Chicken Breed Focus - Legbar

[amanda1]

I love our sweet little Legbar, but I don't think she is very healthy. I got her for blue eggs, and being able to know she was definitely a pullet. Since her comb grew she has always done a lot of head shaking, which I attributed to her comb or crest bothering her. Now I'm thinking something else is wrong. She is 8 months old and still not laying. She has heavy breathing and when I listen to her back it sounds liquids or like if you inhaled and exhaled into a paper bag.

For Legbar owners,
do your birds shake their head more than other breeds?
Do you find possible health defects in the breed?
Do they sometimes take more than 8 months to,lay eggs?

I don't know if I'd get another, not only because I think she's unhealthy, but because the others seem to pick at her extra large comb. As far as personality, though, she is one of the calmest we've had.

 

[amanda1]

Here is a photo of our sweet girl, Charlotte.

 

[BantyChooks]

Me, I have found my legbar to be more prone to relapses of MG, which has similar symptoms to what you have described. The rest of the chickens have all recovered nicely from it. I'm not even sure if she's laying yet, despite her being nearly a year old?

 

[amanda1]

WOW! Almost a year? I was thinking that whatever is wrong with her lungs is preventing her from starting to lay. But I notice a previous poster said hers don't lay very well. What do you do for your Legbar that has MG relapses?

 

[BantyChooks]

WOW! Almost a year? I was thinking that whatever is wrong with her lungs is preventing her from starting to lay. But I notice a previous poster said hers don't lay very well. What do you do for your Legbar that has MG relapses?

Nothing. It doesn't impact her quality of life any, and I refuse to keep chickens that constantly need medication to stay well. If I ever find an egg she has laid, I won't be hatching it.
Otherwise healthy, well cared for chickens should not be impacted much at all by it.

Just to clarify, the birds have never been tested for MG, but the whole symptom list matches and when I DID go through and treat the flock (haven't done it since,) the symptoms cleared up immediately.

 

[room onthebroom]

Thanks Sumi for a very informative article!

I have one CL hen & three 2wk old CL pullets that we picked up from a local breeder. Our birds are all strictly pets. We wanted CL's mainly for their autosexing ability (rehoming roo's is just too heart wrenching!) The blueish/greenish eggs are a huge bonus. My kids love their funny hairdo's, especially when they're in that awkward dinosaur stage. The new pullets are little maniacs & I cant wait to see what their personalities will be & what shade of egg they will lay. My adult hen is very hardy, very sweet & a consistent layer. Nothing seems to bother her & she will fight to be the one sitting on your lap. Her eggs are slightly smaller than my other hens & are a very pale greenish/blueish color. After 7yrs of having hens I still get excited everyday to find eggs in the nest... Finding colored eggs is like Christmas, or Easter every single day.

The new peeps.


Dinosaur stage hairdo


Same girl as above, but full grown lap-bird.


Her 1st egg.


This blue egg was laid by the same girl that laid the green egg above. Never a dull moment with a CL in the yard.

 

[room onthebroom]

I love our sweet little Legbar, but I don't think she is very healthy. I got her for blue eggs, and being able to know she was definitely a pullet. Since her comb grew she has always done a lot of head shaking, which I attributed to her comb or crest bothering her. Now I'm thinking something else is wrong. She is 8 months old and still not laying. She has heavy breathing and when I listen to her back it sounds liquids or like if you inhaled and exhaled into a paper bag.

For Legbar owners,
do your birds shake their head more than other breeds?
Do you find possible health defects in the breed?
Do they sometimes take more than 8 months to,lay eggs?

I don't know if I'd get another, not only because I think she's unhealthy, but because the others seem to pick at her extra large comb. As far as personality, though, she is one of the calmest we've had.

The 1st batch of 3 CL's we got last year, only one survived. The 1st one died at 2-3 weeks & the second at 5months. I don't know if it was cocci, mereks, a weakness in the breed or, something we did. The 3rd one survived & is actually very hardy. I'm keeping my fingers crossed for the new peeps we just got.

 

[Ashdoes]

The imported breeds are super susceptible to disease, in our experience. They were to first to show symptoms of, and die from our Mereks outbreak. So, our Creams died off and then we tried Swedish Flower Hens, and they died even younger. If I did any of these breeds again, they would absolutely be vaccinated.

 

[All Ball]

I understand from the legbar thread that the first cream legbars, imported in 2010, were susceptible to American diseases and there were a lot of die-offs from Marek's and such. I hadn't seen much in the threads if this problem lately, so it's unfortunate to read these stories.

I got a dozen fertile cream legbar eggs from a breeder who focused on egg productivity. My broody hatched 10 and 7 survived chick health issues and Free range predation. Of the 5 I kept, all are healthy, and the roo is a pretty good boy. I get lots of light blue-green eggs and one girl even skipped a molt break to give me eggs all winter!

My girls are hardy, thrifty and beautiful, although a little loud...they are friendly tho skittish (I handfed but didn't handle them as chicks), curious, great foragers and have strong opinions.


One question - I had thought I read in the CL thread that Punnett used a "Chilean bird" in the mix, and it wasn't quite clear if this meant Arucana or not.

 

[Lady of McCamley]

I understand from the legbar thread that the first cream legbars, imported in 2010, were susceptible to American diseases and there were a lot of die-offs from Marek's and such. I hadn't seen much in the threads if this problem lately, so it's unfortunate to read these stories.

I got a dozen fertile cream legbar eggs from a breeder who focused on egg productivity. My broody hatched 10 and 7 survived chick health issues and Free range predation. Of the 5 I kept, all are healthy, and the roo is a pretty good boy. I get lots of light blue-green eggs and one girl even skipped a molt break to give me eggs all winter!

My girls are hardy, thrifty and beautiful, although a little loud...they are friendly tho skittish (I handfed but didn't handle them as chicks), curious, great foragers and have strong opinions.


One question - I had thought I read in the CL thread that Punnett used a "Chilean bird" in the mix, and it wasn't quite clear if this meant Arucana or not.

Yes South American birds were used, specifically from Chile, and the Araucanas come from South America.

I'd forgotten about the Merek's susceptibility of the first CL's, and apparently, as I've experienced, some lines are still less hardy than others.

LofMc