Niederrheiner Thread! All Colors!

[UberchicRanch]

Same here, @elkinsacres ,

Welcome! I'm excited to see your pics and I'm curious to see if you get the same patterns as @hofhine68 's chicks. I wonder if there's a difference between Greenfire and Sunbird...

 

[joed1223]

Same here, @elkinsacres
,

Welcome!  I'm excited to see your pics and I'm curious to see if you get the same patterns as @hofhine68
's chicks.  I wonder if there's a difference between Greenfire and Sunbird...

So glad you started this thread! I've been raising chickens of one kind or another for years. I just started with Niedrrheiners. I purchased eggs from Bryce at Sunbird. Very low hatch rate (3 of 18). Not Bryces fault, just tough when eggs are shipped coast to coast. I then ordered some chicks from Greenfire. I now have 10 total. 6 Roos and 4 girls. Here's some observations of this breed

Very calm and friendly breed.

Seem very susceptible to pasty butt. Got so bad I almost lost one as a chick that had a completely closed vent and several others got it bad and had to be cleaned up.

Not auto sexing at birth but easily identified in 2-3 weeks by color.

Mixing different ages and introducing younger birds to older birds was never an issue whatsoever. The older birds seemed to completely ignore the younger introduced chicks

Oldest one I have is a Roo that is closing in on 4 months and is huge. Can't wait to cull him to see what he weighs. He's gonna make some awesome soup!

 

[hofhine68]

@joed1223
My chicks had no trouble integrating, either, although they were hatched in the coop and running around the run with my old hens at three days.

Brinkhaven might be a closer source of eggs for you, and I had a good hatch with my mailed Niederrheiner eggs from them.

Sunbird is north of me, about a six hour drive. I didn't realize they had Niederrheiners.

 

[joed1223]

@joed1223
My chicks had no trouble integrating, either, although they were hatched in the coop and running around the run with my old hens at three days.

Brinkhaven might be a closer source of eggs for you, and I had a good hatch with my mailed Niederrheiner eggs from them.

Sunbird is north of me, about a six hour drive. I didn't realize they had Niederrheiners.

I wasn't aware of Brinkhaven, thanks for the lead! Even though they are closer to me geographically, I have given up on shipped eggs. It seems that in the end, it's much less expensive or the same cost as just buying chicks but without the stress and aggravation of hatching shipped eggs. I love hatching but the eggs just get too rattled by the post office.
Bryce at Sunbird Farms was a great guy to deal with and keeps his word. He also writes a great blog on his site. Maybe I'll find someone here in SE PA that also raises Niederrheiners so that I can mix up the genetics a bit.

 

[UberchicRanch]

Welcome, @joed1223

Yes we're excited as you are! I share the same sentiments as you do with hatching eggs. In the long run, you just about break even but you don't have to endure the stress of artificially incubating the eggs.

I have also found a low fertility rate with a lot of these places (to which I'll leave unnamed) and then you get some good batches here and there. All-in-all I feel it really is luck of the draw and unless if fertility is the issue, there isn't much at fault to the breeder.

As far as your pasty butt issue...that's interesting. I haven't experienced that yet. Usually that is a symptom of the chicks feeling a draft and got too cold, are overheated, have a bacterial / viral infection. Besides using lukewarm water to remove the paste from their butt, believe it or not if you scramble eggs and get them to room temperature and feed it to your chicks, the additional nutrition acts like a "shot in the arm" and can clear it almost immediately.

They say the culprit can be the heat lamps. Rather use light, there are devices out there that radiates heat. I may experiment with some products to see if there are more benefits (and we're not using as much electricity!) Has anyone tried products like this?

 

[hofhine68]

I completely understand your wanting to purchase live chicks and not take another risk on shipped eggs.

I know it is all in my mind (my own perception) but I have less distress with an egg that won't hatch than I do with a chick that dies.
For me, it is much less stressful to stuff eggs under a broody hen and wait to see what happens - although the Bielefelder fertility was a disappointment. I'm still wondering if the Bielefelder roos may be particular about the ladies who get their attention, but I haven't posted in the Biele thread yet.

My FBCM-broody raised Niederrheiner chicks are doing great thus far - no pasty butt issues and growing/eating LOTS. I'll try to take some updated pics this weekend.

 

[joed1223]

This morning I heard this strange sound coming from one of my coops. Low and behold the Niederrheiner RooSo, I culled the first Niederrheiner Roo that my friend hatched for me about 4 months ago. He weighed just about 6 lbs. Seems like a decent growth rate.

 

[UberchicRanch]

Six pounds at 4 months! Wow. And that roo was not fully grown yet so I'm sure he would have hit 10-12 lbs.

 

[hofhine68]

Wow! Let us know how you prepare it, and how it tastes!

I'd love to see others' pics of their Niederrheiners...

 

[UberchicRanch]

I thought you guys would find these vids interesting. This is all I could find for now. Apparently in Germany, Niederrheiners also come in bantam form! I'd still prefer the standard size but that's good to know.

Birchen Niederrheiners

Birchen Niederrheiner Bantams

Lemon Cuckoo Niederrheiner Bantams

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bwXRk0tpubM
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=26rfuJ_khiA
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=U_tG6FQA39E

Blue Cuckoo Niederrheiner Bantams
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6hKEXSHlHi0

"Brown Red" Niederrheiner Bantams
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=26rfuJ_khiA

Crele Niederrhieners
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ap4SOqf_5SE

I'm personally a little confused with the Crele Niederrheiners. How are they different from Bielefelders? They look the same to me. Also, not sure if we would call them "Brown Red" Niederrheiners in English but that was the given translation. There could be more colors out there but this is what we found so far.