I love my chickens, they are truly the best I have ever had or seen.

Alert, fast, bug eating chickens.

The feather patterns are brilliant,

and some are quite striking.

They also lay blue eggs, and will leap up into your lap.

Amongst the blue egg laying chickens there are three types;

Araucanas, which have a lack of tail feathers.  They also have ear tufts, this trait is a deadly gene that kills 20 percent of them if it is from one parent or if it is from both parents, all of them.  Whatever other qualities they have, I think I would rather not select for a deadly gene so I don’t really want to raise araucanas.

Ameraucanas,  have tail feathers, neck muffs, like you can see in the picture above, and beards like you can see below.  This bearded girl does not have tail feathers though.

And last, Easter Egg Chickens.  These are the non purebred mongrels that still make blue eggs.  Aparently a lot of breeders raise and sell Easter Egg Chickens, as one or the other of the two recognised breeds, but in fact they are mongrels.

Not all of these chickens have all the traits, so in fact, I have Ameraucana/Easter Egg Chickens.  Not a clearly distinct breed.  Nor will I ever have a true flock of Ameraucana’s, I plan to breed for temperament, health and egg laying.  After that comes pretty.    Inbreeding them to fit a precise physical form is not even on the list.

Bob