This has been an exciting spring for us. Along with all the usual miracles that spring brings, we’ve also added French Pearl Guineas and a pair of Geese to our farm.
The one with the dark beak is a Toulouse and the other is a Pilgrim. I’ll be sharing our experiences here with these new members of the Iron Oak Farm family.
This spring has also added a very interesting egg color to my collection basket. This egg color has been a two year project and spanned two generations of chickens. But I think it’s been well worth the wait!
I posted photos of our olive eggs on the Iron Oak Farm and Community Chickens Facebook page and I was greeted with a lot of interest. So I’m here to share the magic formula!
Olive Eggers (as they’ve been colloquially named) are not really a “breed” of chicken, but rather a cross between a dark egg laying chicken and a green egg laying chicken.
Our deep olive eggs are the result of a French Black Copper Maran hen and an Easter Egger rooster.
Easter Egger Rooster
Last year I paired these two “breeds” off for mating. When I breed chickens there is a waiting period of about 2 weeks to cleanse the hen’s lines of other breeds of rooster that we keep on our farm. Once she is clean of those breeds, I introduce the rooster whose lines I want. I make sure I witness several mates to ensure that the offspring will be his descendents.
Once I knew she was fertile, IĀ collected the dark shelled French Black Copper Maran eggs and placed them in an incubator.
The adorable chicks hatched 21 days later and with them, the hope that they would someday lay olive eggs.
Fast forward a year.
Olive Egger Offspring
The chicks that hatched last spring are now laying, and laying beautiful, dark olive eggs!
Olive Egger Rooster
After posting this on Facebook, I learned from our readers that you can use any breed of dark laying hen, Welsummers and Kuckoo Marans will also work.
Olive Egger Hen
One reader told me that she has a Wyandotte cross with an Easter Egger and she gets a light olive egg from those offspring.
Olive Eggs in the Incubator
I’ve collected an incubators worth of the olive eggs from this second generation. These chicks will be part Olive Egger, part Easter Egger. I’m wondering with the additional gene of the green laying chicken, if the eggs from this third generation will be lighter? greener? Only time will tell. I’ll keep you updated.
Olive Eggers and Black Spanish Turkey Eggs in Incubators
Do you raise Olive Eggers? What shade are your eggs and what mix of breeds are your hens? Share by leaving a comment below, or visit the Community Chickens Facebook Page.
18 Comments
I have a gorgeous olive egger. Her mom was a BCM and her Dad an Ameraucana. She is currently laying olive drab eggs. Her husband is a cream legbar. What color eggs do you suppose her (female) offspring will lay?
I was curious how your OE x EE crosses came out? I tried to find a post but no luck. I have an EE pullet who is laying a GORGEOUS blue egg, and I’m thinking about hatching her eggs from our OE roo. Wondering if a sort of teal is a possible outcome with such a blue layer. Thanks!
Hi Ashleigh! The resulting egg color from that generation was still olive but a bt lighter. More like a sage green. Blue vs green shouldn’t make too much of a difference. A green egg is actually a blue egg with a brown coating formed in the shell process. So once you cross that green or blue egg with a brown layer the “coating” will go green no matter what. But let us know what happens if you try it! Thanks š
I’ve gotten some unique green eggs from my Catskill Homesteader Chickens that are more like a khaki green, toupe & light olive color. They aren’t the traditional Olive Egger cross, but it makes for an interesting egg basket. Plus, they come in a wide variety of feather colors.
Your chickens are absolutely beautiful. Thank you so much for sharing.
What color egg would I get if I crossed a black maran hen with a olive egger Rooster
a darker green I believe or that could be the cross that gives you like nine different colors hopefully this come up but it has the egg chart of the crosses
https://s-media-cache-ak0.pinimg.com/236x/0d/75/a5/0d75a50f1d471bd6edd30b63119ddb05.jpg
The before mentioned email was wrong it should have been baileysbirds_sc@outlook.com
I am expecting green eggs this time around with our EE X with our varied laying hens. I think our EE x partridge Plymouth rock will produce a nice green egg. The Roo is from 2 gen of blue egg layers and the PPR lays a nice dark brown egg ( nowhere near a maran but they’re pretty dark)
I have six very young hens. Four of the six have just started laying fairly regular. I get one double yolk dark brown egg from a Maran, one small dark brown egg, one pinkish egg, one olive egg, and occasionally one light blue egg. I have no idea who is laying what except for the big dark brown egg. They all insist in using the same nest, sometimes two will be sitting in the nest while another one is waiting. Two of the girl are Marans and the other four are Easter eggers. I can’t wait until I can figure out which girl lays which egg.
Will it work with easter egger hens and a Welsummer rooster?
The resulting chicks will still be 1/2 & 1/2, so they could lay the olive colored egg??
I bought my chicks this year with this in mind but decided to go with the Dark gene coming from the rooster so I could be more selective with which color gene was coming from the easter egger?!? I may be way off in my reasoning.
OH! Could you get dark blue!!
I use Biefeilder hens with a Cream Legbar Rooster eggs are a medium dark green and the chicks are sexable at birth with the roosters having a white spot on their head and lighter colored and hens are chipmunk striped just like both parent lines bet you didn’t know there was a sexable greenegger at birth now you know my big secret.
Hi, I have some Wheaton Marans and Easter eggers that I have crossed and the chicks have hatched. With the dark brown and blue eggs I am hoping the get the olive color. I have never tried this before so it’s pretty interesting. So far the chicks have black markings and some have the green feet and some have feathers on their legs.
I also spent about a year and a half getting olive eggs. My rooster is a Cuckoo Marans (females lay dark brown eggs) – my hens are Ameraucana (lay green eggs). Since i also have other hens, i only collected the green eggs. After incubation, hatching, and raising the chicks, all the females from this cross started laying oliveĀ coloredĀ eggs at about six months old.
I have bantam cuckoo maran s and I’ve crossed the cockerel with a cream legbar hen. I’ve had two different coloured chicks hatch. One almost black…one identical to a female legbar chick….what colour were your chicks?
Does it have to be a EE roo over the Marans hen or can it be Marans roo over ee hen?
It can be either way. I left a comment but they haven’t posted it.
I’m not sure. If I had that combination I would have tried it. We just happened to have an EE Roo.