I do not know for certain if the hens were hetero or homoz, I do know the roo that fathered them had no rose comb for many generations
OK, my new pair has finally outgrown the damage done by their previous caretaker. How do they look? I couldn't get Deb to hold still for a full-body shot, but she does have nice carriage, a brick-shaped body, and stumpy little clean legs with 5 full toes one both feet. She started laying two weeks ago, and napoleon has been crowing for about a month now.
At that point she would have been heterozygous most likely.
They look good!
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Originally Posted by pysankigirl
okay, so it will be frustrating at first, but any singles that do show up will throw true. Yes.
just another dumb thing to potentially cull for, although I would be hard pressed to really cull a chick for something that superficial (and still SOP) until I get everything else close to perfect, given I am just starting. Well, if the new cockerel is homozygous for RC, this will be a two year process; if he's heterozygous, then you can fix it this year. I wouldn't think of it as dumb; rather that it is what it is. If you're going to head down the path of Coloreds, you have your culling work cut out for you, so you might as well just resign yourself to it. There are patterns that are generally stable, there are those that are very much not. If you are getting SC and RC, by culling the RC you allow for the space needed to raise a SC chick that approaches the SOP. I guess what I meant by "dumb" is that they allow both varieties by the SOP so it isn't as good a thing to cull for if I don't have the important things taken care of...body size and weight, structural defects of comb and feet, general "Dorking-ness," color. Perhaps I should pair up with someone who WANTS rose combs and just send all the rose combs to them!!! LOL
I weighed one of my SG hens and she is only 5.2 lbs at about 10 months old. At what age should they weigh what they are going to finally weigh? Well, even if she's ging to put on another pound over the next year, she's under weight. If you have other pullets from which to breed tht are securely weightier than she, than she's a cull. If this is were all of your birds are at, than choose the best two females with the best two males and begin there. You should see an improvement by the end of the year. Although if you're going to try to bring up three varieties, it's going to take a lot of hatching and a lot of raising space. Don't want to do SG's... just trying to see how far off they really were from what they should be. and start to train my eye for size. she's actually an average sized SG from my hatchery chicks! not worth doing anything but getting eggs from.
my new big boy is scared to death of me still. I will have to win him over with food before I can grab him to weigh him.
or try to be superhumanly quick...LOL Do it at night with a head light with a red light. They can't see the red light well, and it allows you to pluck them off of the roost. It also makes the whole process a little disturbing as possible which is good for the whole flock. I am really curious as to this fellow's weight. He seems big to me but how much is fluff and how much is substance I don't know. It is just too funny that he is such a big baby. the cockerel is so much more sure of himself, it is hilarious. I could actually see the cockerel defending the flock and this guy running for the hills.
