Mille Cochin Info

[jaymeellis06]

My Mille fleur/Calico babies. One four week old, the other three are two weeks old. My only hen is brooding her first set of chicks that hatched this past weekend (not related to her), so these are my only milles for a long while.

 

[mindylee]

Wow!
What a good cat fight. Like reading this.

Anywho...
I bought eggs from erin, just recently myself.
Post office defected a lot of them but got 8 good ones growing and got my fingers crossed for a few good birds.
I love erins birds and as a person who has crap birds. Im working on my type to better it. And between them and other breeders stock I purchased, im hoping my crap birds improve.
I also am working on chocolate cochin and chocolate millie and mottled cochins. Have 6 pullets total. 2 of which are frizzled. So far, 1 is a cull. The other's are a promising start.
Hope ya guys work things out. As im learning myself and a huge fan of the millie cochin. And working hard and spending $ to improve mine.

 

[suncatcher]

Finally have a MF hatched this year...... Got side tracked last year, with my Calico pen, so sticking with the plan this year!

 

[County Boy]

Hey y'all here are my MF/calico starter birds. I know they aren't perfect, but I would like to get some opinions on them. They are still young. Most are about 20 weeks old, but the 2 smaller pullets are only 13 weeks old. I'm looking for HELPFUL tips and suggestions, I feel like so far (for the most part) my type isn't too terribly bad and I think my roosters look pretty good, my hens need work. What can I do to add more color?


Jack






Henry


Frizzle




Pullet#1








Pullet #2






Pullet #3


Pullet #4




Pullet #5 - This girl was a runt and is obviously still catching up

Sorry nobody has replied to your post. It's just a busy time of year and most of us here just kind of follow this thread than post on it lately, unless they use it to argue like you said. But seriously, all of us here care about what we breed ourselves, sell and purchase, and I think we are all trying to have the best interest in this variety of cochins as we can. But we don't need to point fingers and say they did this or didn't do that. there is still a lot to learn and none of us know everything yet. So stop the bickering and just go back to being fellow breeders and do our very best to help one another out.

Now, regarding your birds, I do agree you don't have a lot of color but see promise. I think you could benefit from a rooster with some more black in him for your hens or a hen with more black for your roosters. The 2 roosters you have good color, and white tipped feathers, but no chevrons. All you hens are kind of the same way, good color, some black in their necks, and good white tipping on their feathers but no chevrons. I personally think you could benefit even from a MF/ Mottled or in other words a Mille Fleur that hatched out Mottled based so it carries the MF gene but also helps get some of those chevrons and possible darken up some of your birds. But again, I think you have a lot of promise in your bunch. Like you said their type is decent. They have great foot feathering, decent cushions for being so young, and many other things I see that I could probably say but I think you already know. Just remember they are still young and have a lot of changing to do. In a few months I bet you won't recognize them if you looked back to these photos. If you have any other questions I'd be happy to do my best to help and I'm sure everyone else will do the same.

 

[Debs55]

Sorry nobody has replied to your post. It's just a busy time of year and most of us here just kind of follow this thread than post on it lately, unless they use it to argue like you said. But seriously, all of us here care about what we breed ourselves, sell and purchase, and I think we are all trying to have the best interest in this variety of cochins as we can. But we don't need to point fingers and say they did this or didn't do that. there is still a lot to learn and none of us know everything yet. So stop the bickering and just go back to being fellow breeders and do our very best to help one another out.

Now, regarding your birds, I do agree you don't have a lot of color but see promise. I think you could benefit from a rooster with some more black in him for your hens or a hen with more black for your roosters. The 2 roosters you have good color, and white tipped feathers, but no chevrons. All you hens are kind of the same way, good color, some black in their necks, and good white tipping on their feathers but no chevrons. I personally think you could benefit even from a MF/ Mottled or in other words a Mille Fleur that hatched out Mottled based so it carries the MF gene but also helps get some of those chevrons and possible darken up some of your birds. But again, I think you have a lot of promise in your bunch. Like you said their type is decent. They have great foot feathering, decent cushions for being so young, and many other things I see that I could probably say but I think you already know. Just remember they are still young and have a lot of changing to do. In a few months I bet you won't recognize them if you looked back to these photos. If you have any other questions I'd be happy to do my best to help and I'm sure everyone else will do the same.

Thanks! I think adding a mf/mottled would be a good idea as well. Problem is, no one around here is really working on them! My frizzled cockerel is having some of the chevron come in now, he is younger than the other 2 cockerels so I'm hoping as he gets older he will have more. I will be on the look out for hens with more black though like you suggested

 

[suncatcher]

Quote: I disagree Bear. There are some with nice type, you build the barn before you paint it, so work on type too! Set up a breeding pen with your best types and go from there! We all work with what we have, and is a start!

 

[Debs55]

I disagree Bear. There are some with nice type, you build the barn before you paint it, so work on type too! Set up a breeding pen with your best types and go from there! We all work with what we have, and is a start!

These are also young birds, but they came from nice stock so I am hopeful that they will fill out. Yes type is on my list to work on, I think my pullets could use shorter backs and more cushion. Once everyone is breeding/laying I will be pulling out to do pairings and such

 

[Msbear]

They are pretty poor typed considering what a well typed cochin should look like. This guy below is a cross between a very nice well typed blue mottled bird and my mille fleur. I could still nit-pick (sp?) him to pieces but he's a heap better than what I had and loads better than what you have. It really depends on what you're after. If it's yard candy, save the worry and pump out pretty. If it's working toward the standard, I would start over with better birds and save yourself about ten years.



If it's just color you are having an issue with, cross to a mottled which give you darker offspring. It will take a few generations to get back decent gold base color but you can then breed towards what you like.

..a couple more decent typed birds (pictured below) to see the difference. .. Your birds may be young but it's still obvious to me that they won't fill out much more than what they are...


ETA: the top pair of birds you posted (Henri & Jack are very similar and the first pullet.. not the frizzle) are better than the rest. The youngins really seem to have bad pinched cushions. Maybe try getting a mottled pair and splitting them up on that pair. look for undermottled birds (more black than white) as this seems to be the best way to go for MF. I am sorry if I was offensive. .. I am a type natzi.

 

[Debs55]

They are pretty poor typed considering what a well typed cochin should look like. This guy below is a cross between a very nice well typed blue mottled bird and my mille fleur. I could still nit-pick (sp?) him to pieces but he's a heap better than what I had and loads better than what you have. It really depends on what you're after. If it's yard candy, save the worry and pump out pretty. If it's working toward the standard, I would start over with better birds and save yourself about ten years.



If it's just color you are having an issue with, cross to a mottled which give you darker offspring. It will take a few generations to get back decent gold base color but you can then breed towards what you like.

..a couple more decent typed birds (pictured below) to see the difference. .. Your birds may be young but it's still obvious to me that they won't fill out much more than what they are...


ETA: the top pair of birds you posted (Henri & Jack are very similar and the first pullet.. not the frizzle) are better than the rest. The youngins really seem to have bad pinched cushions. Maybe try getting a mottled pair and splitting them up on that pair. look for undermottled birds (more black than white) as this seems to be the best way to go for MF. I am sorry if I was offensive. .. I am a type natzi.

I'm not sure how you think that phrases such as your birds are "loads better" than anything I have and that I should toss them and save myself 10 years isn't offensive, but because I am hear to discuss the quality of our birds I won't discuss conversational etiquette. I know my birds aren't great, I never said they were. But they are project birds, which I specifically stated. I personally, do believe they will fill out more because I have seen the stock they came from and they are very nice birds from Lynn Van Dyke lines. Not only that, but also more people have told me they have potential than the number of people who have told me to start over. So basically the only helpful tips I have been given are to find a typey mottle pair and pair them with my "poor typed" birds and maybe if I'm lucky I will have something worthy.

 

[ChickenPox]

Deb I think what you have to work with is loads better than some I've seen! This isn't even an approved color yet, so bear that in mind. My guys took a while to fill out as well.