Black Copper Marans discussion thread

[BarnGoddess01]

We have only BCMs and five sweetheart Roos but one meanie. He was from a real friendly roo and his offspring so far have not been aggressive. Can it be that Agro is not passing his bad manners on to the chicks ?

Seems to me I read somewhere that the temperament of the off-spring is determined by the hen. In other words, it would be mom passing on the good or bad manners to her boys.

 

[Arielle]

I breed chickens, horses sheep. Temperament comes from both parents. Offspring behave most like the parent it was raised with, ie mom. Tempearment is a characteristic that is reported to the mareowners for selection purposes. I have a couple lambs that are as skiddish as the ram; I have a few roosters as kind as the mother , with one kind rooster and one attack raptor as fathers.

You may have hit on a plan to use IT then cull him. If you continue to cull the difficult temperaments you will have more and more mild tempered creatures. Hope I'm making sense here. GL

 

[BarnGoddess01]

I breed chickens, horses sheep. Temperament comes from both parents. Offspring behave most like the parent it was raised with, ie mom. Tempearment is a characteristic that is reported to the mareowners for selection purposes. I have a couple lambs that are as skiddish as the ram; I have a few roosters as kind as the mother , with one kind rooster and one attack raptor as fathers.

"Temperament in farm animals, such as sheep, cattle and quail, has a strong genetic basis. In sheep, the temperament of young lambs born from a calm or nervous mother is not affected by the genotype of the rearing mother as demonstrated with a cross-fostering experiment (Bickell et al., 2009b). Briefly, the temperament of the cross fostered progeny was assessed at two occasions, one week after birth by measuring locomotor activity during an open-field test and at weaning (16 weeks) by measuring locomotor activity during an arena test and agitation score measured during an isolation box test. At both time points, there was a genotype effect but no maternal or fostering effect on the lamb's behaviour suggesting that temperament in Merino sheep is mainly determined by the genetic transmission of the trait rather than behaviours learned from the mother." (Dominique Blache; Samantha L. Bickell, July 2010)

 

[Arielle]

"Temperament in farm animals, such as sheep, cattle and quail, has a strong genetic basis. In sheep, the temperament of young lambs born from a calm or nervous mother is not affected by the genotype of the rearing mother as demonstrated with a cross-fostering experiment (Bickell et al., 2009b). Briefly, the temperament of the cross fostered progeny was assessed at two occasions, one week after birth by measuring locomotor activity during an open-field test and at weaning (16 weeks) by measuring locomotor activity during an arena test and agitation score measured during an isolation box test. At both time points, there was a genotype effect but no maternal or fostering effect on the lamb's behaviour suggesting that temperament in Merino sheep is mainly determined by the genetic transmission of the trait rather than behaviours learned from the mother." (Dominique Blache; Samantha L. Bickell, July 2010)

Interesting.

In horses, I carefully screen broodmares because the foals copy the behaviors of the dam. One colt kicks out after starting to eat his grain--he started this after weaning! All foals from one mare who dunks her hay in the drinking water also dunks their hay. The temperament can be inherited from either parent. I have quiet mares. So occasionally have bred to a high strung stallion and can see the result in the foal. Since then I ONLY select 10 temperaments in a stallion.

My current ram is standoffish. In the 2 replacement lambs I kept, they are loco. Unreasonably skiddish. WIll see if this second lamb crop is the same. If so I may stop using this ram and find a new ram with a better temperament.

Temperment is genetic. Behaviors are often copies of the dam/mother.

 

[BarnGoddess01]

Quote:

Temperament is extremely complex, I'm sure, and is effected by many things (both genetic and environmental/learning) which is a huge part of why breeding can be such a complicated proposition!!

What I found MOST fascinating doing the search on this stuff was discovering that broodiness is passed on by the male! Apparently, we know which chromosome "broodiness" resides on and that chromosome is only passed on by the male. Certainly flies in the face of the anecdotal evidence so many would pass on (broody raised babies tend to go broody.) But I guess that's why we can claim certain breeds tend to broodiness more than others.

 

[kefiren]

Thanks, everyone, for your interesting thoughts on temperaments and behaviors.

My two roos (with opposite temperaments) had the same father, unknown if they had the same mother.

Unknown whether dad was sweet, but the breeder had the sort of chicken set-up in which you just do things around the edges.

MacDaddy has always been so darn robust and i wonder if he is just naturally filled with lots of testosterone--a state of health for a robust male! But how much is temperament and how much is just the male mojo? Once when he was still in the brooder he pecked my finger and with my finger still in his mouth he looked up at me for my reaction! He just can't help himself.

I have an OE roo that is SO sweet but he doesn't manage to breed all his hens...

Oh well, I'm not set up to keep the cowboys, just the poets!

 

[Arielle]

I understand. I have 2 boys, black sexlinks from MM hatchery, so I don't know how related they are. One is named Raptor as he was ascerting his dominance at an early age, by a month old he was the top chicken of 26. He pecked everyone to make his point, except us. That came as he matured and as a free ranging bird my boys carry sticks and have endured many attacks. (They will not let him go for soup!) THe second black sexlink was very insubordinate, very slow to mature, slow to learn mating the hens (months behind the other rooster). This one is the favorite of my boys and is easily approached and scooped up for an in-house visit. WHen my boys are home ,like now for school vaca, I keep the overly protective rooster penned most of the day as I can do that.

Not sure we really answered your question; or provided enough information to help youu make a decision. For what it is worth, I had a slow maturing SSH, a tiny thing that dethroned Raptor as top dog, but he has never attacked. THen the FBC marans grew up and they dethroned the SSH and have never attacked us either.

I generally think that if you breed it you will repeat it to some degree, from rarely to often. Just know that selection can improve the temperament of the whole flock over the generations. GL

 

[BarnGoddess01]

I'm lucky right now. My two Marans boys (Black and Blue Coppers) are the nicest boys I've ever had on the property - to me and the hens. (A bit suspect with strangers - we free-range here - but I really couldn't ask for better, nicer boys.) My Ameraucanas, on the other hand, are not so nice - to me or the girls. They aren't the worst boys I've had but they aren't as nice as my Marans who are REALLY setting a high bar. However, they are improving with age. They are just 10 months old now and I'm finding as they mature, they are mellowing. So perhaps if you give it more time?

 

[culler]

Question for the experts. If as most are saying the female produces the mean and nasty males, what would you have to do to figure out that a female was producing these besides single mate and keep the males to see if they turn out mean.

I can give you some info on what I know to be a fact. I have a long Gamefowl background as I was born into the Gamefowl family. If you have a mean male and breed him you will get mean males from the breeding. Very simple just cull the mean males and go forward. The occasional male that will hit you can be trained not to do that.

 

[chicken-whisperer]

Temperament is extremely complex, I'm sure, and is effected by many things (both genetic and environmental/learning) which is a huge part of why breeding can be such a complicated proposition!!

What I found MOST fascinating doing the search on this stuff was discovering that broodiness is passed on by the male! Apparently, we know which chromosome "broodiness" resides on and that chromosome is only passed on by the male. Certainly flies in the face of the anecdotal evidence so many would pass on (broody raised babies tend to go broody.) But I guess that's why we can claim certain breeds tend to broodiness more than others.

I agree this is fascinating, I guess Agro is destined for soup even though he is nice looking. Now I think back on my breeding and I used to have many more broody hens. Maybe I have some how, by breeding for type (SOP) reduced this trait. Are BCMs originally bred to not be broody.