Wybar Thread!!!

[Makomd]

Lets get something started here rather than https://www.backyardchickens.com/t/362967/anyone-breeding-wybars-in-the-us.

Considering there are Wybars in other places in the world, would be nice to see some pictures and have some discussion.

 

[nicalandia]

I thought they were extinct

the Original stock maybe, BUT as you can see the can be recreated quite well...

 

[Makomd]

Nice start...so what did you use on what? Silver laced male on barred rock female?

Started with GLW over Barred Rock. Then followed up with a backcross of the F1 male over GLW hens. The silver gene in the Barred Rock also gave me silver in the process. So ended up with some Silver and Gold hens and the males are currently carrying a S/s Silver and Gold. These are the results of the backcross.

 

[Makomd]

Most recent hatch..

 

[Makomd]

Since the chicks are all at the ugly stage (pin feathers here and there) figured I would post some updated pictures of the parent stock. Mid-June we will be doing more selective matings.

 

[Makomd]

LOL, we are not where we want to be at this point. Before releasing any birds from this project I want the type, combs, autosexing to be at an acceptable point.

I would say we have hatched over 500 chicks the past 2 years for this project alone and found maybe 10 keeper hens and 3 keeper roosters (single barred). We have not made our culls for this years double barred roosters yet as we are holding out to see what we can on the lacing and may even keep a few single barred cockerels if their lacing and type are good. The good thing is, we are seeing some of the lacing and barring coming through with hens and have added a couple a very nice quality SLW hens to improve type this summer. We are currently breeding these hens to our single barred male with the best lacing to hopefully start seeing some major improvements on type as some of these will be Wybar hens as long as they are barred and of good type.


I will try to grab some current adult pictures and grow out pictures during the week, its so much easier posting pictures in facebook, so that is where my most current pictures have been going.

I am just anxious to get to 100% autosexing as even in this years hatchings I can see the double barred males, but the single barred birds are still male and female.

 

[Makomd]

Currently fourth crosses are hatching while also doing some backcrossing to some show quality Wyandottes to get some better type. The barred hens from the backcrossing should breed true to the fourth generation double barred males.

If all goes as planned, chicks should be hatching 100% autosexing with next breeding groups (probably spring). The current hatches (not from the backcross) are clearly identifying the double barred males, but the single barred males and the females are still looking alike.

My biggest needs of work will be getting the lacing better as some are growing out to be incomplete laced to the point its just a few ticks of lacing and as always type. The lacing should be an easy fix helped along with the backcross.

Probably looking at about 600 chicks hatched now over the last 2 years with one more set hatching in the week and then the incubator gets to rest for the winter. When I started this I never thought it would take so many chicks to pick just a few to move the project further.

Do you have any projects going on CJ? I know the last time we talked you had moved on from the Violet (Blue) laced Wyandottes Project. I had to start over on mine but got it started again and figured, we might as well work on the Violet Laced Wybar as well, lol.

 

[Makomd]

Hatched out our first group of eggs for the year. This is from our project eggs that I do not particularly like their type while waiting on the better type birds to lay. Fortunately they are laying now so only two clutches of these will be hatched out.



Not too hard to tell the males apart from the females.

 

[Makomd]

Here are the hens used in the back cross
.

Here are some of the selected offspring of the back crossing. These birds are at most 8-9 months old so they still have some maturing to do and are already bigger and more round than the 1 year olds that the above chicks were hatched from.



I wish I had a better picture of this male he is much rounder than he appears in this picture as we was trying to stay out of the picture. His lacing is far cleaner than previous males and his shape and width is quite impressive.

The following are the parents of the chicks that just hatched. Not necessarily poor birds in general, but looking at these hens and the cockerels do not by any means say wow that looks like a wyandotte.



The silver hens that are the parent stock of the chicks are being breed by the back cross silver cockerel with expectation that the best that carry over the Wyandotte type will be kept and the Gold hens that were produced from the back cross are being bred to the best double barred rooster that was from last years non back cross.I am still battling some polygenic red from the initial gold crossings in the silvers still have some single combs as well that will need to be bred against 3 out of the 20+ chicks had single comb, so this boy was R/r with the recessive single comb gene and a hen was likely R/r as well. So there is still some work to be done, but just glad to see the auto sexing has worked out and with more double barred males it should be much easier to test breed out the R/r combs in both hens and cockerels as well on the polygenic red int he silvers. I need to take my time as well and get some better pictures, lol.

 

[Rancher3535]

I have just started my on line of Welbars. so far 50 chicks that are totally black, black with a little white on top, and black with a lot of white on top. they are my first round of chicks and only 2-3 weeks old so we shall see where we go from here.

ROb