Blue Orpington

[ol_grayfeather]

I have the option to choose which rooster I want to fertilize my next batch of chicks. In the small pen currently are 5 hens and one of the darker roosters. The other two pics are of the other roosters that I can choose from. I do not have a clue what I should be looking for as far as desireable characteristics. I dont plan on showing or breeding them for anything other that my personal enjoyment, but I dont want to breed bad qualities if I can prevent it.

How long should I have them together before I'm sure I'm getting the correct roosters offspring? All the chickens could access the other sections until last night.

Rooster with 5 hens

Three other roosters and one other hen

another pic of two of the roosters in second pic

As you can see in pic #2 there are also barred rocks, buff orpingtons, RIR, and not pictured are the white rocks. The main reason I'm choosing the Blue Oprpintons is becasue of the "splash" (or so I was told) coloration. I have a gray and white EE hen that I like the color of, so I chose these.

 

[kathyinmo]

The hens should be separarted from the roosters for 3 weeks, then put them with the rooster you want to breed them. They are fertile after one mating.

By the way, thanks for sharing your pictures with us! AND, welcome to BYC ! ! !

 

[joletabey]

There are a couple of threads on here with great pics of Blue Orps- Bamachicken, Miss Prissy, a bunch of other nice people whose names I cannot pull out of my head have posted GREAT pics of beautiful birds. You might scroll down in this section for a page or two and find them- it might help you make a choice.
Good luck!

 

[snowydiamonds]

Please don't leave that one hen alone w/three roo's...get her in safe w/the other hens asap. Your bachelors will be just fine w/each others company while they wait their turn for a flock of hens

 

[BamaChicken]

It is really hard to tell much without a closer up picture of the males. Is there anyway you can get closer photos. You can read about the standard for Orpingtons on the UNITED Orpington Club site. Just google it. The color from what I can tell on the Cock bird in the pen with 5 hens has nice coloring. I can't see if he has any lacing on his chest. The splash doesn't look bad from what I can see in the photo. You might want to put him over your black hens and get all blues with hopefully good lacing. Dark eyes, slate legs, tight wings. Small to medium comb and wattles. 5 points would be perfect. Not leggy. Nice Dark Saddle with slate undercoat. Hope that helps.

 

[ol_grayfeather]

There are about 40 other chickens in there. The doors are open so they're all together. Only the 6 others in the first pic were pulled out yesterday.


These are cell phone pics. I thought it might need to be more detailed.

Guess I'd better start building a bigger pen and add the other hens.


Thanks