Thanks to those that took the time to evaluate my bcm's and give me their guidance. I have learned a lot and will get started with the breeding process.
I have taken some more pics of cockerels 2 and 3, and I have also taken some pics of the 3 pullets. Here they are:
Cockerel 2:
Cockerel 3:
Pullets (just to show what the cockerels will be bread to):
Again, thanks for taking the time to help me out.
Thanks for all the advice so far. Kfelton0002, I observed the cockerels yesterday to see who was dominate. You managed to hit the mark dead on without seeing them in person. Cockerel 1 is the biggest bird and is dominant. Cockerel 2 is brave enough to crow once in a while. Cockerel 3 is at the...
Last night I purchased 3 bcm cockerels and 3 bcm hens, all are 6 months old, and hoping to select one cockerel to use as a breeder. I have spent hours reading about the French standards today but the more I read the more I realize I don't know enough to select the right cockerel on my own. Here...
Below is a pic of my blue wheaten Ameraucana's legs, followed by a pic of my wheaten Ameraucana's legs. I have no idea how old they are or if they have been previously treated for scaly leg mites.
First, the blue wheaten Ameraucana. Definitely raised scales but I am not seeing any white crusty...
Here are two of my young Easter Eggers. They are about 9 weeks old now. If I were to guess I would say the white one is a pullet and the redish one is a cockerel, but I am interested in everyone's opinion.
The white one:
The reddish one:
Thoughts?
My hatch is over. 10 of the 13 hatched giving me a 77% hatch rate. I have 6 barred rocks, 1 barred rock/black Australorp, and 3 barred rock/barnyard mix.
Out of my 13 eggs, I have 7 chicks and 4 pips. Today is day 21 and I am hoping the 4 that have pipped will be out soon. The other two hadn't pipped so I quickly removed and candled them (didn't impact humidity). There wasn't any movement at candle so I opened them up. Sure enough, there were two...
That would explain a lot, but adds to my confusion. The Easter Eggers eggs look identical to this one and I had a 100% hatch rate with them. Maybe something happened in the last 5 weeks and they are no longer fertile. I have an idea. I will get today's Easter egger eggs and put them in the...
They do look different than my barred rock eggs as those have a very well defined bullseye. It is hard to see on the pics but these have rings around the center. Not as bright white as my rocks but it is there. And the EE's had a 100 hatch rate 5 weeks ago. Odd I know but they did hatch.
I will check out the link, thanks for that.
Curiousity once again got the better of me today and I decided to crack open an Easter egger egg from one of the hens in this same coop. I know her eggs are fertile as I hatched them a couple weeks ago. They look very similar to the Ameraucana bulls eye:
I should clarify something - by relatively recently I meant somewhere around 4 months.
The eggs that hatched from this rooster were set 5 weeks ago, and I have had a light in that coop since November or so. I have not witnessed him breeding these hens but I have seen him "dance" around them...
I have 11 Ameraucana eggs in the incubator right now along with 13 other eggs, mostly barred rock. The Ameraucana eggs are from my two hens (wheaten and blue wheaten) that I fairly recently picked up and this is my first attempt at hatching their eggs. They are covered by a blue wheaten...
Below are two EE's that I hatched that are a little over 5 weeks old. Based on what I have read in this thread I think the white one is a hen and the brownish one is a roo, primarily based on comb size. Am I correct?
The white one:
The brownish one:
That is good to know. I have 11 eggs in the incubator now where he is the father and the Wheaten and Blue Wheaten are the hens. With your info I now know I need to keep all roosters until probably close to a year old. Thanks!
The girls don't have any black in the hackle. I will give it a shot and see how it turns out. I will try to take a pic of the blue wheaten hen and post it tomorrow.