This isn’t the focus of the project, but I also have 12 lavender silver Marans eggs from imported French lines. They are part of the project, but not at the forefront.
They’ll offer true recent French blood and associated type and better egg colour than my cuckoos (lighter than my darkest...
Otter, Badger and Toad. Classic English Dark Cuckoos. These are extended black (E) based rather than birchen. I haven’t set any of their eggs this time (to my knowledge!), but they’re from the same guy as Belle and Esmeralda. I plan to use them to inject nice quality dark barring, pure white...
Esmeralda
Belle
These two I bought as pullets from a breeder I’d been in contact with for a while. Very dark egg line plus decent type confirmation, rare to see advertised on Facebook where I came across them. Not got the sheer bulk yet of my own line, but welcome genetic diversity plus egg...
Mole, my Silver Cuckoo English Marans hen. He’s sister/relative to Wellington. Nice stout hen, tidy tail and small comb.
She’s currently suffering with a blocked crop, so hoping I can get her through it so she can be bred to the F1 cockerels to give F1 double barred English type cockerels.
Her...
Loki, my original BCM cock. Sold him as soon as I got a better son (which took a while but I wasn’t hatching loads out) because… that tail. He was out of a dark egg and is the sire to Claudie and Joan. Fanatic colour though, I appreciate his input on these great pullets.
Napoléon, Loki x Chanel...
As soon as they’re breeding true for colour (regardless of leg feathering) I’d be eager to get them spread out across the country. Won’t be for a year and a half to two years though probably. I’d be willing to send unfinished project birds to anyone understanding where they are at and what to...
I know. Chooks man has said before she aged like wine. Even truer this side of the moult now she’s put weight on again and come into condition. Ignoring her big spike on her comb, she’s a class Marans hen. Blessed to get her out of eBay hatching eggs before I even knew enough about the breed to...
JoanClaudie
Both Chanel’s daughters. Their sire had a bad squirrel tail so I’ve got to watch out for that in their progeny. Their tails are high but not as high as these photos as they like to get alert as soon as I see a nice photo shot.
Claudie is my favourite and best quality pullet from...
Duke of Wellington, the Sire of the F1s I have in the incubator. Nice English standard boy, classic crisp cuckoo barring. For some reason he is missing a wattle but I think that was just developmental and hopefully not genetic.
Unfortunately the new build houses neighbouring my small holding...
One of my favourite hens I’ve ever had, Chanel. She’s a blue copper from my original Marans line. Very dark egg, very heavy hen. About 8.5lbs. She’s coming up 4 years old.
Fantastic proper French Marans type. I have two of her daughters and she’s produced a great cockerel, though unfortunately...
A couple of my favourite looking cocks I’ve seen. There’s reasons for preferring either, I’d like to settle somewhere in between both of them, though hopefully the BCM blood will make the hackles even deeper gold.
Two fantastic hens. I can’t remember where I’ve saved this pictures from to credit them. They should be birchen (E^R) based, not wheaten or duckwing, or else their bodies are too brown rather than black/blue. They’re basically a black copper with barring.
Finally to get back to posting here.
I’ll start with the Golden Cuckoo Marans standard, as laid out by the Marans club of Great Britain. I’ll assume everyone knows the Marans standard for type, even if it’s the French one. Main difference for the English standard are clean legs and less...
Yep they are. My Brahmas have the driest pen on slightly higher ground to stop messing their feet up. My maras are eventually all going to be moved to the English Clean Legged standard.
I also have another project for my own ‘breed’ that have feathered legs but not feathered feet, which would...
As a lot of my friends here know, I’m working on a project to combine the Gold allele from my French Black Copper Marans with the barring of my English Silver and Dark Cuckoo Marans, in an attempt to revive the English standard Golden Cuckoo.
Contacts in the Marans club executives have agreed...