Search results for query: *

In that case, never mind my suggestion :D

Have you had any of the Red Shouldered White Yokohama from McMurray Hatchery? I had some pullets a few years back, and liked them. Some details about the ones I had: I bought them in midsummer. They began laying earlier in the fall than the other rare breeds in the order, laid nicely through...

I trust the weight, but not visuals, when I'm considering birds meant for meat. (But I don't always bother with a scale-- just picking up one bird after the other can tell a lot about how heavy they are.) Long legs and fluffy feathers make a bird "bigger" without providing anything more that I...

I assume that size comparison is based on weight? (I've been fooled a few times by fluffy chickens that looked big, and close-feathered chickens that looked small.)

I've considered buying similar prefab coops myself, with the expectation that they only hold a few chickens and don't last for very many years-- so I've been watching yours to see how well they last, and what goes wrong with them. Thank you for sharing the information! I just wish it was better...

What colors?

If it's just an issue of all the males jumping on the first ones before you can carry the rest, you might be able to move them at night. That way they are all there at once in the morning. I'm not clear on how many females are already in the pen, or how many you want to add, but I can certainly...

Yes, I was able to submit multiple marked samples and get back labeled results for each bird. I used https://iqbirdtesting.com/ They had a form to send with each sample. For each bird, I printed the form and attached a plastic bag with the plucked feathers from that bird. I forget whether I...

That's what I would probably do, but you can process the males a lot sooner if you are willing to have them be small (maybe pretend that they are furry quail.) Or if you've got some animal that eats raw meat (snake, dog, etc) you could use the males that way.

Have you already ruled out the hatcheries that sell unsexed chicks? You might be able to buy 3 times as many as you need, in the colors you want, and then get DNA sexing if you are impatient. (Basically, do your own version of what csp does, but the birds would be growing on your own property...

The blue gene does not change where black would appear on the chicken. It just changes all the black to blue. Or two copies of the blue gene will change all the black to splash. The blue may not be an even shade all over the chicken (example: Blue Sexlinks with darker necks and lighter bodies).

Obvious partial-answer: half the chicks with black, and the other half with blue. But it sounds like you're more interested in the genes that make white crest/dark bird or dark crest/white bird, and I don't know about those. I found an old thread that talks a little bit about Polish crest...

From what I know of genetics, yes that should work. Depending on how much black they have in the chick down, you might be able to sex the chicks at hatch, or you might have to wait until they grow some feathers to see the color.

It still sounds normal to me, but I'm not the one who saw it in person :idunno Some cockerels & roosters just have really big ones.

Oh, I remember them now! Yes, the combs looked a bit like stars.

What's a Starcomb? I don't remember hearing of it before (or did autocorrect do something odd?) One was clearly a lot more mature than the other one. We all know that pullets can start laying at different ages, even when they are closely related-- I think this is the male version of the same...

That's definitely interesting. Can you recognize the eggs that hatch defective chicks? Or would you have to use food coloring (or a separate pen) to know which hen laid which eggs, then hatch them and check the chicks for defects?

Oh, I was assuming White Laced Red mother and something else father. With the father being White Laced Red, I'm not sure which hen to guess is the mother-- could probably be WLR or Dark. She's pretty anyway, although quite heavy on the white and not much red.

What roosters?

Those patches dos seem a bit odd, but it looks to me like she could well have come from the White Laced Red hen.