[Chick Pic!] 3 Weeks old now and we might be getting a clue! Or... are we....??!

[Clumber]

New to birds, here are a sample our first chickens, all about 3 weeks old (±1 day when photos taken). We bought 5 Barred Rocks and 5 Rhode Island Reds as ~day old at the poultry auction, hoping that we end up with 4-5 hens. They are all 10 thriving, accepting us taming them, and are surprisingly fun to watch!

Anyhow, yesterday we took some photos of them, and of the photos that we didn't screw-up by leaving the dang red heat lamp on (we forget that with puppies as well... D'OH!) and I cropped them to heads only to compare. All are different birds. The montage below is what we are going with so far - we think 3 of the BRs are Roasters... errr... Roosters I mean, and 2 of the RIRs. (Can't keep roosters in this zoning).



Mainly we are going from the sudden appearance of wattles in some of the chicks, as well as the more distinct and redder combs. Rate our guessing? Are we close?

Related Question : With the RIRs and BRs, when they first start crowing, are they large enough to be slaughtered for meat, or do they crow long before they are of harvest size?

Unrelated question : How would I go about asking if there are any BYC-ers local-ish to us that would sell us some Speckled Sussex chicks? I read through the FAQs and looked at the thread topic headers, but am still not sure where it is acceptable to ask. I don't want to violate any written or even unwritten etiquette rules. (We are in the Pacific Northwest, and concerned about reports of the mailorder chicks not doing well with all the heatwave weather across the country. Have yet to see Sussex at the auction except for fully grown roosters).

Thanks in advance!

~ Tracy
Rochester, Washington

 

[hdowden]

post full body pics of the barred rocks and we can give you a good gender guess on those (without comb usage) with rir those with larger redder combs and wattles coming would be your cockerels

With the RIRs and BRs, when they first start crowing, are they large enough to be slaughtered for meat, or do they crow long before they are of harvest size? maybe maybe not depends on when they start to crow

How would I go about asking if there are any BYC-ers local-ish to us that would sell us some Speckled Sussex chicks? ask in your thread here https://www.backyardchickens.com/f/26/where-am-i-where-are-you theres should be a thread for your area or close to your area in that forum also try posting a want ad here https://www.backyardchickens.com/f/67/buy-sell-trade

 

[Clumber]

THANK YOU!

We'll try to get better non-reddish tinted photos in the next couple days. So there isn't a general age/size when they start crowing?

This is a shot of the smallest one - s/he has never looked ill, just always significantly smaller than the others. Very friendly and likes to sit on our shoulders when we're doing the chick chores. Hopefully a hen.