Backyard breeding projects, need help and opinions!

[noplacebo]

Hi,
I hope this is the right forum for this..

I've recently built up a little flock in my backyard of a variety of breeds of chickens (and 2 ducks.. buy they're just trouble). The eldest hens have been laying for a few months now and I want to start incubating some eggs. I'd like to keep breeding my flock and raise a few friendly hens for neighbours and friends, but I want to make sure I improve the genetics of my flock and produce useful offspring.

So far the bizarre little flock includes:

8 month old cock - ISA-Brown (sex-linked RIRxRIW or other unk white)

Two 8 month old pullets - RIRs. One is darker than the other and has some poorly connected feathers on its back (silkie like) making it trouble in the wet.

15week old pullets:
-Light sussex, curved beak, very friendly
-Barred Plymouth Rock, very meaty, friendly
-double laced Barnvelder, shy, small, beautiful feathers, maturing earliest.

Two 9 week old pullets - black Australorps, both very friendly and early maturing

and recently I purchased a Red/Black cock and Black/golden laced cape bantam cochins, both 22 weeks old, not related, with plans to breed them.

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Okay - Questions:

1) Bantam Cochin male:

How sucessful should I expect his matings to be? Is it advisable to trim his feathers around his tail and vent (and her feathers) to assist? Will he be able to mate with any of the larger hens?

I believe the australorps are fairly small and would like them to mate eventually, but my housemate caught the bantam roo apparently mating with a 9wk old australorp pullet. Is this ok for her?? (they sleep together for the extra warmth, no other troubles with behaviour)


2) RIR x ISA-Brown:

Any advice on x'ing the hybrid back with the RIR's would be greatly appreciated. Any info on the "silkie" gene in the RIRs. Any idea what the offspring will be like/how the genetics of the colours works. Any info on the ISA-brown hybrid.

I'm hoping to produce some less friendly dual purpose backyard chooks with them. If possible sex-linked would be nice as something to work towards (it's a hobby/obsession

)


3) Breeding a backyard bird aimed at meat:

The plymoth rock is amazing. cute, beefy with a great stumpy tail and lovely stripes. What will happen if I cross it with the ISA-brown? Is it worth getting a plymoth roo? what other (full size) roo may fit into my flock?


4) Breeding a backyard bird aimed at eggs:

The australorps and the light sussex are amazingly friendly and are both said to be great layers. I'd like to breed some small friendly layers, is this possible with the bantam cochin roo as a first step? how would it effect egg production? will some be great layers and some hopeless (as it's a hybrid? I have no idea how egg production genetics works).

I'm hoping for a smaller bird which produces a reasonable number of eggs. broodiness/small eggs is fine.


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As you can see lots of thoughts, but I want some opinions before I even begin incubating. (Thinking of buying a digital hovabator off e-bay for $175AU).

Thanks in advance!

Chris.

ps pics to come tomorrow when the sun is shining on the chickens.

 

[noplacebo]

I put together some pics. It's been pouring rain so no new ones, but here they are anyway.

Stewie the ISA Brown cockerel: (At 16wks)

Grommie, Blizzard the Rhode Island Reds and Stewie again: (6 months)

The barnvelder, light sussex pullets and an australorp cockerel who has since been rehomed (at 5 weeks)

The three younger pullets at 9 weeks:

The Australorp pullets:
(at 4 weeks)

(at 6 weeks)

I would love some opinions on the genetics of my flock.

-chris

 

[flyingmonkeypoop]

I will have to read over this again and will probably repost but my first thought is that cochins tend to be poor egg layers and more meaty so maybe swap your mating ideas. Like the isa brown with the layer hens since he comes from laying lines and maybe the cochin with the rock or even the isa brown with the rock for meaty birds.

 

[noplacebo]

Thanks for your reply,
That's a really interesting idea about the cochin as a meat bird. As my cochins are bantams (1kg cockerel, 700g pullet) it hadn't occurred to me.

What restrictions are there when crossing a large and a small bird? is it best to have a large roo/small hen or small hen large roo? Will the offspring be a range of sizes (or the grandchildren) or does large + small = medium?

Thanks again for any thoughts.

chris

 

[flyingmonkeypoop]

I have an old poultry book that mentions crossing a cochin or brahma cock with leghorn hens then back crossing those to a brahma/cochin to make a dual purpose bird. It would seem that even with them being bantam cochins that it would have the same effect.

I have seen tiny little old english game bantam roosters mate huge wyandotte hens with no problems and I have seen huge wyandotte roosters mate with old english game bantam hens and it seems that the big rooster with little hens gave the best fertility but it would seem that a bantam rooster with a large hen would make larger chicks because the eggs are larger. Either crossing would tend to be inbetween and lean closer to the mothers size.

Back to the first questions the isa rooster with the RIR hens should give you great layers.

What about your barnvelder? Also your barred rock and RIR's look great, are they from show lines?