Black Copper Marans discussion thread

[Ihilani Coffee]

I'm gettin three BCMs at around Christmas as POL will they lay in the winter ???

My experience is if you have them on good nutrition and 16 hours of light per day, they will lay.

 

[philipchickymad]

My experience is if you have them on good nutrition and 16 hours of light per day, they will lay.

. Well in winter in Ireland I think there is around 10hrs of light bit what food cud they b given for extra nutrition

 

[NestingHillsSC]

That is not the point. I consider spherical eggs a defect. If I had two hens that I considered equal in every way but egg shape the one with the spherical eggs would be sold and I would use the one with elliptical eggs for breeding.

There are whole studies done on egg shape to correlate internal egg quality to egg shape, shell strength to egg shape, egg weight to egg shape, hatchability to egg shape, etc. I haven't read vary many of them and am by no means claiming to be an expert on egg shape, but in the same way that a long skinny egg with both ends being really pointy is defected and needs to be more rounded on the ends and wider to be a well shaped egg, a spherical egg need to have more length to it and to have a recognizable "egg shape" to be a good egg shape. You do not want a pointy egg. The end should be rounded, but if it is not shaped like what you can buy at the store from the perfected egg shape of the $4 billion commercial poultry industry then it isn't what I am looking for as the ideal for my flock.

If your going to cull it, I'll take it!!!!

 

[Ihilani Coffee]

. Well in winter in Ireland I think there is around 10hrs of light bit what food cud they b given for extra nutrition

We just have a 40 watt bulb on a timer in the coops. We raise composting redworms, and they are a good source of extra protein for the breeder birds. We also sprout barley fodder (Google it for ideas) as it is about 20% protein and fresh green feed useful in winter.

 

[GaryDean26]

If your going to cull it, I'll take it!!!!

Yes, I do sell culls as laying hens but they are for local pick up only.

Those spherical eggs are typically about 10 grams lighter than what the eggs from the hens in their hatch group that are laying "egg shaped" eggs.

I found this and thought it might be of interest to some of you.



Something in between the "Short-subelliptical" and the "Subelliptical" on this chart is what my ideal would be. Names I have seen used specifically in the chicken world for egg shapes are "Biconical" and "longitudinal". The biconical being the name for a long oval egg an longitudinal for an extra long elliptical egg.

 

[DMRippy]

The point of the round egg is that it causes darker eggs. Marans should have rounder eggs, thus darker eggs. If you enter rounder eggs in a Marans contest the round ones should win out over reg egg shapes.

It is harder to tell where the air cell is but I can guess pretty well.

 

[GaryDean26]

These are round eggs that are posted on the Black Copper Marans page for Cackel Hatchry.



These are egg from a MCCUSA Marans egg contests. While these all have rounded ends you can easily recognize the small end from the big end and they are NOT spherical like the eggs post a few pages back. They have length to them. I am not sure if they would be categorized more as an elliptical or sub-elliptical,



and here are some from the MCC of American Marans egg contest. Also an elliptical to sub-elliptical.

 

[DMRippy]

Round is preferred in Marans eggs..... really. You can breed what you prefer. Very few people know that and therefor you will not find many round marans eggs.

 

[cyborg]

I'd take square ones if I could get them that dark.

 

[GaryDean26]

Round is preferred in Marans eggs..... really. You can breed what you prefer. Very few people know that and therefor you will not find many round marans eggs.

Well I tossed out the open egg contest judging guide which list spherical eggs as a defective shape and went to the Marans Club de France site. Below is what is listed about the eggs. I find many things about breeding Marans counter intuitive.

The shape of the egg: