Australorps breed Thread

[DevilsDenHen]

Our 2 new australorp chicks.

 

[ronott1]

Our 2 new australorp chicks.

Congratulations!

They are very cute.

 

[DevilsDenHen]

Oh thank you! They are suppose to be cockerels. Hubby needs a rooster for his ladies.

 

[ronott1]

Congratulations!

They are very cute.

How do you know?

 

[DevilsDenHen]

Well we ordered cockerels lol so fingers crossed.

 

[ronott1]

Well we ordered cockerels lol so fingers crossed.

That should work!

 

[rfreedlund]

They are suppose to be cockerels.

I ordered 5 Australorp Cockerels this past Spring to go with my 45 mixed flock girls. Two chicks died leaving me with 48 total. Every single one of them was a pullet, even the cockerels I ordered. They can mess up the other way sometimes, too. Not even an accidental rooster among the others. Go figure.

 

[DevilsDenHen]

Oh i know. We ordered 2 in the hopes that there would be a cockerel in the bunch lol.

 

[maddogdodge]

I ordered 5 Australorp Cockerels this past Spring to go with my 45 mixed flock girls. Two chicks died leaving me with 48 total. Every single one of them was a pullet, even the cockerels I ordered. They can mess up the other way sometimes, too. Not even an accidental rooster among the others. Go figure.

No cockerels at all!! Wow haha!

I ordered 6 pullets not long ago and ended up with 3 pullets, and 3 cockerels! I got them swapped for pullets, and the breeder couldn't believe they'd made such a huge mistake!

 

[YgritteChick]

Three of our chickens, two hens and one cockerel, were sold to us as Black Australorps. I have been very impressed with them, their personality is definitely the most low key in the flock, they never create any drama and are just so sweet and calm. They are almost 20 weeks old now, so I have been watching the hens closely in my excitement and hope for eggs...and I have noticed a few characteristics that seem slightly off. Now I am a little worried they are Jersey Giants. To me they look Australorp-like...however it seems like Jersey Giants look very similar to Australorps but get bigger so I'm guessing that fact doesn't help make my birds stay Black Australorps, lol.

From what I read it appears like the color of the bottoms of the feet are different colors between the two kinds, however without anything to compare it to, I'm having a hard time telling the color of the bottoms of my chickens feet. All of my chickens have pretty dark legs and feet and the underside does seem to maybe have a yellow tinge, but they also seem more creamy or peachy depending on the light. I've even been looking back at their chick pics but the color always seems slightly ambiguous to me and changes depending on the lighting and background. I also read that the eyes might be different? Are Australorp's eyes supposed to be all black, ,or just pretty dark in general?

The farm where I got the chicks from didn't say that they had any Jersey Giants, so technically there shouldn't be any chance that my birds are Jersey Giants. I thought the only black birds they had were Black Australorp, so I didn't really inspect all the black chicks to see if there were any differences between them, but they were more hobbyists so maybe they could be mistaken in what they even had.

Any help, especially in picture form, of examples of specific traits that show that a bird is one or the other would be very much appreciated. I'm going to be so sad if I end up not having any Australorps after thinking I did all summer, lol.