A Barbezieux Thread.

[cutipatooti]

Barbezieux Chick Feeding Advice?
I am very new to the BYC community...I have lurked for years but this is my first post.
I received my first 12 Barbezieux chicks yesterday and I need advice on the best way to feed them.  
My questions are:
What percentage of protein should the starter feed be?
How long do they stay on starter?
Is there a benefit to fermenting the starter crumbles?
Medicated or non-medicated?  They are in a brooder in the garage so it will be awhile before they touch the ground.  
Thank you so much...I am so excited and just want to do the best for my babies.

Personally I try to get starter non medicated at 20% protein or greater. I do ferment the feed but not always.

 

[StephWind]

I have! Beautiful, healthy birds!!!

 

[indyNile]

I acquired a my "special" chicken Barb because she was not doing well with her flock. She was nearly 6 months when we she came home with us. She appeared underweight and her comb is very pale and dry. We wormed/vitamined/electrolyted/probiotics etc. and feed her high quality chick starter. She doesn't roost unless we put her up. She cant walk on slippery floors at all, just lays down. She seems to step on her own feet ALL the time. I wonder if she is a little knock-kneed? She MIGHT be deaf? or just reallly not care when we drive the riding lawn mower right by her. She goes into a kind of panic then ptsd catatonic state when put with other chickens and they DO NOT LIKE IT. So we have had her 2 months now and she lives alone in our BIG brooder in the garage. She is maybe 8 months now and comb is still pink, no eggs to be seen.
Oddly, she LOVES loves loves us humans. Any humans. Toddlers, neighbors, anyone. She loves outdoors time and scratches and pecks around while never straying more than 10 feet from us. If she gets bored, she just lays down and naps right where I am. She will follow us anywhere. She enjoys "visiting" the other chickens as long as they can't touch her. She even sits quietly in the passenger seat on car rides. She is so sweet we really love her, but man she is different. I recently purchased a small one-chicken type condo for her to put inside my main run so she can have her private space but maybe still have chicken friends??? Of course we will still take her for walks, but I hate to think of her alone so much.
This is Barb when we first got her, to recently.

 

[MaryZoe]

Dang, this thread seems to have little to no life left in it just as my barbezieux eggs are about to hatch..

It is a drag that not many people seem interested. I love my Barbezieux. I posted above about some hens I decided to get to breed with the Barbezieux. They look exactly like the Barbezieux. The person who sold them to me told me they were Spanish White-Faced chickens, which they are NOT. They may be Minorca, which are indistinguishable from Barbezieux in terms of their phenotype as far as I can tell. In any case, I've been breeding them for a couple months now and their chicks are large and vigorous. I'm so pleased. People who see them LOVE them--the roosters are so elegant. I hatch in small batches, but I have not had a hard time selling the chicks. Of course I don't charge much, at least not yet.

 

[stevekwan]

Barbezieux and breese chicks that just came in from Gold Feather Farms.

 

[CNJ]

mine didn't - in fact, he was very slow to start. I think the absence or presence of mature roos has something to do with it.

I think you are right, they seem to be responding to the neighborhood crowing................

When I heard them crowing this morning I let them out with an older cockerel. I let my older Bresse cockerel chase them around and terrorize them for a few hours. I hoping that he will put them under his wings and establish a new order. This is helping him build up his self confidence. He gets hen pecked all day by the older hens.

 

[Perris]

Did anyone process any hens? My hens look skinny in comparison to the males. They must be around 2 1/2 months old. This breed isn't working out for me. However, I notice that they started eating more, I wonder if they will start to fill in by 4 months.

I haven't processed any (and don't intend to) but they did take a long time to fill out; more like 6 months for the hen, and a year for the cock though he was set back badly by a fox attack.

 

[CNJ]

Amazing, I saw this 2 1/2 month old Barbeziuex cockerel jump on a mature Australorp hen today. I had to do a double take. He is really talented............

Now that I think about it, this cross will improve the egg laying ability of its offspring. That would solve the skinny hen problem, at least they can be decent egg layers.

 

[Perris]

that's a very good point @chickengr - I would second your concern.

 

[Burdi]

Interesting. Is it distinctively better enough to justify the relatively small size at the best time to process a cockerel?
In 2 months or so I will have the same breeds to process as well as a BCM, and a Bielefelder. Will have to have a big family chicken tasting dinner with scorecards or something. LOL, if enough of my loved ones are vaccinated by then. Regardless I will try to post a review of how these 4 dual purpose birds compare.