Andi's Chicken Journal

[andi_freeze]

Hello!

I'm Andi, this is my third year keeping chickens, and today I just got the chicks for my first breeding project

The first time I got chicks (my current flock) I went to a local chicken keeper and just got a variety -- no real focus. But since then I have dug deeper into chicken breeds, and genetics and thought about what my Ideal Chicken would be... I love a cute but fancy bird that is friendly! I want my chickens to be primarily pets, secondarily decoration, and a relatively distant third to be egg producers.

So after looking through many many lists of chicken breeds, and spending a lot of time lurking on this forum, I eventually decided that Barnevelders are almost perfect -- they are gorgeous, and I love a big round soft chicken... The classic black double laced gold barnevelder is one of my favorite patterns. The only thing holding me back from just getting all Barnevelders is that I really, really love a long tailed rooster.

But then I thought - maybe I could work with that.

So! I decided that some day I would try to cross a Barnevelder with a Phoenix, aiming for a double laced gold(or golden, or lemon, or buff) bird with the various long feather genes that give Phoenix Roos their beautiful tails.... And ideally more of the barnevelder body shape, and a nice friendly attitude.

And today is the day! Or rather, today is the day at least a year or two before the day I actually start crossing anything, because today my batch of 3 barnevelder female chicks and 5 phoenix SR chicks arrived

I am planning on using this forum post to keep track of my progress, in raising these chicks up and also what will probably be a 10ish year breeding project hahaha

 

[Debbie292d]

Congrats!!

I hear you too as I just made a page here a week or so ago as I was getting inundated with keeping track of my breeding/hatching projects. It's more fun too if folks pop in now and then to see!

 

[andi_freeze]

If I understand the genetics right, to get the feather pattern I'm after I need: e^b/e^b,
Pg/Pg, Ml/Ml, and NOT Co/Co -- which is to say, I need the 'brown' base on the e locus, the 'pattern gene' so the feathers will have markings in the first place, one of a handful of possible melanizing genes to make it so the markings thicken up and move to the outside of the feather, and I need to NOT have the columbian primary pattern because that will make them single laced instead of double....
And then for the tails it's a whole complicated thing that as far as I can tell is not super well understood, but most likely there are a LOT of all sorts of interconnected tail growth and density genes for the saddle/sickle/tail feathers

Which means that my plan is to cross a Phoenix roo with a Barnevelder hen, and then cross my G1 roos back to my barnevelders.... I am thinking I'll try to lock the pattern genes in first, because I suspect I won't necessarily be able to tell the quality of the tail feathering gene expression until my cockerals are at least a couple of years old. So I'll breed for the feather pattern and keep a rooster flock of potentially well-tailed birds that I can start crossing back in at like G2 or G3.

I'm really hoping that the tail genes will not be super binary -- ie that partial expression will be distinguishable from no tail genes so I can avoid having to cross back to the phoenixes too much and lose my pattern genes

 

[Debbie292d]

If I understand the genetics right, to get the feather pattern I'm after I need: e^b/e^b,
Pg/Pg, Ml/Ml, and NOT Co/Co -- which is to say, I need the 'brown' base on the e locus, the 'pattern gene' so the feathers will have markings in the first place, one of a handful of possible melanizing genes to make it so the markings thicken up and move to the outside of the feather, and I need to NOT have the columbian primary pattern because that will make them single laced instead of double....
And then for the tails it's a whole complicated thing that as far as I can tell is not super well understood, but most likely there are a LOT of all sorts of interconnected tail growth and density genes for the saddle/sickle/tail feathers

Which means that my plan is to cross a Phoenix roo with a Barnevelder hen, and then cross my G1 roos back to my barnevelders.... I am thinking I'll try to lock the pattern genes in first, because I suspect I won't necessarily be able to tell the quality of the tail feathering gene expression until my cockerals are at least a couple of years old. So I'll breed for the feather pattern and keep a rooster flock of potentially well-tailed birds that I can start crossing back in at like G2 or G3.

I'm really hoping that the tail genes will not be super binary -- ie that partial expression will be distinguishable from no tail genes so I can avoid having to cross back to the phoenixes too much and lose my pattern genes

I have silkies and only do the color genetics as the only thing within that same breed is frizzles, and they either are, or they aren't, and you don't breed two frizzles. After you have that down, it's simple.

Your attempts are way more admirable to create chickens you want to see particular traits and genes in.

 

[Slothinc]

This sounds like a very exciting project! Love all the research you have put in and I’m excited to see how the next few years go!

 

[andi_freeze]

1 week in and the chicks are doing great!
So far I haven't lost any, except for the one that was sadly DOA. It's so impressive how fast they grow - they're already so much bigger then they were day 1!

I might go and get some colored leg bands for them, all of my other chickens look really different from each other so it didn't occur to me how difficult it would be to tell the chicks of the same breed apart, and they're getting to the point of starting to show individual personality - I think it would be good to be able to keep track of who is who

 

[andi_freeze]

Over 2 weeks and I need to upgrade the coop size!

I forgot how quickly chicks grow I have them in a kennel right now but they are definitely getting a bit cooped up. They've already started perching so I added dowels for them earlier then I expected to. I think it was just one of the phoenixes at first who kept jumping up on the waterer, but now they all do it, even if the Barnevelders stick to the lower dowels I added.

I was planning to move them outside once they outgrew the kennel, but that is happening faster then I anticipated (that's my bad) and the weather took a bit of a cold turn... The larger kennel I have for them outside is better insulated then the wire one so I might still give it a shot and just keep a close eye on them... Or maybe try moving them out during the day and bring them back inside at night?

It's averaging mid 40s at night which is a bit low even with a heat lamp :/

 

[Debbie292d]

Over 2 weeks and I need to upgrade the coop size!

I forgot how quickly chicks grow I have them in a kennel right now but they are definitely getting a bit cooped up. They've already started perching so I added dowels for them earlier then I expected to. I think it was just one of the phoenixes at first who kept jumping up on the waterer, but now they all do it, even if the Barnevelders stick to the lower dowels I added.

I was planning to move them outside once they outgrew the kennel, but that is happening faster then I anticipated (that's my bad) and the weather took a bit of a cold turn... The larger kennel I have for them outside is better insulated then the wire one so I might still give it a shot and just keep a close eye on them... Or maybe try moving them out during the day and bring them back inside at night?

It's averaging mid 40s at night which is a bit low even with a heat lamp :/

Yes, I'd give them one more week or so to get more feathers before trying those night temps. At least they'll love you hauling them back in, rather than staying outside where it's cold.

We use a cozy coop radiant heater as at night it still gets lower than that, like 20F last night so I don't leave them out there overnight until they're about 6-8 weeks (silkies).

 

[andi_freeze]

At 4 weeks, and they are getting so big!
I've been noticing it for the last couple of weeks, but one of my barnevelders is a bit different from the other two - she's got much darker feathers, way less striping on each feather. I wonder what that says about their final patterns?

I had assumed they would all be the default double laced pattern, but maybe not! It could also just be individual expression of something or other....

They all perch so often now hahaha - especially the phoenixes.... I am not sure if that is a built in preference, or if it is just that the perches in their chick kennel are a bit too small for the barnies to be super comfy.... Though the barnies definitely also all perch very often

Last time I had chicks I did not provide them with enough perches I think! I had a little ladder you can get for parakeets and such, which did see a lot of use, but I didn't have the long dowel all the way across the kennel.

I have been putting them out in the big kennel every couple of days. I put some stumps and such in it to provide interesting terrain for them, and the chicks seem to like it. They definitely loved the work they found in one of the stumps hahahaha!! I don't leave them out there too long, because I do not have a raident heater for that kennel and I do not trust the heat lamp without supervision... Also we're getting construction done in our backyard which makes it a little awkward to just hang out with the chicks

Inside I have stopped using the heat lamp - there is a heat strip affixed to the bottom of the small kennel, and I keep my room quite warm. I was a little worried at first, but it seems like they really quickly adjusted -- they don't cuddle up too aggressively or anything to indicate they are chilled.

I've been working on their hand-shyness... The phoenixes are definitely way more skittish then the barnies, though there is a fair amount of overlap in individuals - one of the barnies is pretty shy, and a couple of the phoenixes are pretty bold... They are much less interested in treats then my last batch of chicks - I offer them a very small amount of meal worms every couple of days, and they have definitely figured out that they are treats, but even as they get less hand shy they don't seem super excited about them. My first batch of chicks went nuts every time I brought meal worms by, as soon as they realized what they were.

I wonder if the worms I've got now are less good or something? Last time I got a big bag from the local co-op, this time I picked up a small bag at a grocery store's 'pet' section, mostly on a whim... Could just be individual preference though.

 

[andi_freeze]

Going on six weeks now - I put their kennel outside full time a couple of days ago, and that seems to be going alright. Their combs are all pretty pale, which is maybe a bit concerning? I've been making sure they have access to water all of the time but I might put in another waterer in case it is an access issue.

I'm pretty sure I've got 2 roosters - one of which already has notably more tail feathers growth, which is neat. Since the chicks are outside all the time the big chickens have come around to check them out a bit. They've only directly interacted a few times (heavily supervised) and it's been pretty fine every time - Negotiator is mean, and has pecked at a few of the chicks, but nothing damaging so I've been letting them figure the social dynamics out on their own. Galactica is surprisingly chill with the chicks - she's a leghorn and generally really flighty, but apparently she does not see the chicks as any sort of threat at all which is nice.

The barnies feather patterns continue to develop - black edging is visible on the feathers of the two that are lighter, so I'm hopeful they will end up laced and not partridge, but we'll see. Interestingly, the darker one has developed copper coloring in the neck - I kind of dig it, but I'll have to look up the genetics involved, I think that's not a common barnevelder trait?

Probably I'll keep the chicks in their kennel for at least a week or two more. I might move it out to the grass if we have a consistent block of less rainy days. I don't want to put them in the coop quite yet, mostly so I can keep the chicks on their medicated starter feed for a bit longer, start exposing them to the flock's bacteria/parasite dynamic while they are still getting medicated feed to try and prevent shocking their system too bad. Then once I move them over to the coop I'll start mixing the medicated chick starter and the layer mix the flock gets for a bit before tapering down to just the standard flock feed. So, probably around week 8 I'll put them in the coop. I might also switch the flock over to a general flock feed when that happens and increase the amount of oyster shells provided...