What to look for in a show chicken?

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chickenslave2 said:
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Do the legs have to be yellow?
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Yes, the legs have to be yellow. And the comb has to be a rose comb. And she has to have a certain body structure. And be a certain weight. And be a certain color. And .......

That the whole point! In order to be shown as a Wyandotte bantam, she has to look like a Wyandotte bantam.

The poultry world is totally different than the mammal world (dogs, cats, horses, cows, sheep, goats, etc). The mammal world uses pedigrees, the poultry world uses the Standard.

So in the mammal world, if an animal has a pedigree paper trail of parentage (I think at least 5 generations, but it may be different in different species), it is officially a "purebred." It may not look anything like what it is supposed to look like, but regardless of whether or not it represents the breed well, it is still officially a purebred animal.

In the poultry world, pedigree is irrelevant, and "purebred" is not a term that is used. If a bird looks like what is described in the Standard, then it is considered to be that breed, and can be shown as that breed. If it doesn't look like the Standard description of that breed, then it's not an example of that breed, regardless of what its parents were. When you buy chicks that are the offspring of two Standard bred parents, some of those chicks will probably grow up to look like the Standard, and chances are that some won't (unless the breeder has been breeding for years and has selected out all the "non-Standard" qualities). That's only if you get chicks that are the offspring of two Standard bred parents, two parents that actually look like what they are supposed to look like.

So here's what hatcheries do. They typically obtain a flock of birds from a breeder. Hopefully those birds will all be Standard bred birds, but there's no way to know. Let's assume they are. Then they breed these birds and sell almost every chick that hatches, keeping a few for future breeding. .But unlike the true Standard breeder that waits for these birds to grow up, evaluates each bird, and keeps only the best for future breeding, the hatcheries just breed what they kept. No selection towards the Standard, no pair or trio mating facilities to select the best mates for each individual to create offspring that are even better than their parents. Just a big breeding barn with 20 hens and 5 roosters, or 100 hens and 20 roosters, or 500 hens and 100 roosters, none selected specifically to represent the breed well, all cranking out as many fertile eggs as possible. You'll probably still get a few good looking birds the first few generations of this. However, every year there are more and more birds that are included as hatchery breeders than any Standard bred breeder would have never used in a breeding program. So each generation has more and more poor quality hatchery breeders, until eventually there are very few breeders, or chicks, that look anything like the Standard. Depending on how long the hatchery has bred their line, there may be no birds in their flock that look anything like that breed. But because that flock was once XYZ, they are still selling the chicks as XYZ.

Every local show is a little different. In the one I went to most recently, if a bird was entered as an XYZ, but didn't have the characteristics of an XYZ, the judge simply wrote "hatchery quality" on the bird's cage card and moved on. The birds weren't even judged, because they weren't birds that met the Standard. Once a bird had enough qualities to meet the Standard, then it was judged against others in the show that also met the Standard.
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chickenslave2 said:
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I was told she was a wyandotte hen though, lol.

The question is, what breed/s is she then?
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She is a "hatchery Wyandotte," which means that sometime in previous generations there may have been breeder birds that looked like Wyandottes. However, because selection for breed characteristics is not practiced in hatcheries, the distant offspring of the the original flock obtained by the hatchery no longer has all (or perhaps any) of the Wyandotte characteristics.
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Sydney Acres said:
The poultry world is totally different than the mammal world (dogs, cats, horses, cows, sheep, goats, etc). The mammal world uses pedigrees, the poultry world uses the Standard.

So in the mammal world, if an animal has a pedigree paper trail of parentage (I think at least 5 generations, but it may be different in different species), it is officially a "purebred." It may not look anything like what it is supposed to look like, but regardless of whether or not it represents the breed well, it is still officially a purebred animal.

In the poultry world, pedigree is irrelevant, and "purebred" is not a term that is used. If a bird looks like what is described in the Standard, then it is considered to be that breed, and can be shown as that breed. If it doesn't look like the Standard description of that breed, then it's not an example of that breed, regardless of what its parents were. When you buy chicks that are the offspring of two Standard bred parents, some of those chicks will probably grow up to look like the Standard, and chances are that some won't (unless the breeder has been breeding for years and has selected out all the "non-Standard" qualities). That's only if you get chicks that are the offspring of two Standard bred parents, two parents that actually look like what they are supposed to look like.
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This is actually very helpful to me. I don't intend show chickens but want to breed chickens that look like their breed should

As a purebred dog breeder/exhibitor of 31 years this chicken thing has been confusing. pedigrees are irrelevant? It has been a brain fryer for e. Your post explains much

And stud book integrity means little in the chicken world but visual appearance means all?
 
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Yes, the history of birds has some meaning, but nothing such as a dog or race horse pedigree. The genotype, the genes within are important when breeding and breeder's book may have that information going back several generations. But phenotype, what we see against the breed's detailed standard, is what is judged and all that can be judged.

When working the Wyandottes group, for example, the judge pulls out each bird from the exhibition coop and examines it for structure, feather, opens the wing, examines carefull the bone, the comb, legs, the eye color and the rest. The bird is put back into the cage and the judge makes eye trained observations of the "lines", the top line, the tail angle and width, the breast line and the bottom line.

Judging is also comparative, similar to a dog show ring, where the judge begins to establish an ordering of the top 5 or 6 birds he chooses out of a field of perhaps of 25-30 birds exhibited.

Often, the judge will return the his final two or three choices a second time and make marks (code) on the coop tag and then makes the placements. Best, Reserve, and may # the next three,four or five birds in his ordering. The rest in the field normally get no ranking number as it would be far too time consuming.

If a bird wins best of breed, it may then compete for champion of class and on upward, compete for Ch Large Fowl and finally, Champion of Show. That's how it is done.
 
Fred's Hens said:
Funny thing is that many of the best breeders pedigree breed. We call it spiral line breeding, etc, but the goals are quite similar. LOL
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I think both systems have benefit, and weaknesses. It makes sense that the best poultry breeders would pedigree breed within the Standard bred goals, in the same way that the best mammal breeders breed to their Standard within the pedigree system.
 

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