Once you've got true-breeding olive eggers, you can breed to increase or decrease the number of birds with crests, and you can breed toward an entire autosexing flock with the barring gene.

 

[NatJ]

I forgot to include the company that currently does tests for the blue egg gene in the USA:
https://iqbirdtesting.com/blueegg