Marans Thread - breed discussion & pictures are welcome! - Page 3341

here are my marans.  any thoughts on sex? Approximatley 2-3 weeks old

Spot

BCM #2

BCM #3

Let me start by saying sorry if this is the wrong way to post these remarks/questions.  I have searched through the threads best I can but have not come across the information I seek.  We are new to Marans.  We have started a pen of Silver Birchens and a pen of Splash.  We have also acquired some Blue Birchen eggs and hatched some chicks from them.

We acquired two splash hens and one rooster at a show around College Station Tx a few months ago.  The rooster was second and one of the hens first in the show.  We noticed a spot of red on a wing feather of the rooster and inquired of the breeder.  We were told it did happen but was not the most desirable.  We were under the impression that it was a fairly infrequent occurance but have since come to realize it is quite frequent indeed.  Most of the splash demonstrating some red just looked smudgey or dirty looking. We decided we did not like the occassional red spot or the smudgey look and thought to try and breed the occurance out. That may be a much bigger undertaking than I thought! 

My first thoughts were that some splash birds were derived from blue copper and some from blue birchen.  Thinking birchen covered the copper with silver, I assumed that was the way to get splash birds without red.  Now I read here and there about red leakage?  We have hatched 30-40 splash birds breeding splash to splash and are watching them grow.  We seem to have a number of hens without any red but seem less lucky with the roos.  We have one nearly mature roo that we have not spotted red in as yet but he is nearly all white, very few blue spots.  Does using a nearly white splash produce more nearly white splash?  We do have one very young roo we have high hopes for, he is more blue than most even has a blue hue and as yet we have seen no red.  Is culling for red the correct way to breed splash in order to eliminate the red?  Or do I need to introduce the birchen or blue birchen in order to eliminate the red?

We have now come across some splash roosters that demonstrate a lot of red throughout including red in the hackles.  These birds show enough red that it does not have that dirty look.  Instead it is a red/blue/black splash on white that is very attractive.  I think we have decide to try and propagate this look independent of the clean blue splash birds.  We are wondering what others are doing with their splash marans.  Are you trying to avoid the red or trying to increase it?  Are you breeding both in the same flock?

I also have a question about the chicks we hatched from the blue birchen eggs.  I understand the blue black splash nature of the blue gene.  I was however surprised to see several of the chicks hatch with very copper colored down covering most of their body.  Is that to be expected as well?  If they are not blue birchen what do you think they are?

Thanks for any time any of you take to help me with these burning questions.

Mike

Okay reading about the splash Marans, what is more preferable in breeding, more blue look or more white?  I will have to take pictures of my chicks tonight and see what everyone says.  I need to cull the ones we won't be using for breeding this next year now that they are getting over a month old. 

OOH, my eggs from Wynette are due to pop this weekend hope I get a bunch!

At a month old it's difficult to cull unless for an obvious DQ. Splash will probably never be approved so you should pick what pleases you color wise. Pullets that pass the muster in type should stay until they begin to lay then you pick your breeders. For me I only keep the ones who lay #6 to use for breeding and as you build up your flock you keep raising the bar higher for egg color. I use my splash for creating the best laced blue coppers for showing though I think my splash birds are beautiful.