Heritage Large Fowl Thread - Page 1051

I do not  have time to read all you have posted right now as I just got off work and my wife is posting for her web site.

In regards to Buff Wyandottes . There where a lot of good strains forty years ago and today maybe one or two and they may be only worth a 92 to 93 point scored under the old judging  system. If you have a nice buff male with a poor comb and a flat chest that's about a four to five point cut. So you wont see me doing back flips down Wyandotte alley over such a bird. This buff color is not a easy color to breed. Even in Rocks we only have one or two good Buff breeders.

Now about new colors. I bet there is some guy or girl that would like to have a blue laced Wyandotte or Blue Laced Rock excepted into the standard or maybe even a blue laced Cornish large fowl or some off the wall color that is hard as can be to breed and maintain.

Why, there are so many colors of Wyandottes that have gone to the way side and even the poor Rocks. They are just so so birds that would take 100 chicks and five to eight years of work to breed up to have a shot at the white birds in their breed at a show. Yet there are people who contact me who want breeds that are down in the toilet for  being true to breed. You  would have to be a expert with 20 years of breeding under your belt and have 20 years left in your live to breed them up. Then think of the cost. It is not a few hundred dollars. Its Thousands with a capital T. Who has that kind of money. If you are a good breeder and have been around the block a few times you know your limits in skill as a breeder and what you can afford to do such a project. When I crossed Barred Rocks onto my White Rocks I got type that me fall to my knees. But when I figured out how many birds I would have to hatch per year and the years it would take and then the money Thousands of dollars. I through the towel in and scrated the project. I could not afford to do it  with my White Rocks  and my Reds. So I sat down with my pencil and paper and figured it out there was no market for me with R I Red large fowl or Barred Rocks at the time so I decided I could afford to raise 40 large fowl white rocks and produce enough birds to keep me going  and not go backward on what I have invested in the last ten or five teen years.  Even today I can not afford to keep a army of large fowl as I can not afford to feed them  and enjoy the hobby on my income.

So if I wanted to start out to help the cause of endangered large fowl Standard Breed Birds I would try to pick a breed that I could afford to raise and not the prettiest as they are the hardest to breed for color. Rookies dont need to be fooling with such a hard breed. Heck us guys that have been at this for ten or twenty years will have a hard time and we should have a better chance for success. That's why I am against trying to make new colors  of Cornish or Rocks or Wyandottes. So many are in trouble who have been around for 75 years or more and need help that are in the standard right now.

However, there will be one percent who think they want to make a new color for a variety. Heck we have not got the Blue Rocks into the APA standard yet . I dont think many understand how hard it is to breed a blue color its one of the hardest there is. I tip my hat off to those folks who have done well with this color pattern.

Thats all I got to say. You can do what you want and in ten years we will see how you did if you are still in this hobby. Many are Called But few are Chosen. Remember this. bob