Bob Blosl's Heritage Large Fowl Thread

[Yellow House Farm]

I've read Bob's posts and articles where he says that a trio will get you about 5 years of good breeding without needing new blood refresh the gene pool, so I'm wondering what you're getting for the $500-$600 that will last a life-time. If $300 gets you a sound trio, does $600 get you 2 trios, or 1 really good top of the line trio?

Well, pricing is hard to say. A sound trio that is not a sibling mating should get you at least five years. Starting with three or four pairs can get you very far, indeed. You just keep their pedigree and control your matings. If you start with two pair, you'll go far. It would be nice to have someone in the same boat with you. Bob mentions it a lot, but having a partner is great. Every so many years, you can exchange cockerels.

When buying a trio, how far removed from the cockerl should the hens be? Surely not brother-sister. But what about cousins? Aunt-nephew? Uncle-neice? 2nd cousins? Or, grandpas cousins great grand-daugher twice removed?

Don't buy sibling matings. Don't buy from anyone who can't tell you whether or not it's a sibling mating. There are all sorts of possible permutations. The breeder selling to you should be able to explain to you where they are and where you'd be better off going with them.

What about the hens? Could they be sisters? Or would you prefer something else?

Sure, the assumption is that you're going to map out your matings, and you can do a lot with birds from one clan. The question is whether or not you're going to be totally self-contained or not, i.e. whether you're going to have a partner, or a community connection or not. Being totally self-contained requires a modicum of numbers. A lot of people don't want to have that many spaces and coops, etc... In such a case, I wouldn't recommend going for the rarest of the rare. If you start out with Silver Pencilled Hamburgs but only want to maintain two cock-birds, you're asking for trouble down the road, but if you go for Brown Leghorns and only want to keep two cocks, you'll be fine.

How far removed should 2 trios be?

On a side note, 3 15-22week old started pullets from Murray is about $20ea, shipping is $100. So you're $160 in to get juvenile hatchery stock(without a rooster). Seems to me that to pay $200, will get you quality just above hatchery. Maybe at $300, you're starting to get somewhere. By the time you consider tagging, hard culling, time, feed, etc., $300 sounds like a steal and $400-$500 gets you something worth breeding.

Indeed, I think that few breeders actually ask what their stock deserves.

Keep in mind, I only have hatchery stock right now, but my SOP is on the way and I just subscribed to the Poultry Press. That's $100 just to start learning about SOP chickens.

Bravo! And you're going to do great. Have you started attending shows? What are you hoping to do breed wise?

Most of all, stay open, which it sounds like you are--buying your standard is a good sign. So very much about what I know is the inheritance of reading and mentoring--doing what I'm told. So often I'm with somebody who has it all figured out, and I can't tell them anything. They tell me what they're up to, and I know they're going to crash and burn. So often, if I try to say something, they just try to further justify what they're doing. What good it that? If a breeder you know from the shows, who seems well connected, and intent on getting things right is telling you you're heading for a stone wall, put on the breaks. Stay open to change and program adjustment.

I'm telling you what, we talk about individual breeders--maybe. I know that's not my case. These birds keep getting better, and I can say truly that it's a work of collaboration. Yes, I pay the grain bill and shovel the bedding, but every year poultry friends and judges make the tour, check it out, tell me what they think is good, voice their opinion on where they think I should go. At the shows it's, of course, more of the same. I constantly have a little notebook in my back pocket so that anything the old breeders and judges drop gets scribbled down as quick as I can. I volunteer to clerk with every chance I get. I admittedly corner judges and breeders, whatever they're doing, I want to watch. Even if it's about a seemingly completely different breed, they're going drop a ton of info that with a little tweeking can be transcontextualized into a scenario that will advance my breeding programs.

Once you decide on a breed and variety, now's the time to start shopping for the fall. You want to set your purchase up ahead of time and not come sliding into home at the last moment.

Best of luck!

 

[Yellow House Farm]

So many good points. Think how many White Dorkings you have to hatch per year to get white ones. They don't understand your story like I do. Hatch 800 chicks and only keep three hundred to raise because they have color in their down color from the crosses you had to make to get the type. And maybe only keep twenty to adult hood and breed from them.

Honest to Pete, it has been a haul, and all I did was outcross to another Dorking variety!!! It requires a heck of a stomach for and willingness to cull. Five years later, we've had our best hatching season yet. I culled practically nothing at the incubator door for color. There were a few chicks that looked a bit Red Pyle, and now I have a couple of cockerels and pullets growing out that are bleeding some color: wing bows and salmon breast respectively, but it looks like the worst of the color wars is coming to an end. Before this season, it has been a decrescendo of practically everything Silver and recessive white can drop, which is a lot. I imagine in another season or two, I'll have it completely contained--it will only have taken six or seven years (!!).

Colors aside, what was astounding was taking two basically alright typed Dorking varieties and in the crossing get any number of different types. Types you never would have predicted. The first season, every single one of the pullets was blue-legged. I didn't get a single pullet with white legs, even though every one of the parent birds were white legged and would have bred white legs in a pure mating.

This season I only have had a few birds with blue in the leg, none with solid blue, and the type is looking really strong. Still, I'm breeding from 8% of the birds I raised out last year, and that has been the rhythm for five years. A friend was over the other day who has seen this project from the get-go, and she was remarking how beautiful and uniform everything is. I'm crossing my fingers and feeling pretty happy, but it has taken a lot of chicks and no small financial commitment. In a couple of years I'll be forty, and this literally will have been the poultry project of my thirties. I started with these eight years ago, made the necessary outcross five years ago, I think in two years they'll be predictably what they need to be, but even then, I'm thinking of your 92 point bird. How long before Super Grand Champ?....well....How long do I have before I retire?

 

[thedragonlady]

Honest to Pete, it has been a haul, and all I did was outcross to another Dorking variety!!! It requires a heck of a stomach for and willingness to cull. Five years later, we've had our best hatching season yet. I culled practically nothing at the incubator door for color. There were a few chicks that looked a bit Red Pyle, and now I have a couple of cockerels and pullets growing out that are bleeding some color: wing bows and salmon breast respectively, but it looks like the worst of the color wars is coming to an end. Before this season, it has been a decrescendo of practically everything Silver and recessive white can drop, which is a lot. I imagine in another season or two, I'll have it completely contained--it will only have taken six or seven years (!!).

Colors aside, what was astounding was taking two basically alright typed Dorking varieties and in the crossing get any number of different types. Types you never would have predicted. The first season, every single one of the pullets was blue-legged. I didn't get a single pullet with white legs, even though every one of the parent birds were white legged and would have bred white legs in a pure mating.

This season I only have had a few birds with blue in the leg, none with solid blue, and the type is looking really strong. Still, I'm breeding from 8% of the birds I raised out last year, and that has been the rhythm for five years. A friend was over the other day who has seen this project from the get-go, and she was remarking how beautiful and uniform everything is. I'm crossing my fingers and feeling pretty happy, but it has taken a lot of chicks and no small financial commitment. In a couple of years I'll be forty, and this literally will have been the poultry project of my thirties. I started with these eight years ago, made the necessary outcross five years ago, I think in two years they'll be predictably what they need to be, but even then, I'm thinking of your 92 point bird. How long before Super Grand Champ?....well....How long do I have before I retire?

Another great post ! Thinking about the long haul is what separates breeders from propagators, and sheep from goats.

 

[finnfur]

I posted this in the DELAWARES from Kathyinmo thread but thought it would be interesting here:


TALE OF THE SCALE;
OK its 5 weeks and thats our wing tag day- when we tag them we weigh them - the KIMNIM line is my BLUE tag line.
I have another line from two breeders [ not hatchery ] that are 5 weeks older . These are my RED tag line. All were weighed at 5 weeks. Same feed and schedule for both.
11 RED line averaged 9.29 ounces [ there are only 4 pullets in RED line ]
14 BLUE line averaged 11.57 ounces [ there are approx 7 pullets in this line and one WR that is below the average]
Thats a whopping 24% better weight gain

Just moved them from brooder pen to 10x10 pen . We can not free range in the enet till they get 10 weeks . they are to small body wise and can slip thru the netting. At this rate however the BLUE line may be ready in 8 weeks LOL
I'm impressed. The RED line is a more social group . Blue a little skittish."

Just shows the difference in quality

 

[colburg]

 

[fowlman01]

I posted this in the DELAWARES from Kathyinmo thread but thought it would be interesting here:


TALE OF THE SCALE;
OK its 5 weeks and thats our wing tag day- when we tag them we weigh them - the KIMNIM line is my BLUE tag line.
I have another line from two breeders [ not hatchery ] that are 5 weeks older . These are my RED tag line. All were weighed at 5 weeks. Same feed and schedule for both.
11 RED line averaged 9.29 ounces [ there are only 4 pullets in RED line ]
14 BLUE line averaged 11.57 ounces [ there are approx 7 pullets in this line and one WR that is below the average]
Thats a whopping 24% better weight gain

Just moved them from brooder pen to 10x10 pen . We can not free range in the enet till they get 10 weeks . they are to small body wise and can slip thru the netting. At this rate however the BLUE line may be ready in 8 weeks LOL
I'm impressed. The RED line is a more social group . Blue a little skittish."

Just shows the difference in quality

Great information. Kathy has some huge Del males.

Walt

 

[cluck-cluck]

May I ask another newb/small time question? I have a good mama raising 3 2 week old chicks and I've definitely noticed these chicks are growing bigger and stronger than their parents did (probably because of actually being raised by their mama). I have 2 chicks that hatched via incubator, and I would so love to add them to this broody's clutch, but I'm worried the difference in age is too great. Do you think that if I waited a week, so these 2 chicks get their legs under them, I could add them in the night to the broody mama's clutch?

I think mama will accept them, however, they won't be able to jump down the ramp until they're about a week old, but another thing I could do is put a heat lamp in the coop so they don't get too cold while mama is outside with the others. But I have no idea how that would work out?

Thanks for your time and insight.

 

[Lacy Blues]

One of the issues you'll face with chicks that old is whether THEY will accept HER as their mama and provider. They'll probably be terrified of her to begin with. Perhaps with my birds being of a slightly raised energy level

they are more fearful so maybe it depends on whatever breed of chicken you have?

 

[cluck-cluck]

Oh, no, it's the other way around. The two week old chicks are with mama, and I have newborns that I'd like to add to the group. Is this a bad idea? Or a possibility? LOL, thanks so much for bothering to help me on this

 

[Lacy Blues]

Oh, no, it's the other way around. The two week old chicks are with mama, and I have newborns that I'd like to add to the group. Is this a bad idea? Or a possibility? LOL, thanks so much for bothering to help me on this

I was referring to the chicks that are new hatches. The older they get, the less likely they will accept the mama. I had a similar situation not too long ago. One of my girls brooded over some eggs and only one hatched. A week later, I had a couple hatch from my incubator. I waited until these chicks were 3 days old, maybe 4. I wanted to be sure they knew what food was before putting them in a situation with an older chick. I slipped them under her at night when she and the older chick had gone to bed. In the morning when I came out, the mama and older chick were out of the box waiting for food. The two younger ones were still in the box and cold (not COLD but not being kept warm). I had to coax them out of the box and put them at the feeder. After they ate, they wanted warmth but didn't know that the mama was the source. (I think I had to do this maybe 2 or 3 times that day) I had to guide them over to her and she convinced them to get underneath. I think by the end of that day, they knew what she was there for.

So, to make a long story short, I wouldn't wait til they were a week old, just until they are eating good and then slip them under her at night. You'll probably have to lend a helping hand the next day or so until they get the hang of it. Unless you have chickens that are extremely aggressive, I don't really think a two week old will hurt a younger chick.