Marans Thread - breed discussion & pictures are welcome! - Page 3221

Marcy~ Solid yellow is not a good sign and may be a sign of an outcross somewhere in the past genetics of these birds. But will hold off on until photos. Congrats on the chicken condo...sounds cool!

A question away from the chat... :) Very interesting reading.

 

I do have a question - I have a game hen that absolutely insists she needs to brood and quit laying.  So has anyone had any luck hatching marans eggs under a broody hen? I have heard they are tougher to hatch (looking into buying an incubator/hatcher)...

 

Thanks.

I haven't posted on this thread in over three years! WOW did time go or what! When I first posted I said I was hatching my first Marans. And Three years later I am loving them more and more! Thought I would share some photos. My husband thinks they are a boring colored chicken compared to my Wheaton Ameraucanas. But I think they have a beauty all of their own!

 

I love them!  I am fairly new to marans.  I am growing up some of my first chicks.  I have a question... in the picture above this girl's bustle is really fluffy. I think it is just adorable.  I became worried about a month ago that this was vulture hocks when I saw this excess fluff on some young pullets I have.  It's like the thighs just have these extra long fluffy feathers poofing out like a bustle.  Is this how they are supposed to be?  Cuz it is way fluffier than my ameraucanas.  

 

We personally don't use broody hens to hatch but a friend of my put 5 eggs of ours from our Cuckoo Marans pullets under her game hen and as of yesterday 1had hatched and she is waiting to see what is there today. If you can provide a separate spot that your other chickens can't bother the broody while sitting on eggs that would be a good thing. That way the others hens don't try and lay eggs where she is sitting and possible push her off the eggs you want her to hatch. The secure spot could simply be a wire dog crate in the coop so she would have food and water right there or something along those lines.

Welcome to the thread, and ask all the questions you wish! The thread does get moving so from time to time questions do get lost so reask if that happens . Everyone here is super helpful and a lot of us are still leaning!

Good luck with hatching, we use two home made incubators, my DH built one out of a small wine frig and I currently have 17 cuckoo Marans eggs and 1 Ameraucana eggs in there due to hatch March 27th!

Not sure as to which way would work best, you would need to pick chickens that came from or laid darker eggs to help darken up the egg color of the bantams. Remember both hens and roosters contribute to egg color. Not sure who else is working with bantams, hopefully more will give you some ideas. If you have standard Marans too, you might have to try both ways and see what results you get-always picking the smallest birds to work towards the bantam size. Good luck

Well...made it safe and sound back from the sale in Kansas and bought a few birds.....7 of which are black birchen marans pullets with streetsweepers, nice silver color is coming in on the neck collar, eye color is already changing, combs are great....but.....they are wild as march hares... I'm gonna have to double my efforts of attention for this lot. Every time I touch them, they screech like they are getting killed. I asked around and they were from an older couple that was thinning down their stock because its becoming too much for them....so, I'm super excited to see how they do. I will have pics coming, that is if I can get close enough to.  might be a few days. 

 

I also got a Silver Penciled Wyandotte pair...so now I will have a man for my lone girl. I'm pleased with what I got indeed. I missed out on a couple of boxes because the prices were insanely high at some points... for example...a pair of old english game bantams from bill wolf stock went for $175 per bird!!! Crap hatchery RIR young pullets were going for between 25 and 33 bucks. I just couldn't believe it. I lucked out because my boxes came later on once the crowd had blown their wad of money and was able to snatch really, really good deals. It also didn't hurt that the guy reading the box tags to the auctioneer totally butchered everything about the marans box... 

Edited by gilavina - 3/18/12 at 8:00am

That sounds like it was fun!  Hope you enjoy your new birds!
 

 

it was! I think i'll enjoy the birds better when they don't think i'm trying to kill them!