I’m a tad worried.
On Sunday, I found Napoléon the BCM cockerel dead. Yesterday the white olive egger cockerel, the last descendent of Freddy, who was in with my Brahma flock, was dead. They were both 28 weeks, heavy and strong looking cockerels. The BCM had mites under his no-crow collar, which...
Here’s the punnet square of the split lav chocolate gen cross double split cock.
Edit: see how both choc/choc and Choc/choc lavender cocks are lavender
The lavender dilution is way stronger than the chocolate. A lavender and chocolate bird looks basically lavender. I’ve never done it myself but you could expect a very slight difference between black+lavender and chocolate+lavender.
I’m going to run it through the calculator rather than listing...
(I’m doubling down on diatomaceous earth and making sure the other boys don’t have issues).
I think now I’m going to focus on getting GCMs quickly by typical flock breeding and I’ll use clan breeding later down the line. DoW (Duke of Wellington) cross Channel might be a promising cross, since...
I took his no-crow collar off when I buried him and found mites and eggs under it. That’s my best guess but he has no other mites and he was still very heavy and healthy looking.
I’m just hoping it wasn’t the collar in a worse way. He’d been fine for ages with it though so I assume not.
Just after posting all his pictures yesterday I’ve found Napoléon dead today…
That’s a real shame, I was really excited about his breeding prospects. I’ve still got one marans cock at least.
I may have mixed up the DCMs but I think this is Badger. The biggest cuckoo, I think she might be the biggest pullet altogether now, even if she’s 23 weeks vs 27. Love her long, flat back and small tail, will cross well to Napléon hopefully.
The other Dark Cuckoos. I’ve ended up renaming Ozzy...
Napoléon, looks big and weighs even more than he looks! About 9lbs at 27 weeks. Didn’t avoid the high tail and big comb of his parents, but still a big below squirrel and much tidier than both. Overcoloured breast but I do like his copper.
The Duke of Wellington, 27 weeks. Still only has one wattle! Comb a tad floppy but I like its shape. Big and chunky. Tail high but not squirrel, still taking form a bit. Nice silver cuckoo barring.Mole, his sister. Maybe my favourite marans type of all of them. Long, low, compact. I can’t wait...
Yeah I was going to say it’s probably too small for SOP but ultimately we breed for a practical fowl. Your climate is different from the swamps they were bred in, so I see it as an understandable adjustment.