Birchen Marans Thread

[Broad St Farm]

Are Birchens and the people who breed them that scarce? Never activity on this thread.

 

[mtadkins5]

Ok complete newbie here! I am getting some Birchen Marans chicks in a few weeks and have some questions. These will be my first chickens EVER

So I have some other breeds I am getting and I am wondering if they can be houses together? The other breeds are Blue Double Laced Barnevelders,Light Sussex,Welsummer,Blue Laced Red Wyandotte, Coronation Sussex, Sweddish Flower & Lavender Ameraucans. I have already ordered the Birchen Marans and Blue Double Laced Barnevelders. I have the two breeders picked out on the others. Is 8 breeds too many to have? I just got online and picked what I liked lol.Oh and can you keep French Black Copper Marans and French Blue Copper Marans[FONT=Arial, Verdana, sans-serif] with Birchen Marans?[/FONT]

 

[Broad St Farm]

Ok complete newbie here! I am getting some Birchen Marans chicks in a few weeks and have some questions. These will be my first chickens EVER

So I have some other breeds I am getting and I am wondering if they can be houses together? The other breeds are Blue Double Laced Barnevelders,Light Sussex,Welsummer,Blue Laced Red Wyandotte, Coronation Sussex, Sweddish Flower & Lavender Ameraucans. I have already ordered the Birchen Marans and Blue Double Laced Barnevelders. I have the two breeders picked out on the others. Is 8 breeds too many to have? I just got online and picked what I liked lol.Oh and can you keep French Black Copper Marans and French Blue Copper Marans [COLOR=291403] with Birchen Marans? [/COLOR]

You can keep all of them together as long as they are roughly the same size or age and you introduce them to each other properly. You don't want a lot of major fighting going on. Now the problem is this. If you are planning on doing major breeding of your Marans to the SOP then no. You will get a bunch of Marans crosses and they will end up being unusable. As for housing all the Marans together. You can but I would recommend it. It all depends on your breeding goals are. Each variety brings positives and negatives to a breeding program. Birchens I would not have with either Black or Blue. Breeding a Birchen to a Black Copper will bring the Copper or Red gene into Birchens which you don't want to express. Some people do it to darken the egg color, but then you will be culling a ton because of the red leakage. A lot of options though. I guess I have to ask what your intent or goal is first. Just a nice flock, or are you breeding them. People always get them for enjoyment and later end up breeding them. It happens the majority of the time. So start you foundation of right so you don't have problems in the future.

 

[mtadkins5]

You can keep all of them together as long as they are roughly the same size or age and you introduce them to each other properly. You don't want a lot of major fighting going on. Now the problem is this. If you are planning on doing major breeding of your Marans to the SOP then no. You will get a bunch of Marans crosses and they will end up being unusable. As for housing all the Marans together. You can but I would recommend it. It all depends on your breeding goals are. Each variety brings positives and negatives to a breeding program. Birchens I would not have with either Black or Blue. Breeding a Birchen to a Black Copper will bring the Copper or Red gene into Birchens which you don't want to express. Some people do it to darken the egg color, but then you will be culling a ton because of the red leakage. A lot of options though. I guess I have to ask what your intent or goal is first. Just a nice flock, or are you breeding them. People always get them for enjoyment and later end up breeding them. It happens the majority of the time. So start you foundation of right so you don't have problems in the future.

Thank you for your response! I am not wanting to be a breeder by no means. At some point I would like to have SOME chicks just for my family see the process.I am not getting the Black and Blue Coppers I was just wondering. What is SOP and culling?

 

[Broad St Farm]

The SOP is the Standards Of Perfections set forth by the APA or American Poultry Association. When a breed is accepted and recognized by the APA they create an SOP for the breed. This sop is the standard or guidelines that breeders refer to and work towards. The better a bird conforms or resembles what is stated on the sop then the nicer the bird is overall. It usually really comes into play if a breeder is showing his birds. But I am a breeder of Marans. I haven't shown any birds yet, but I am trying to breed to resemble what the sop states. You can get an sop book from the APA. However, in the book it doesn't list Marans. Marans were just recently accepted by the APA. And only Black Coppers and Wheatons. All the other no. Birchen SOP has been written but it hasn't been accepted. So as a bird is maturing and you see it develop something negative that is bad in the sop two things happen. You either realize it and feel that though not the best quality you want your bird to have. You decide to keep it and use them in your breeding anyway or cull. Cull means a couple things. The basic is not include it in your breeding program. Now it could be that I sell it as a backyard layer, or I humanely dispatch it and eat it. Lets so two examples. Our standard for Marans require them to have feathered shanks. I get a bird that has no feathering. Now some breeders cull for this. I don't as its not that difficult to add leg feathering. Now lets say I have a black copper rooster that doesn't show copper at all. He's all black, or lets say he is really thin. No heft to him at all. I'm not going to breed him, he doesn't conform to what a healthy Marans should be. So I remove him from my breeding. Getting it now? There is a Marans SOP thread. First couple pages are the sop discription. If you read over them you will know exactly what I am talking about.

 

[Lilwanis]

Im new to Birchens as well, however not new to Marans. If you havent done so read the Black Copper SOP thread and visit the Marans Discussion thread. Lot of relevent info to use for the Birchens. These birchens are a mess, they are way behind the Black Copper. Unless you are getting consistent type and conformation in your birds I wouldnt even worry about comb points or even leg feathering. Only time I would cull for combs is if the birds comb was a disaster, like Sprigs. Wavy combs somtimes go away as they get older. If they get full grown and have the wave gone. Leg feathering can be improved fairly easy. Egg color, not even worried about until I get the bird right. Build the barn, paint it later. My opinions, and if you just want pretty birds for your backyard, no breeding or showing....forget about what I said.

I started to reply earlier, but got distracted by work. I am making an attempt to breed toward SOP. I am a backyard breeder with limited space, and I live downtown so have legal considerations also. The better term for me is probably wannabe breeder, lol. Out of twelve birchen marans that I have hatched or purchased, 10 are cockerels. One female was culled as she had a birth defect (club foot). She is now a happy part of a small backyard flock. I have read the sop off of the marans website, I didn't know there was an sop thread here, I will look it up. I have read a portion of the marans thread. Most of these boys will be dinner sometime around October. I had intended to keep two boys and three or more females for each. With only one female I don't really know where to go now. I suppose I can keep her and one of the boys. Thank you for your information!

Are Birchens and the people who breed them that scarce? Never activity on this thread.

It seems to be that way!

The SOP is the Standards Of Perfections set forth by the APA or American Poultry Association. When a breed is accepted and recognized by the APA they create an SOP for the breed. This sop is the standard or guidelines that breeders refer to and work towards. The better a bird conforms or resembles what is stated on the sop then the nicer the bird is overall. It usually really comes into play if a breeder is showing his birds. But I am a breeder of Marans. I haven't shown any birds yet, but I am trying to breed to resemble what the sop states. You can get an sop book from the APA. However, in the book it doesn't list Marans. Marans were just recently accepted by the APA. And only Black Coppers and Wheatons. All the other no. Birchen SOP has been written but it hasn't been accepted. So as a bird is maturing and you see it develop something negative that is bad in the sop two things happen. You either realize it and feel that though not the best quality you want your bird to have. You decide to keep it and use them in your breeding anyway or cull. Cull means a couple things. The basic is not include it in your breeding program. Now it could be that I sell it as a backyard layer, or I humanely dispatch it and eat it. Lets so two examples. Our standard for Marans require them to have feathered shanks. I get a bird that has no feathering. Now some breeders cull for this. I don't as its not that difficult to add leg feathering. Now lets say I have a black copper rooster that doesn't show copper at all. He's all black, or lets say he is really thin. No heft to him at all. I'm not going to breed him, he doesn't conform to what a healthy Marans should be. So I remove him from my breeding. Getting it now? There is a Marans SOP thread. First couple pages are the sop discription. If you read over them you will know exactly what I am talking about.

Again, thank you for your information!

 

[Lilwanis]

Btw, how hard is eye color to correct? My boys are young, but one has black eyes. They may lighten up, I don't know, but they are definitely wrong. So far, he is the only blue, the best size, the most color (silver) coming through (not sure if it is too much straw color), and in my opinion has the best shape overall. Such a pretty boy! His comb flops in the back and his eyes are different than the others (they have green eyes, which I have seen turn to the appropriate orangey color with my RIR). They are only twelve weeks, so lots of growing to do.

 

[Lilwanis]

Ok, so the black eye is a DQ, so hopefully he outgrows that. Also, I counted from their hatch day and they are eleven weeks today, so still have a LOT of growing to do. I don't like the idea of only keeping one roo, so I will put one with the layer flock, or let him stick with the lav am girls and the EE and get some OE's split for lavender (I guess that's what they would be). Anyone have any spare pullets? I could try straight run chicks again, but right now I have a 90% roo to hen ration that rout, lol.

 

[GaryDean26]

My experience is that the black eyes are usually the over melonized birds. They will turn orange eventually it just may take a year on some of them for the pigment to balance out. I personally am breeding towards birds turn to the orange color early on. I just like the orange eyes to show early since that is all I see of most of them (cockerels rarely last more than 20 weeks).

At least you got some pullets and will be able to hatch a lot of home brown chicks next season. I got 100% cockerels from a Rare line of BCM cockerels last year. I still have two of the cockerels who are now over a year old, but have not be able to find any available pullets from that line so I will be forced to out cross to other Marans lines or else give up on that line all together.

 

[Lilwanis]

My especirence is that the black eyes are ussually the over melonized birds. They will turn orange eventually it just may take a year on some of them for the pigment to balance out. I personally am breeding towards birds turn to the orange coloror early on. I just like the orange eyes to show early since that is all I see of most of them (cockerels rarly last more than 20 weeks).

At least you got some pullets and will be able to hatch a lot of home brown chicks next season. I got 100% cockerels from a Rare line of BCM cockerels last year. I still have two of the cockerels who are now over a year old, but have not be able to find any available pullets from that line so I will be forced to out cross to other Marans lines or else give up on that line all together.

Actually, only one pullet. I can still breed her and hope to get some girls from her. I had a second girl, but her foot was very deformed. I sold her as a layer for a back yard flock and she is now one of three, very spoiled, pet chickens (when I saw the person was building a coop on FaceBook, I PM'd them to see if they wanted my spares...perfect chicken mom).

So...I am starting to think that the Marans only produce males. At least I am going to be well fed. No one seems to want my boys here in SLC,

No one has any females either, other than my one girl, poor thing. I just need to buy a farm so I can have more birds (DH emphatically disagrees with me). 20 weeks is really a deadline here also. I know there is still a lot that can change, but I can't keep ten crowing roosters that long in the middle of the city. My property is grandfathered so I can have roosters, but I don't want to push my luck.