- Apr 7, 2022
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Picture- Two Bantam Ameraucana Chicks. One Blue and One Lavender Silver
Example Shown- Evaluation of Head Width on young chicks. This applies to any breeding program no matter the breed. Even hybrids. Evaluation of Head Width is important because it has been shown to correlate to width on the entire body. Wider pelvic widths give us better production and less reproductive disorders.
In this photo- pay attention to where the eyes are and how much of the eye can be seen from above looking down on them. The chick on right has more eyeball showing when viewed from above, which means it's skull (and body) are more narrow then the left chick where we see almost no eyeball from this angle.
The breed standard must also be taken into consideration especially with Ameraucana because nothing about an Ameraucana should be extreme- including head width. Everything in the standard points to a medium/moderate bird. Head widths are evaluated on a scale of 0-5 usually with 0 being super narrow and 5 being the extreme of wide. You don't want an Ameraucana to score a 5 in this or anything for that matter. When I say a scale of 1-5 I'm not talking about judging points, I'm simply talking about breeder evaluations and your personal scoring for your breeding and hatching records. Always remember everything is subjective and how we personally interpret the standard. For me- I would select towards a head width like the left chick. That chicks width is not the widest I've seen and I probably wouldn't want to select any wider the the left chick. I wouldn't want a chick to be any narrower then the right chick either though. IMHO- either chick is actually acceptable especially when beginning a program. If I had to choose though, the left would be my choice.
This photo also shows proper combs on chicks
More to come
Example Shown- Evaluation of Head Width on young chicks. This applies to any breeding program no matter the breed. Even hybrids. Evaluation of Head Width is important because it has been shown to correlate to width on the entire body. Wider pelvic widths give us better production and less reproductive disorders.
In this photo- pay attention to where the eyes are and how much of the eye can be seen from above looking down on them. The chick on right has more eyeball showing when viewed from above, which means it's skull (and body) are more narrow then the left chick where we see almost no eyeball from this angle.
The breed standard must also be taken into consideration especially with Ameraucana because nothing about an Ameraucana should be extreme- including head width. Everything in the standard points to a medium/moderate bird. Head widths are evaluated on a scale of 0-5 usually with 0 being super narrow and 5 being the extreme of wide. You don't want an Ameraucana to score a 5 in this or anything for that matter. When I say a scale of 1-5 I'm not talking about judging points, I'm simply talking about breeder evaluations and your personal scoring for your breeding and hatching records. Always remember everything is subjective and how we personally interpret the standard. For me- I would select towards a head width like the left chick. That chicks width is not the widest I've seen and I probably wouldn't want to select any wider the the left chick. I wouldn't want a chick to be any narrower then the right chick either though. IMHO- either chick is actually acceptable especially when beginning a program. If I had to choose though, the left would be my choice.
This photo also shows proper combs on chicks
More to come
