Breeding Half Siblings

[ChickonLand]

I have a question about genes and breeding a rooster with hens. This may take a little time to explain. Here is goes!

I have 9 hens from a feed store. They grew up and I let one of my BRs hatch 5 eggs from a family friend who has two Roosters, an Araucana and Dominque. Out of the five eggs, two are roosters. A Leghorn Dom cross and a Delaware Araucana cross. The other three are hens: a leghorn, silkie, and partridge rock. Is it okay for my to breed my roos with the three chicks for new babies in the spring since they may have the same father/rooster?

 

[Fanci Feathers Marans]

Take a look at this, see if it clears anything up.
http://www.maransofamericaclub.com/inbreeding-chickens.html

 

[3riverschick]

Yes it's perfectly alright and probably for several Generations because you have multiple breeds involved here.
just go ahead and breed your birds and be happy. with as many breeds as you have I wouldn't worry about it at all . just select what you like from your birds as you go you may end up developing a whole new look and chickens. The trick is to select for vigorous chicks each year . and from the artist's perspective , to pick virtues you like. Since you're combining several breeds you will see a lot of silliness pop up. traits that are useless, maybe detrimental .do not keep those birds. Do not keep any needy Birds or weak chicks . I can't stress that enough. because for all you know, they're bringing in weakness from two or three different breeds. keep only the most vigorous .what you're looking to do is pull the best out of all of these different breeds that you're breeding together.
select for vigor ; for Health; for temperament ( friendly, curious hens & friendly, noble cocks) and for practical virtues. that's it, have fun!!!
Karen

 

[Ridgerunner]

Champion chickens at chicken shows are developed by inbreeding. All chicken breeds were developed and are maintained by inbreeding. The risk of inbreeding is that you lose genetic diversity or that you enhance negative traits. There are different methods that breeders use to maintain a certain level of genetic diversity. Hatcheries have their own methods.

One standard model used for thousands of years on farms was to keep replacement roosters and hens from their own flock for maybe 4 or 5 generations, then bring in a new rooster to reset genetic diversity. The more hens and roosters they had the longer they could go before inbreeding became a problem.

3Rivers pretty much nailed it. Select only your best chickens to breed. Don't allow defective chickens to make it into your breeding flock. You should be able to go several generations without any problems.

 

[ChickonLand]

Thanks for all the help!

 

[3riverschick]

don't forget pictures! we want pictures when those beautiful little chicks start to feather out ! keep us up-to-date on your project ,it's going to be interesting.
Karen

 

[Chickassan]

Take a look at this, see if it clears anything up.
http://www.maransofamericaclub.com/inbreeding-chickens.html

Thanks for this cartoons always make things easier to understand. Didn't know you could do this, always figured you would end up with the hills have eyes chickens.