Barnevelder breeders lets work together and improve the breed

[tls_ranch]

Updated pics of the project chicks from the New Years hatch. They free range during the day and hang out amongst the pots in my plant "nursery" area. Naughty kids are always digging in the potting soil and knocking over the pots. Boy do they run and hide when they hear hawks or even see other birds. Pretty smart for little ones Very hardy chicks and they've been in an outside brooder without a heat lamp since they were 4 weeks old. Always foraging and eating the green grass. I'm lucky because my two labs sit and guard the chicks most of the time.

A few of the black and blue pullets. .



The splash pullet. What a pet and sweetest thing ever... always begging to be held or flying up to land on you when you don't expect it (a bit of a pest also). She doesn't have good as lacing, but is double laced if you look at her newer feathers coming in.


Two of the best blue cockerels....had six and kept these two to grow out. The front one is huge and lighter blue in color. He's friendly, bold and the dominate one. The back one is darker, has a nice head and may have a bit better lacing. He is actually bigger than he looks and was the second biggest chick in the group. I also kept a huge black cockerel. He's even bigger than the blue ones and is looking exceptionally nice. I'll try and get a good pic of him later.

 

[enggass]

Nice. Splash girl is a beauty! Love her grey head...
S

 

[Happy Chooks]

Beautiful Trisha!

I've got 19 barnevelder eggs in the bator now. 14 are pure Johan and 5 are mine from my pair from Trisha. (hopefully there will be a 6th to add if my girl gives me an egg today)

 

[BlueCamas]

I don't have any bantams, but I like the first pullet the best

. She looks like she's going to have nice lacing, has a nice body and really nice shaped head. The last pullet's lacing looks a little to "mossy" to me when compared to the other two. The darker cockerels with less red would probably produce better marked pullets.

Trisha

Thanks for the input! What do you mean by "mossy"?
So I should pick one of the darker cockerels for breeding then?

 

[pinkchick]

I love this girls head!!!!!!

Okay so here is my updates.

I found a wonderful home for my Roo, Stormy, he was supposed to go to his new home on Valentine’s day. Then the day before, I got home and went to do the feeding and watering and he was dead. I don’t know how or why, thought it might be snakes, he was totally fine the day before that. I was so upset!

Now, I am down to 1 Roo and 4 Hens. Of those 4, 3 are Barnies but only 1 is even remotely good enough to breed. 1 of the “Barnies” looks a LOT like a very poorly breed Welsummer. The other hen is a Barred Plymouth Rock. So that brings me to my next “project”, this is just for fun but I want BarneBars. The reasoning is twofold, one they are “Auto sexing” not “Sex Linked” so I should always be able to tell boys from girls upon hatching. Next, their colors are not the prettiest but still pretty neat and I think they would blend in well where I live in the TX hill country. Which should mean better predator protection. I have read that they do lay a dark brown egg and are also very friendly. Finally, I think my main reason is I love my BPR she is the best and I just want some of her babies and this is my excuse LOL! Anyone have any experiance with BarneBars?

Below is a pic of my best Barnie girl (Left) named Bella (again not saying is perfect, just the best I have) and my worst Barnie girl (Right) appropriately named Shaggy. The one in the background is my first Barnie "Charlie" (thought she was a roo). Lucy, BPR, is of course not in this shot. You know you don't have enough chickens if all of them have names and you can tell the difference between ALL of them in a split second. The second pic is a slightly better one of Bella.

 

[pinkchick]

Updated pics of the project chicks from the New Years hatch. They free range during the day and hang out amongst the pots in my plant "nursery" area. Naughty kids are always digging in the potting soil and knocking over the pots. Boy do they run and hide when they hear hawks or even see other birds. Pretty smart for little ones Very hardy chicks and they've been in an outside brooder without a heat lamp since they were 4 weeks old. Always foraging and eating the green grass. I'm lucky because my two labs sit and guard the chicks most of the time.

A few of the black and blue pullets. .



The splash pullet. What a pet and sweetest thing ever... always begging to be held or flying up to land on you when you don't expect it (a bit of a pest also). She doesn't have good as lacing, but is double laced if you look at her newer feathers coming in.


Two of the best blue cockerels....had six and kept these two to grow out. The front one is huge and lighter blue in color. He's friendly, bold and the dominate one. The back one is darker, has a nice head and may have a bit better lacing. He is actually bigger than he looks and was the second biggest chick in the group. I also kept a huge black cockerel. He's even bigger than the blue ones and is looking exceptionally nice. I'll try and get a good pic of him later.

 

[pinkchick]

Many, many great hatching vibes coming to you Kelly!

I'm going to toss in this weeks eggs and whatever they give me next week with your Wellie eggs. If the rough handling did them in and you don't get a good hatch...I can send you the collection of Barnie eggs if you want them.

 

[mountainvieworchards]

Hi Rachel

In breeding your BarnieBars as you call them if you put a male barnie on a BPR hen you will get essentially black sex links, where the males are barred and the females are black, perhaps with some brown in the hackles and breast. You may also get a shot of hybrid vigor from the cross, especially if your BPR is from a good laying strain like mine are. Black F1 pullets will not have the barring gene, so you will have to use the barred F1 rooster on a barnie hen. I have never gone past the initial cross. But to get a pure barred line you will have to do lots of breeding until you get Barnie type and homozygous for barred. I too am a big fan of the Plymouth Rocks, I always had at least a few and I recently bought some eggs reputedly descended from the old E.B Thomson Imperial Ringlets line. Thats a mouthful, but they are the old fashioned big rocks. They will hatch next week. My first Barnies of the season are hatching, I just put the Johan line in the breeding pen this week so I should be getting some pure Johan eggs to set. But like Pink said, we have snow falling here.

Andy

 

[PromiseLand]

Hi Rachel

In breeding your BarnieBars as you call them if you put a male barnie on a BPR hen you will get essentially black sex links, where the males are barred and the females are black, perhaps with some brown in the hackles and breast. You may also get a shot of hybrid vigor from the cross, especially if your BPR is from a good laying strain like mine are. Black F1 pullets will not have the barring gene, so you will have to use the barred F1 rooster on a barnie hen. I have never gone past the initial cross. But to get a pure barred line you will have to do lots of breeding until you get Barnie type and homozygous for barred. I too am a big fan of the Plymouth Rocks, I always had at least a few and I recently bought some eggs reputedly descended from the old E.B Thomson Imperial Ringlets line. Thats a mouthful, but they are the old fashioned big rocks. They will hatch next week. My first Barnies of the season are hatching, I just put the Johan line in the breeding pen this week so I should be getting some pure Johan eggs to set. But like Pink said, we have snow falling here.

Andy

Hi Andy

Great to hear about the coop change, I am still in need of hatching eggs from your Johan line.
I am try to retire my Rooster from which he came from the Johan line and want to bring in fresh GENE's
Please put me on the list, First dibs, ASAP...

Many of you may not know But Johan is sick in the Hospital and is expected to get out in the spring he will only sell eggs locally
and as he recovers and gains strength he will ship out eggs so it will be a long time till we see his eggs.
As well VB has sold all there Barnevelder stock because of family illness, so we have two resources down.

Paul

 

[mountainvieworchards]

HI Paul you are on top of my list! Also thanks for passing on the information about Johan and Christina. They have both played a huge role in the Barnevelder breed in North America and we are all indebted to them for being so good at spreading their wonderful birds around the country. This thread on BYC is a wonderful resource for me and for all of us. I like the title of it and the spirit of cooperation, friendliness and politeness that goes on in here, such a productive forum. Thanks to all of you who keep it going strong and who are doing so many great projects keeping the Barnies alive and improving.

Andy