show quality speckled sussex ??

[snowbird]

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Lisa, what is up with that Comb ? Myself I would need for the male to have a more open tail or all the off spring will have pinched tails.I hope he is not out of the hatch that had welsummer stripes involved.

 

[snowbird]

Quote:
Lisa, what is up with that Comb ? Myself I would need for the male to have a more open tail or all the off spring will have pinched tails.I hope he is not out of the hatch that had welsummer stripes involved.

Lisa, for curiosity sake check and see if he has white undercolor.

 

[Indianfeathers]

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Good choice....I think he is handsome, but then again I love all chickens!!

 

[RustyHen]

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Good choice !

 

[math ace]

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The comb is all jacked up, but I do have some females with small and nice combs.
I hope to produce "A" male with a better / normal comb by using a female with a normal comb.

I want a more open tail..... but ouot of all the birds from two different breeds, this seems to be an issue. I had cockerels with even tighter / pinched tails ( like the one Walt said "Would never amount to anything"

). I have a few females with ok tails, BUT nothing as nice as the marans..... So, I will do the best that I can to make this better and not worse.

He is NOT from the welsummer stripe birds.

I checked many of my stock before for the undercoat color and it was grayish. I didn't check EVERY bird, but I did randomly check some. I will make it a point to inspect his undercoat tonight when I put him up.

I am down to one cockerel and 10 females. I will now start selecting the couple of females to counteract this boys major faults....

I KNOW I won't produce many that are better than what I am starting with, but I should see improvement in something - - comb, size, tail openess or angle.

Culling HARD is not a problem around here. My birds are healthy and friendly. MOST People around here are delighted to have friendly, healthy birds.
The show quality thing is MY thing, MY goal, NOT every one elses....

 

[lauralou]

So let's have a look at those pullets!

 

[math ace]

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I did the separating tonight and have 5 left for him to mate with.... I'll try to get some pictures over the next couple of days.

 

[teddiliza]

Could someone post a picture of a 'pinched' tail and an 'open' tail?

 

[math ace]

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This is from one of my marans that has a very nice open tail

This is one of my speckled sussex pullets with a pinched tail. I've got some more pullets with even tighter closed / pinched tails. I'll see if I can't grab a picture of them. These two birds - the bcm above and the ss below are the same age.

 

[math ace]

Here is a question for Don / Snowbird.....

How open should an SS tail be? Should it be as open as the BCM tail or less than that?