Prairie Bluebells

Prairie Bluebell eggs Prairie Bluebell Egger — Prairie Bluebell hens typically carry one blue and one recessive white egg gene and lay a beautiful, bright powder blue egg.

Prairie Bluebells are a hybrid first offered by Hoover’s Hatchery in January 2019. Their beautiful mix of feather colors and guaranteed blue eggs made them wildly popular. Our first chick order arrived in June 2019 and have proven to be absolutely wonderful birds.

Prairie Bluebell chick Prairie Bluebell Egger — Cricket, one of our hens, as a chick. She lays a gorgeous blue egg and feathered out blue (gray).

Hoover’s Hatchery used true, purebred Araucana roosters, each carrying two copies of the blue egg gene, over white egg laying Leghorn hens to create the Prairie Bluebell hybrid. The resulting offspring carried one dominant blue egg gene and one recessive white egg gene, which results in them laying a stunning powder blue egg. All have pea combs and many have fluffy faces. Clean faced offspring can occur if the hen or roo is clean faced.

Guaranteed Blue Egg Layers

You can use homozygous (2 blue egg gene carrying) roosters over F1 Prairie Bluebell hens to create offspring that are guaranteed to lay a blue egg. 50% of offspring will carry 2 blue egg genes. The other 50% of offspring that carry 1 blue and 1 white egg gene can be crossed (bred together) to create rare white laying Easter Eggers in 25% (or less) of their offspring.

Prairie Bluebell Egger eggs — Prairie Bluebell eggs photographed in daylight in a white egg carton.

A Prairie Bluebell rooster carrying 1 blue and 1 white egg gene can breed the following six egg colors when crossed with various hens: blue, green, peach, brown, olive and white. You truly cannot lose with these birds in your flock!

Prairie Bluebell Egger — This chart gives a simplified visual example of what a Prairie Bluebell roo can produce. All offspring would be considered Easter Eggers except for offspring from dark brown laying hens, which would be expected to produce olive eggers.

Prairie Bluebells are not actually a breed, they are a hybrid. A hybrid is when two purebred chickens are deliberately crossed to produce a certain type of offspring. Hybrids will not breed true; the won’t create more birds just like themselves. Instead you’ll get multiple possible outcomes for both feather colors and/or egg colors. (This is why crossing two Prairie Bluebells can produce white laying Easter Eggers!)

There’s No Such Thing as “Purebred” Prairie Bluebells. Yet.

Even though F2 generations and beyond of Prairie Bluebells are being bred, none of them are considered “purebred” because the Prairie Bluebell hybrid is not yet considered a breed. Crossing two F1 Prairie Bluebells results in 25% of the offspring being white egg layers, with no blue egg genes at all, which is not a Prairie Bluebell but an Easter Egger.

Use roosters carrying 2 blue egg genes to guarantee you end up with blue laying Prairie Bluebell hens no matter what, just like you would be able to order from the hatchery.