Lavender Orpington Thread

[WVduckchick]

I have a Lavendar Orpington Roo that hatched the end of May. I gave him to a woman who was looking for a rooster to protect her small flock of hens. He was the biggest roo of any breed of my spring chickens (appx 150 chickens). The woman actually just recently brought him back because he doesn't crow and doesn't mount the ladies. I reintroduced him to my flock and the smaller LO roo that hatched out with him is now mean to the bigger one. His feathers are all in and he's clearly a roo. I am bringing him from my farm to my city coop since I have a number of my favorite hens here and I thought if he does mount the ladies without crowing I can at least hatch out babies of my favorite ladies. So very odd that he doesn't crow though. I will post a pic tomorrow of him.

Mine are huge too! Gentle giants, really. But they do their job with the ladies!

While looking through some pics, I happened to find this one. Isn't he cute?!
View attachment 1201661

This was "Mr Nice Guy" who I was hoping to breed next spring. (before he died from an extreme heat wave in Sept.) Sadly, there are no male chicks looking this good in my current batch. It doesn't help that can only identify 1 definite male.

Adorable pic! Sorry you lost him. Any idea how old he was at that pic?

This one?

For 18 weeks, I'd guess female based on the body shape. Males tend to get "leggy" & their stance looks different. This one has wattles, but some of my females get pink wattles just like this. The males should have more red & much taller comb by 15 weeks. (Not to mention the lack of saddle feathers.)

My laced orp who hatched June 17th just started crowing. (Well technically he crowed just once 4 days ago.) He doesn't mount either, but he's definitely male. I think my other roo handles all the crowing & breeding, so the new guy (Mr Wonderful) is taking his own sweet time to grow up.
View attachment 1201666

Yep, 19 weeks today. I still feel he is a he, but it's never taken me this long to know for sure. But since the only other one that hatched with him died, he's been kind of a loner. Running with my bantam cochin boys. I do have a blue Marans hen that he hangs out with too. I've been watching to see if he will try to mate with her. But he is very shy.

pics from yesterday. All depends on the angle.

 

[Faraday40]

Any idea how old he was at that pic?

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He was 20 weeks old in the pic. (He was not as big as his bro, but the temperament was exactly what I wanted.)

Your "boy" looks like a girl to me, but time will tell. Perhaps a gender neutral name for that one! LOL Here's more 20 wk old pics taken on the same day.
The boys get all leggy & awkward-looking before they fill out. By 20 weeks, the boys usually show some pointed saddle feathers. (If you enlarge the 2nd pic, you'll see some.)

.

Here he was at 5 mo. - which is about when he started crowing.

 

[WVduckchick]

He was 20 weeks old in the pic. (He was not as big as his bro, but the temperament was exactly what I wanted.)

Your "boy" looks like a girl to me, but time will tell. Perhaps a gender neutral name for that one! LOL Here's more 20 wk old pics taken on the same day.
The boys get all leggy & awkward-looking before they fill out. By 20 weeks, the boys usually show some pointed saddle feathers. (If you enlarge the 2nd pic, you'll see some.)

View attachment 1201780 . View attachment 1201779

Here he was at 5 mo. - which is about when he started crowing.
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Excellent pics, as always. He was stunning. I know mine should have much darker comb/wattles by now, if male, so i sure hope you are right. The tail feathers are what bother me most. And i predicted male at hatch! Lol
I already have a wonderful boy now at the farm, so this one will probably stay home, no matter what gender turns out to be.

 

[Faraday40]

Here are some 11 wk old lav orps. We should KNOW the gender by now.... (Usually by 6 weeks I can confirm the gender guesses that I had made at 3-4 weeks!)

Please tell me if you agree with my guesses:

Male (about the only one I feel confident about) Sadly poor quality, so he'll be off to freezer camp.

Male? (late bloomer) He has a little more height to his comb than the females, and his wattles look like they're dropping.

Female ?

Female?

Here they are all together. 2 Males on left / 2 females on right

The 5th chick has always acted/walked/sounded female. The comb is tiny but the wattles are big. This one is Jewel's chick. Jewel also had very large male-looking wattles & a tiny female-looking comb. So, there's still a good chance this one is a female.

 

[Faraday40]

BTW- Moose is the dad of all these chicks. There's a reason why they all have big wattles. LOL

Jewel came from a completely unrelated line. At 4-5 weeks, she had pink wattles!!! I thought she was male until 8 weeks old

 

[WVduckchick]

@Faraday40 I'm going to have to agree with your guesses. I looked at the pics on my phone the other evening, and meant to go back on the big screen. I've never seen the yellow leakage like that first chick. How does that happen?

Moose does have some massive wattles! LOL

And my mystery one is now 20 weeks, so I'm going to have to assume female, even though I thought male at hatch. I saw some of my bantam cochin juvie cockerels tackle her the other day, but they never were able to "mate" her. I ran them off. Comb and wattles are pinking up, both are still small, I see no hackle or saddle feathers, no crowing, etc. So hopefully I am pleasantly wrong and I have a girl.

 

[Faraday40]

@Faraday40 I'm going to have to agree with your guesses. I looked at the pics on my phone the other evening, and meant to go back on the big screen. I've never seen the yellow leakage like that first chick. How does that happen?

Moose does have some massive wattles! LOL

And my mystery one is now 20 weeks, so I'm going to have to assume female, even though I thought male at hatch. I saw some of my bantam cochin juvie cockerels tackle her the other day, but they never were able to "mate" her. I ran them off. Comb and wattles are pinking up, both are still small, I see no hackle or saddle feathers, no crowing, etc. So hopefully I am pleasantly wrong and I have a girl.

Yay, a pullet! Yes, by 20 weeks you should see hackle/saddle feathers if male.

Moose was/is a great boy. His shape, size, & color were impressive! His only flaw was that after he took control of the flock, he kept bullying the former head roo, Mr Dummy-pants (his father). The other roos were fine, but Mr Dummy (named by DD ) is a semi-retired, now pet, rooster. Moose went off to a rural farm & now has 18 hens all to himself. I miss him (especially now after we lost my fav silkie to a hawk.)


We have Mr Wonderful (above, will be 6 mo next week) but he's very slow to assume any rooster duties and Mr Dummy, who's 4+ years and has a limp from a past injury. I want a lav or blk/lav split boy to breed, so the 2nd roo might be staying. The 1st cockerel has gold along both sides of his comb. From the front it looks like angry eye-brows. LOL

I believe the gold in the cull cockerel came from the great grandfather. He had the most amazing people-friendly temperament which Dummy inherited and passed on to Moose. (Neither went through the aggressive "testing" phase from 8-12 months. They pretty much always had good people manners while remaining a vigilant protectors against real threats.) Temperament is very important here because I have kids & all their friends running around the yard. Dummy had a single gold hackle feather, from age 2-3 years old, but then it didn't come back after that molt. I'd rather deal with breeding out the occasional gold leakage than have to deal with an unpredictable roo.

 

[Faraday40]

@Faraday40
And my mystery one is now 20 weeks, so I'm going to have to assume female, even though I thought male at hatch. ... I see no hackle or saddle feathers, no crowing, etc. So hopefully I am pleasantly wrong and I have a girl.

Congrats. Any recent pics of your pullet?

 

[WVduckchick]

Congrats. Any recent pics of your pullet?

she had me fooled for a long time!

 

[Faraday40]

Nice pullet!
I hope she's as sweet as she looks.