B.Y.C. Dorking Club!

[capayvalleychick]

It's great to see photos of breeder's birds. There are so few actual photographs of good Dorkings. I was just having a discussion with a judge about tails. He was explaining to me that there should be a curve instead of an abrupt angle. Jeremy, your photos helped me see the difference.

 

[heritagehabitatfarms]

thats what all those extra roosters are for lol...

Hey thanks so much heritagehabitatfarms. The blacks came from SandHill. I was wondering about white being recessive but both colors need a bit of work. Blacks way more than white though. I wouldn't want to put whites on blacks until I at least have my whites straightened out. My main focus is going to be with the whites for some time to come though.

 

[Yellow House Farm]

Awesome everyone! It seems like all things are looking up for the whites. They've been in need of other custodians. We need to be patient; they've been neglected for 100 years, but we'll certainly get there.

Greenhorn, I'm glad the dinner went well. It really is quite delicious eating.

Be careful with the notion of angles. Dorkings are a bird of angles as compared, to say, leghorns, which are all sweep. A Dorking has a a back that is "long, broad its entire length, straight, and decling to tail." The tail rises up at 45 degrees. It is not a thin feathered, stark angle, but it is an angle, perhaps a rounded andgle, but an angle. A leghorn or Ancona just sweeps up from the back in a crescent curve.

Also, the tails of femals are not spread like a leghorns, They are held pretty tight and a really wider and he base tha at the tip. A lot of females we're seeing now have open tails, but we want to aim at something releatively tightly folded.

Best everyone!

Joseph

 

[greenhorn]

Awesome everyone! It seems like all things are looking up for the whites. They've been in need of other custodians. We need to be patient; they've been neglected for 100 years, but we'll certainly get there.

Greenhorn, I'm glad the dinner went well. It really is quite delicious eating.

Be careful with the notion of angles. Dorkings are a bird of angles as compared, to say, leghorns, which are all sweep. A Dorking has a a back that is "long, broad its entire length, straight, and decling to tail." The tail rises up at 45 degrees. It is not a thin feathered, stark angle, but it is an angle, perhaps a rounded andgle, but an angle. A leghorn or Ancona just sweeps up from the back in a crescent curve.

Also, the tails of femals are not spread like a leghorns, They are held pretty tight and a really wider and he base tha at the tip. A lot of females we're seeing now have open tails, but we want to aim at something releatively tightly folded.

Best everyone!

Joseph

Hey Joseph, thanks once again for your advice. Your input is always much appreciated. Now that we know how delicious Dorking chicken really it's going to be all guns blazing haha.

I think my idea of what a Dorking is supposed to look like fits your description pretty well.

I kept the roosters with the best cinder block shape, longest back, widest gate, and least pinched at the tail. Went for shape and seemed that size went with the best shaped birds outside of one which was way too small and he had a rusty sheen. He had the best shape of all the birds in my opinion. I thought about keeping him but size is a major trait that I believe we need to strive for so he got culled. I also noticed that my pictures seem to make the backs look shorter than they are and that last bird wouldn't stand still for me at all lol. Actually none did.

I can see most of the desired traits are spread out but they are there. I think the legs were long in all the birds which may be the only trait other than size that is missing. I'm certainly not an expert chicken breeder, more of a neophyte really but I think we can eventually breed birds that meet the standard.

Maybe next year we can get more pictures. This year building the new coop took up all my extra time. It's still not totally finished but it works for now. I do have plans to build a rooster rearing coop so we can raise up the top 3 birds from each clan to allow for a better final selection and it never hurts to keep back ups. So we need at least 8 separate rooster houses and runs yet and I'm sure we will start adding new rearing areas eventually also. That coop should be large enough to rear all the chickens we can eat in a year and more. Next October we may have to have a big party and cook up some chicken haha.

 

[greenhorn]

thats what all those extra roosters are for lol...

I think for now the thing to do with the blacks would be to keep them as a separate clan and work them as a kind of side project. They do have short legs and some of the hens have good shape. Size is definitely an issue.

 

[ki4got]

thought i'd post up some new pics i got yesterday... (be warned, my naming system kinda lacks imagination LOL)
my Craig Russell roo "Big Red"
when i first got him, he appeared too upright and short backed, but i think part of that was having to earn his place in the flock...
now that he's more relaxed i like what i see.


my younger cockerel from Roger Tice/Dick Horstman lines "Thing 1" (i lost "Thing 2", so mostly now he's just "Thing")
as young as he is, he's nearly the same size as Big Red, but lacks the muscle mass still.
he's got a bit of a lazy tail right now, making his back look arched. when he's moving along it's much flatter (but my camera doesn't focus that fast LOL)


and a couple group pics, first with Big Guy, my senior silver grey roo and a few of the girls.


the dark headed sg girl on the right was out of a colored hen and sg roo... any of her dark headed offspring will be culled. fortunately Charcoal is a dominant trait and easily removed. I did that breeding to help reduce the inbreeding involved in the sg's. we'll see once i start hatching sg's again (if they ever start laying again from being broody/moulting...)


2 of my sandhill girls. "blitz" the colored girl on the left and "tannish". i'll be breeding her to one of the red guys to see what we get. I'm absolutely in love with her size and type, it's just her color that's not right...


overall, I think I was hasty to judge the sandhill birds... I culled them way earlier than i should have I think, seeing how tannish and a few of her 'sisters' have grown out... I will be placing another order in the spring with them. Then I'll be more selective of what i keep, based on type not color... the color will sort itself out in the long run.

I also have to say, comparing a couple new sg's from Mcmurray (spring 2012) with sg's from there last year, they seem to be improving their program a bit too. the new girls are much larger than my 'old' girls, and have better type. These came from a local woman who got them for 'barnyard color', not specifically for breeding, but she let me have 2 of her girls to add to my bunch. (i REALLY want her roo... he's MASSIVE!) but i haven't gotten any good pics of the new girls with the rest of the flock yet... hopefully soon.

 

[alisar]

Hello Dorking club, I purchased some Dorking pullets earlier this month from Ideal. Could you tell me if the ones with white feathers are actually Roosters? The white banded wing ones are growing in white/cream colored feathers along the armpit/chest and the brown ones are coming in dark brown.

 

[Rockashelle]

Alisar - looks like you may have to cockerels & two pullets. Are they SG's or colored dorkings? I don't know what Ideal sells. If I remember right, just SG's.

 

[alisar]

Silvers. The white wing feather ones are the boys?

 

[Rockashelle]

Yep! I'm afraid so.