A Heritage of Perfection: Standard-bred Large Fowl

[Greywolf1962]

I'm starting up the big shuffle.

What is that?

 

[Yellow House Farm]

Combining pens, getting birds into breeding quarters. Monte Bowen refers to it as the great chicken shuffle. It's a pretty accurate description.

 

[Greywolf1962]

Oh, ok.

 

[ocap]

I'm starting up the big shuffle.

I started and finished the shuffle but my deck only had seven, for the initial deal, I might shuffle again after the March hatch, just to see if I can get a wild card.

Still thinking about which male to use

 

[ocap]

I think "Yellow House Farm" was the guy who posted a photo of cages lined up for judging then culling, I have been thinking of doing something similar. Reread some of the posts I saved and found one (might have been from Walt) that said to start with "head, body and tail" not leg color or comb points.
anyone who has opinions chime in, I am learning.
read the SOP for Large Fowl Brahmas again, maybe I will need those cages next fall.

 

[Yellow House Farm]

I think "Yellow House Farm" was the guy who posted a photo of cages lined up for judging then culling, I have been thinking of doing something similar. Reread some of the posts I saved and found one (might have been from Walt) that said to start with "head, body and tail" not leg color or comb points.
anyone who has opinions chime in, I am learning.
read the SOP for Large Fowl Brahmas again, maybe I will need those cages next fall.

That's how we all do it. It's how success is found.

Where to begin depends on what you're working with. Different breeds, and therein, different strains, are able to handle various degrees of selection pressure in accord with where they're currently at.

 

[fowlman01]

I think "Yellow House Farm" was the guy who posted a photo of cages lined up for judging then culling, I have been thinking of doing something similar. Reread some of the posts I saved and found one (might have been from Walt) that said to start with "head, body and tail" not leg color or comb points.
anyone who has opinions chime in, I am learning.
read the SOP for Large Fowl Brahmas again, maybe I will need those cages next fall.

Start with the body first and then the head and tail. The body is the most important part of the bird.

Walt

 

[Fred's Hens]

Put a few up in conditioning cages and look at them at a whole new level. It is enlightening.

 

[Kinmera]

Hi all,

I feel ignorant here, but I'm going to ask this anyways......

I have 2 roosters that I want to pair with 12 hens.

At the moment each rooster is in with 6 girls for winter quarters.

Should I only hatch eggs from 1 pen at a time so that I know which chicks come from which parent stock?

Just to get the incubator going and see if it is working I gathered all the eggs I could in a week and put them in.

I have never used broody chickens for hatching, but I am going to try that this year as well. I am working on a set up to handle that safely.

this spring I will be constructing more breeding tractors - small 4x6 triangular shaped tractors - that I can move daily. At that time I can downsize to groups of 1 rooster and 3 hens.

 

[kimberly35042]

Kinmera -- you can mark the eggs to identify which pen they came from and use a designated hatcher or separate incubator for each pen when they are ready to hatch. Toe punch your chicks as they go to the brooder from the incubator. Easy peasy!