Araucana thread anyone?

[Rumbull]

New photo of my first hatchling. She is going to look like he mother with a salmon breast, but will be blue instead of splash. She is rumpless and tufted. Her color is so light, it almost looks like the pictures of the self blues.

It was a great day! First, I had two of the three araucana eggs hatch this morning and both are tufted but tailed. More importantly, I had also set a couple of eggs from her yard mates. The father is my blue araucana that I had suspected could be tufted due to the low hatch rate.
I have a tufted mix chick! The roo is tufted! What a steal. I only paid $3 for him!! He is molting now. I hope some tufts show up with the new feathers.

 

[Stacykins]

Quote:
Crossing my crossables that you have a great hatch rate and lots of little tufted and bootyless babies!

And Rumbull, I love your little pullet! She is so pretty, and her willow legs are perfect! I bet she'll be stunning when she fills in and grows up!

 

[ndoles]

Thanks!
I see lots of babies with "tufted and bottyless babies" in my future..

Rumbull, I have a pullet just like yours, only without the red...she is so light, there is not much blue...she looks light gray. Yours will be beautiful when she grows up!

Quote:
Crossing my crossables that you have a great hatch rate and lots of little tufted and bootyless babies!

And Rumbull, I love your little pullet! She is so pretty, and her willow legs are perfect! I bet she'll be stunning when she fills in and grows up!

 

[smoothmule]

Lanae,
Sounds like some really good hatches,

Lanae, Illia and anyone,

Have you ever had a duckwing cockerel that kept the juvenile feather colors? I have one that is old enough he should be coloring up like Columbo but he's still in that white streaky feathering like his first feathering out of the down. Maybe I'm wrong but I think he's old enough he should be at least starting to moult and change. This picture was taken about a month ago but he hasn't changed much. I'm going out to check on the puppies so I'll take a new photo of him and post it later. I have photo's of Columbo as a 2 month old chick and he was already in those brown/jeweled tone feathers before his next moult into what he is now. This cockerel is over 3 months old, closer to 4 months now

Columbo is about 9 months old now and looking wonderful. He may be sold and going to the northeast but I put him with the duckwing and BBR hens and have hatched out his first chicks, both wheaten (I think) they are both yellow with no markings. Does that mean one or more of my hens is wheaten based duckwing or BBR? He has yellow legs so he's not correct and of course no tufts but otherwise I really like him. He's also with Slinky and Shirley so I hope to hatch some more really good duckwings before he's gone. I did sell some of his hatching eggs recently but I've been collecting more to set and have some incubating now.

Here is Columbo this morning out with his hens in the rain. All his hens have dark green legs so I expect I will see at least some correctly marked duckwings with willow legs.

 

[smoothmule]

As a refresher, here is Columbo as a much younger chick than the older cockerel above. Columbo was also feathered like the cockerel above but at just a couple of months old he looked like this.

So do some duckwings just color up later on? Was Columbo an oddball that matured sooner than usual? Or am I dealing with something else? henny feathered? another color than duckwing?

Confused

 

[Illia]

Okay, so, bear with me as I'm a tad confused - Are you wanting to know why Columbo still has white on his breast? Or why he took a while to turn a proper duckwing color? Or something else?

 

[dkcrumly]

This chick is now 10 weeks old - need to double check with you experts on the sex - if it's a cockerel I need to give him up asap!

 

[Illia]

Quote:
Definite cockerel!

 

[smoothmule]

Illia,
Maybe my previous posts were not clear enough. That cockerel is not Columbo. It's a younger cockerel that I've been waiting on to change colors. Columbo was that color as a chick but by the same age of that younger cockerel, he was already changing color to what he is now. That younger cockerel is showing some change but not nearly as young as Columbo did so I was wondering what was going on with him. I was wondering at what age everyone elses duckwing cockerels got their more mature feathering.

I am seeing a tiny bit of change in the younger cockerel so maybe he's a tad slow? He is going to a 4H group so I may not see him as an adult. He's definitely going to be a nice heavy rooster, he's good sized now.

Here are some pictures I just took of the young cockerel. Columbo weighs 5 pounds so he's a nice size, I think, for 9 months old. This younger guy, I haven't weighed him but he's solid built at 4 months old.

He's Still in these baby feathers. I think his hackles have a tiny bit more yellow to them and maybe a little more black in some spots but geez, is he just slow? I was hoping to go out and find that I hadn't been paying attention and he would be moulting out and be the color I think he should be by now.

 

[smoothmule]

I try to keep track of what chicks came from what breeding pen but often lose track. I don't need to guess with this kid, he looks just like his dad but better (other than clean faced when Degas is double tufted). He has a better back than Degas but other than that, he looks a whole lot like him. I don't know which hen but one of the black hens is his mamma.

Degas

The kid - taken 3 weeks ago but he is more filled out now and looks even more like his dad