The outer two eggs in the top row are white Leghorn eggs. At least in the picture, one can see that they are essentially the same color as the sheet of paper. They are very white in reality. The two middle eggs in the top row are from F1 pullets in our blue egg project. Their sire is Ameraucana and their dams are Leghorns. They are half-sisters and heterozygous for the blue eggshell gene. The eggs in reality are a pretty nice blue - bluish turquois. At least from this picture one can see that there is a significant amount of color present.
The (only) egg in the second row is for comparison purposes and is from our Ameraucana line. It is about as blue an egg as we get from them. In the image one can see that it is a little bit more gray than the blue eggs in the top row and this is a real color difference. The eggs from the F1 pullets are actually more blue than the Ameraucana egg. But, these two F1 eggs are the best we get from the set of F1 pullets so far. Most of the F1 pullets lay an egg that has a fainter color.
The F2 generation are babies now and we have two more incubators full of them which will start hatching Wednesday of this week.
By Anonymous on Monday, November 26, 2001 - 06:53 am:
With freshly recharged batteries in the camera, the picture (below) is better, but there is still too much yellow/brown in the color, which turns the paper and the Leghorn eggs brown and turns the blue eggs green. The point is that there is a significant amount of color in the F1 eggs (Ameraucana x Leghorn, F1 pullets)
Hi Anonymous! I just happened to buy 2 "true" Araucaunas at the regional show in Richmond, VA. They are bantams. The male is very colorful, red and green. He has very large tufts (real tufts, these are actually skin coming from the side of his face with feathers on them.) He also has no tail at all, he's rumpless.
Thank you for your post, HannahH. One might have a female that lays nicely blue eggs, but if she is fertilized by a male that is from a line of brown or green layers, then the progeny will inherit those genes as well.
Hi again Anonymous, I only have 2 Ameraucaunas, a hen from last years hatch, and a pullet from this years. They both lay green eggs. The pullet (Lucy) came from the really nice blue egg, and I kept a cream and red roo (Ivory boy) that came from the same color blue egg. I think they may have the same parents.
Thank you for your post, HannahH. The fatal gene
Thanks for clearing up the fatal gene for me. I'm not sure if my Ameraucauna pullet is a full sister to my cockeral. I got the eggs from the feed store, and at the time she had a few different birds laying blue eggs. The eggs I got were all the same nice pastel shade of blue though. Not green at all. 
By HannahH on Monday, November 26, 2001 - 11:46 pm:
The little pullet I got with him is also rumpless and has one large tuft. She hasn't started laying yet.
The man I got them from has a good reputation and has been raising these birds for many years. They are in great shape (unlike a trio of black Silkies I also bought.)
He also had the son of the rooster I bought, he was a good looking bird too, tufted and rumpless.
What I'd like to do is maybe breed the Araucauna roo to my Americauna hen and pullet to see if I can get blue eggs instead of green eggs from their offspring. My pullet from this years hatch came from a very blue egg, and I really thought she would lay blue eggs, but of course they're green. I should have bought her mother when I had the chance, but just assumed if the bird came from a blue egg it would lay blue eggs. Wrong!
Since I don't really know that much about genetics, I'm very interested in your blue egg project and results. Guess I'll be having my own blue egg project pretty soon. The quest for the elusive blue egg is one of the reasons I got into chickens. (The chickens themselves have kept me in it!!) :-)
By Anonymous on Tuesday, November 27, 2001 - 12:05 pm:
We are already getting a few nicely blue eggs from our blue egg project. Our F2 generation will probably not lay until May 2002. Hopefully, there will be a few F2 pullets who will lay eggs that are even more blue.
Our motivations in the blue egg project are several 1) We have a small egg business and we want eggs that are distinctive ... eggs that our customers can associate with us visually as well as egg-quality-wise, 2) we would like to sell blue-laying pullets at point-of-lay to local people as long as they are not selling eggs to the public in our local area, 3) we plan to sell hatching eggs under the same conditions ...
So ... HannahH, if you're still here when (if) this project is successful, we could certainly make an arrangement to send you some fertile eggs. My understanding is that fertile eggs that go through the mail in well-packed containers usually have a hatch rate of about 30%. So, one has to take that into consideration when planning.
If your Ameraucana hen lays a blue egg ... and if the full sisters of your Araucana male lay blue eggs, then you should get blue eggs from the cross between these two birds.
We have (true) Araucana also. We have two males (clean face - no tufts but rumpless) and a hen (4 or 5 years old, but she has tufts (poor ones) and is rumpless). All of our Araucana come from Terry Reeder's line and are black, large fowl. Our Araucana hen lays an egg that is not really very good as far as color is concerned. Her eggs are a grey color more than blue. Her eggs are largely infertile but I believe we have two chicks from her now and one seems to have tufts. If this chick survives and grows up, and I believe this chick is a male, we will have a male and a female that are both rumpless and tufted. We will continue with the Araucana line with these two.
We have Ameraucana that lay eggs that are much more blue than our Araucana. Frankly, I am not impressed with the color of any show-quality Araucana eggs I have seen. Again and again, I mean no offense to anyone by that statement...it is just my evaluation .... Our best blue layers, outside of our blue egg project, are our Ameraucanas, not our Araucana. But, I would like to make the point that our F1 pullets in our blue egg project are already laying blue eggs that rival our best Ameraucana blue eggs and beat, hands down, our Araucana eggs in color.
Thank you again for your post.
By HannahH on Tuesday, November 27, 2001 - 10:14 pm:
I had thought of breeding Ivory and Lucy together to see if any of their offspring would lay a blue egg.
The Araucaunas I was able to purchase are both bantams, the roo is a really beautiful bird, tufted and rumpless, and the pullet has one tuft and is also rumpless. She hasn't laid yet, so I don't know what color egg she's going to give me.
I've read that Araucaunas are the only chicken that lays a blue egg naturally, and that you must have Araucauna in the background of the Ameraucauna to get the blue eggs from them.
I know the Araucaunas have a fatal gene, (I've read it's the same gene that causes the rumplessness) and 25% of the eggs won't hatch.
From your post you seem to think the mixed birds have a better quality blue to their shell. I wonder how far away from the Araucauna you can get before you loose the egg color.
I have every intention on still being right here come spring, and I would definetly like to see about getting some blue eggs from you. I need to see about getting my "handle" to be blue too (no pun!! ha ha) so my email address will be available. I'll try to do that tonight, when the puter wiz gets home.
Thanks for discussing your project with me, I would love to hear of your results.
By Anonymous on Wednesday, November 28, 2001 - 08:11 am:
that Araucanas have is the ear tuft gene. It is fatal
in the homozygous state (a bird is 'homozygous'
when she has two genes for a given trait), but
non-fatal in the heterozyous state (a bird is
heterozygous when she has one gene for a given
trait). Rumplessness is a dominant gene and has
been associated with decreased hatchability and
increased post-natal mortality. People who are
faint-hearted or easily frustrated perhaps shouldn't
embark on an Araucana breeding program
because of all the problems.... then there is the
situation that every line of Araucana (that I am
aware of, anyway) is very highly inbred.
A point I wanted to make is that a hen might lay
very blue eggs, but if the sire (father) who fertilized
that egg has brown eggshell genes (and there
may be many of them),
then the chick that hatches from that blue egg may
be a green layer. The laying characteristics of
males are judged by their full-sisters. So, if you
have the sisters of the sire, you can tell what genes
he should have.
There are Araucana and Ameraucana breed clubs
(they'll come up quickly if you do a web search on
the breed names) that give information about the
history of the breeds. Breeders have introduced
the blue eggshell gene into a lot of different breeds
and lines now (like we are doing in our blue egg
project). The ancestors of Araucana in the US
came from South America, but, I am not sure if the
blue eggshell mutation began with that strain of
birds or if there were others that had the blue
eggshell gene as well (I don't believe this is well
documented).
I wouldn't go so far as to say that mixed birds in
general have more blue eggshells than Araucana
... just that when the Araucana breeders select
their stock, they are selecting to improve the
cosmetic characteristics of the bird and not the egg
... so a lot of Araucana can have eggshells that are
not really very blue. Also, in our little efforts (we
have only about 300 birds) our best blue eggs
come from our Ameraucana line. in fact, one of our
Ameraucana hens lays such a blue egg, it really is
a shame that the quality of the eggshell is inferior
and we can't use her in the blue egg project. her
eggshells are grainy and structurally weak ... but,
very blue!
By HannahH on Wednesday, November 28, 2001 - 10:00 pm:
Oh how I wish I'd bought the layers of those eggs! Oh well, hindsight is 20/20, as always. Being so curious about the blue egg layers I bought the Araucaunas, mainly because there was no one else at the show with such birds! The man I bought them from told me he'd been breeding them for 50 years. Someone from inside the show with the Dutch Bantams told me he had quality birds, so I just have to assume they are.
Just finished building them a nice little coop for the two of them, hope the pullet starts laying soon. Wouldn't be surprised if she doesn't wait till spring to start though.
Oh, and my few birds don't compare to the 300 you have. I do believe I'm jealous! Just kidding. Do keep up with me and let me know how it's going, if you don't mind! Thanks again!