Black Copper Marans discussion thread

[maryhysong]

I use zip ties until I know more about what I am doing and what to breed/cull for.

Are the black bars down the middle of the hackle on the cockerel above acceptable?

I am posting some pics of a cockeral I hatched out about 7 mos ago. I culled the father but want to know if he would be worth holding on to. Mothers egg was a 5 but the two pullets I kept out of this hatch are laying a solid 7 and both are decent from a type standpoint and have excellent color. his guy does have a white feather tip on one of his toe feathers. His comb was frostbitten a little this winter. Please note that he blinked as I took the closeup of his face. His eye is no cloudy. Any comments good or bad will be appreciated...

I too would like to know more about the coloring here, if the black on the hackles like this is what we are trying for, if it's not something we want but is OK or is it undesirable and we should try to breed it out. A lot of my young boys have similar coloring.

 

[PAchickensgalor]

My Black Copper Marans Rooster now has white at the base of two feathers in his tail. I know this is a culling point, but what I don't know is how old do the chickens have to be that I can be fairly certain that they are showing their permanent coloring. I have heard "after the second molt", but I have no idea how chickens are when they go through their second (or first) molt.

 

[Zanna]

My Black Copper Marans Rooster now has white at the base of two feathers in his tail. I know this is a culling point, but what I don't know is how old do the chickens have to be that I can be fairly certain that they are showing their permanent coloring. I have heard "after the second molt", but I have no idea how chickens are when they go through their second (or first) molt.

How old is he and did this just show up? I had a roo come in with two white feathers at the base of his tail when he was 2 1/2, no sign of any white prior. I culled him. To date (5 years), I have never had a youngster with white at the base of tailfeathers.

 

[Turkeytruff]

Ooops! So this is my first time EVER hatching anything out; I have a Brinsea incubator and set the humidity has been 45-46%. This is day 8. Brinsea has a cooling 1 to 2 hours a day option and I set it for 1 hour a day starting from day 7 like they advise. Do you think I should definitely put it down to 30% humidity? I weighed them yesterday (total weight down from 1033 grams to 1000 grams so they have only lost about 2-3 % at day 7 which is not enough but what all the textbooks say).

I candled but couldn't really see anything except MAYBE a couple of aircells because they are so dark... Are the Marans really so different from the other breeds in terms of moisture retention? All the info sites say 40-50%.
I am worried now.....

don't be worried, just make the change now, they may catch up. and keep weighing them and adjust humidity accordingly. you have 10 days left to help them catch up.

Also BTW: I just had 7 blue marans eggs in the incubator. I had them at the lower humidity then at about 60% for hatch and still only one hatched. but they were shipped eggs though.

You need to lower the humidity right away. Marans lose humidity very slowly. You will drown the chicks if you keep it that high. Marans aren't texbook chickens.
I actually dry hatch, no water at all until the last 3 days. Since I started doing that, my hatches are much better

Let me add...... listen to the lady,,,, she knows what she's talking about,,,,, it helped my hatches out tremendously !!!!!!!

Thanks again !

Thanks - I have turned it down to 30%. That's too bad about the shipped eggs!
thank you; I have just lowered it to 30%. what % humidity do you use for your final 3 days? 60% like the other people here or?
Funny how a simple coating can make SO much difference....
The humidity is 40% where I am keeping the incubator (in the basement next to the boiler!) How swampy does it get down south!? We have rain here in the Pacific Northwest almost every day at the moment so it's humid but cold!

thank you I will; I am so glad there are experienced people here!

So it is Day 14: I have candled (so stoked they all are fertile!) but the humidity which is now 30% probably needs to be lower- how low can I go? The loss of moisture from the eggs from Day 1-14 is 6.5% -it should have lost about 2/3 or about 9-10% right? So how low should I put the humidity to make them lose more in the next 5 days? Thank you so much for any answers! BTW the humidity in the room is 40%.

 

[Turkeytruff]

Also should I sandpaper a little bit off the aircell? I am so scared of cracking any of them, this is my first incubation!

 

[Zanna]

Does anyone have a photo they could post of the "purple sheen" that is being discussed here ???
Is there NO green sheen in these birds, or do they present BOTH,,,, Green and Purple when in the sunlight ???
This a discussion I haven't seen before and was hoping someone could elaborate a bit on it please.

DON,,,,, any comments here ???

The pics turned out ok in the dark, the green and purple sheen are brilliant in the sunshine but I think the pics show it well enough. These are both young pullets, first pic. pullet one has no green sheen, only the purple (compare to the green sheen on the cockeral next to her), second and third pic are of the same pullet, she has purple and green.

Quoted from the SOP: "Black Birds, Plumage: Surface -- lustrous greenish black. Undercolour--(except where otherwise specified) dull black in dark-legged varieties, slate in yellow legged varieties." BCM's are not in the current SOP and I do not know whether they are listed under the Black Varieties or not but I would guess so, anyone???

 

[Zanna]

I too would like to know more about the coloring here, if the black on the hackles like this is what we are trying for, if it's not something we want but is OK or is it undesirable and we should try to breed it out. A lot of my young boys have similar coloring.

There was a discussion about this recently, I think on the Marans thread?? I believe this is desirable colouring but please do not quote me, I would like to revisit this discussion but can not find it. The search engine for the threads and I do not get along

 

[Wynette]

Regarding purple versus green sheen; there has been discussion awhile back on the Yahoo Marans forum about this, and some folks believe that a bird that is ER based versus E based will have purple versus green sheen (although I don't recall which was present with which base). There are folks that really want to establish for breeders which base each variety is (should be) as it could be helpful in breeding. I am so new to genetics that I don't understand it all and have a few folks I go to for questions, and I DO personally believe that this sort of information would be extremely helpful. The difficulty, though, is getting it all figured out - as far as what the different "bases" are out there, and what they "ought to" be.

 

[snowbird]

Regarding purple versus green sheen; there has been discussion awhile back on the Yahoo Marans forum about this, and some folks believe that a bird that is ER based versus E based will have purple versus green sheen (although I don't recall which was present with which base). There are folks that really want to establish for breeders which base each variety is (should be) as it could be helpful in breeding. I am so new to genetics that I don't understand it all and have a few folks I go to for questions, and I DO personally believe that this sort of information would be extremely helpful. The difficulty, though, is getting it all figured out - as far as what the different "bases" are out there, and what they "ought to" be.

The only thing I can say for sure on the purple sheen to the black feathers is that it is not wanted in a breeding program and should be culled out. At present I do not think it would be possible to figure out the gene for the different colors because of all the mix and match breeding, not saying it is good or bad just hatit is what it is. The genetics people have said in the past that the Marans would not follow trend like most other breeds because of the crossing with other breeds.
Myself I just keep the Green sheen and cull the Purple.

 

[warmheart]

Zanna, thank you for answering.

I'm hoping for calm, people-friendly birds who lay a very dark egg (of course! ) Thank you on your inpur regarding the difference between Wade Jeane and Bev Davis lines.