Breeding Bantam Rooster with Standard Hen

[YeastyNissan]

New here, sorry if formatting/forum area is incorrect.

I have 2 silver sebright roosters that are housed with:
2 sapphire gem
2 black sex link
1 easter egger
2 light brahma
1 golden laced wyandotte
2 silver laced wyandotte
1 barred rock
8 buff Orpington

I'm curious to know if these bantams can fertilize the eggs of any/all of these hens, all are laying age except the roosters and the buffs are only 8 weeks right now. Wondering what results if any I could expect for fertilization and breeding results for next year. They don't have to be great layers or anything, I just enjoy having chickens and getting some eggs from them and I'd like to see what possibilities I could look forward to or not.

 

[LadiesAndJane]

New here, sorry if formatting/forum area is incorrect.

I have 2 silver sebright roosters that are housed with:
2 sapphire gem
2 black sex link
1 easter egger
2 light brahma
1 golden laced wyandotte
2 silver laced wyandotte
1 barred rock
8 buff Orpington

I'm curious to know if these bantams can fertilize the eggs of any/all of these hens, all are laying age except the roosters and the buffs are only 8 weeks right now. Wondering what results if any I could expect for fertilization and breeding results for next year. They don't have to be great layers or anything, I just enjoy having chickens and getting some eggs from them and I'd like to see what possibilities I could look forward to or not.

Welcome to BYC!
Yes, your little Sebrights can fertilize the hens eggs you have. The resulting offspring will likely be somewhere between the sizes of the parents. You will have many chicks with incomplete lacing and some with full lacing (with the laced hens). In my experience egg production seems to favor the mother’s breed in cross breeds.
Good luck, looking forward to seeing the chicks you get.

 

[YeastyNissan]

Welcome to BYC!
Yes, your little Sebrights can fertilize the hens eggs you have. The resulting offspring will likely be somewhere between the sizes of the parents. You will have many chicks with incomplete lacing and some with full lacing (with the laced hens). In my experience egg production seems to favor the mother’s breed in cross breeds.
Good luck, looking forward to seeing the chicks you get.

Is there a way to tell if eggs are fertilized before incubation? I'm seeing stuff about 3-7 days with candling, but if possible I'd like to make sure I'm not fertilizing a bunch of eggs that would have been good for eating instead. And thank you for the information, I'm curious to see what they may produce next spring, my hope is to get them fertilizing eggs early and hatch my own so I can see what varieties lay better and stuff in early summer

 

[LadiesAndJane]

Is there a way to tell if eggs are fertilized before incubation? I'm seeing stuff about 3-7 days with candling, but if possible I'd like to make sure I'm not fertilizing a bunch of eggs that would have been good for eating instead. And thank you for the information, I'm curious to see what they may produce next spring, my hope is to get them fertilizing eggs early and hatch my own so I can see what varieties lay better and stuff in early summer

You can crack open some eggs to see if they are fertile, which obviously means you can no longer incubate it. You should see what is known as a "bullseye" in the yolk. This will look like a ring around the small white dot.

 

[LadiesAndJane]

Better picture:

 

[LadiesAndJane]

Oh and people eat fertile eggs all the time. It can not become a chick until the incubation is started.

 

[YeastyNissan]

You can crack open some eggs to see if they are fertile, which obviously means you can no longer incubate it. You should see what is known as a "bullseye" in the yolk. This will look like a ring around the small white dot.
View attachment 3239760

Thank you, do you think there's a large chance of most of the eggs (from the ones they mate with) to be fertile, or should I expect a worse probability of fertilization from such a small rooster breeding a large hen?

 

[YeastyNissan]

Oh and people eat fertile eggs all the time. It can not become a chick until the incubation is started.

Yes I was just concerned about eating an egg that's been in an incubator, I'm not sure if they spoil under the heat for a few days to a week. It's not that big of a deal if I have duds, I'd just like to avoid wasting food and time on unfertilized eggs if that makes sense

 

[LadiesAndJane]

Yes I was just concerned about eating an egg that's been in an incubator, I'm not sure if they spoil under the heat for a few days to a week. It's not that big of a deal if I have duds, I'd just like to avoid wasting food and time on unfertilized eggs if that makes sense

Thank you, do you think there's a large chance of most of the eggs (from the ones they mate with) to be fertile, or should I expect a worse probability of fertilization from such a small rooster breeding a large hen?

I did not mean eating ones that have already been in the incubator, though I have heard that folks feed them to their pets (dogs, cats, etc). Rather, eating fertile eggs that have NOT been incubated. Once your birds are of age and you have seen them mate, then you can crack open a few to see if they are fertile, before setting any.
You would be surprised how well these tiny roosters figure out how to mate the larger hens.

 

[NatJ]

It's not that big of a deal if I have duds, I'd just like to avoid wasting food and time on unfertilized eggs if that makes sense

There will probably be a point when the cockerels are figuring things out, when some hens are laying fertile eggs and some are not. It will probably go by hens-- this one lets him mate, so her eggs are fertile, but that one doesn't so her eggs are infertile.

But once those cockerels finish growing up and get good at mating, I would expect every egg from every hen to be fertile.

If you don't want to incubate dud eggs, checking for the bullseye on eggs you are going to eat anyway is a way to see if you've reached the point when they are all fertile. You might still get a few duds, but you should be able to avoid an incubator full of all duds.

And if you do incubate eggs and they turn out to be duds, you can cook them up and feed them to your chickens rather than throwing them away. I've done that with eggs after a week in the incubator. They looked & smelled fine, so if I were really short of food I would probably eat them myself (haven't actually tried eating them, just thought about it.)