Chicken Cross Breeds and Results

[raknhrse]

I currently have Buff Orpingtons, Golden Buffs, Dominics, and Anconas. I would like to raise my own birds and they be pure breeds. What bird combinations of birds do I need to produce these different breed offspring and they be say a true Buff orpington, dominic or Ancona? For example, a Rhode Island Red Rooster and a white hen, of what kind?, will produce a Golden Buff? Thanks!

 

[Shalom Farm]

Welcome to BYC!

The golden buff is a also known as a "red star". These chickens are not simply crosses though between two breeds. The parent stock used for these commerical chickens are not really a cross, but carefully selected "base blood". They start out with certain breeds and aggressive linebred, cross, linebred to death, cull, linebreed, etc. until they have a very select amount of parent stock able to produce the number of eggs required for the market, typically 300+ per year. If you crossed, you probably would not get anywhere near 300 eggs per year. It would take the same methods of intensive breeding.

This goes for meat birds as well. You won't get as full and perfect a Cornish Rock simply by crossing the two breeds. You'll get something that looks like it, but not with the feed to meat conversion or same growth rate. It all comes down to these hatcheries having closely hoarded parent stock which you cannot buy. The ISA brown, for example, is perhaps the best commercial layer available to the public and you can only get a true ISA from townline, who has the rights to the parent stock from France. These commerical layers, meaties, "stars", ISA Browns, etc. are not purebreeds. They aren't listed with the APA as a purebred chicken and even their bloodlines can be as guarded as the coca cola formula. Even the leghorn strains have been tampered with (for commercial layers).

So to get a pure-breed chicken you need to have 1 rooster that matches the hen. But breeding commerical egglayers like your golden buff hens to a golden buff rooster won't get you the same quantity of eggs. The offspring will usually be less productive than the parents.

You can, however, breed your Orpingtons, Dominics, and Ancona's. If you want a purebreed chicken that is able to maintain the quantity and quality of meat/egg production you can simply get a rooster of this breed. If you don't have the space to separate by breed, simply choose 1 rooster of 1 of the breeds and hatch only the eggs from that breed of hen.

The reason this works with purebred chickens is that, although thousands of genes are crossing to make each chick, they have a limited number of variables as they been bred down to a specific standard. Simply put, there is only so many more combonations each gene can express now. The G. Buffs have God knows how many more breeds and genetic stock in the background to create an F1 (1st cross) offspring product only. There is no concern for the next generation, therefore they can have millions of variables floating around. The producer doesn't care because he knows the initial product (G.Buffs) will be superior to the offspring because of all these variables and how they can be expressed.

So grab yourself a handsome Buff Orp., Ancona, or Dominic rooster and procreate your chickens that way.

You CAN create a sex-link bird. Thats pretty detailed and I will not go into it here, but there is a thread (https://www.backyardchickens.com/t/626097/creating-sex-links) and many others like it. These sex link chickens you've bred though, have no guarantee as to quality production. So its much easier to stick with the standardized purebred chicken.

Personally, I'd grab yourself a nice Buff Orp rooster Big, handsome, and Golden, and tend to be mellow.

 

[raknhrse]

Thank you! Believe it or not I understand. I have an Ancona and Dominic rooster also a golden buff rooster. They are all are separate by breed already. What you suggested is what I have been doing as far as hatching eggs by breed. I got a solid black hen from my golden buffs and have got solid white. That is the reason for the question. I thought I was missing something. Maybe needing to cross to get back to the breed persay. Thanks again!!

 

[donrae]

Thank you! Believe it or not I understand. I have an Ancona and Dominic rooster also a golden buff rooster. They are all are separate by breed already. What you suggested is what I have been doing as far as hatching eggs by breed. I got a solid black hen from my golden buffs and have got solid white. That is the reason for the question. I thought I was missing something. Maybe needing to cross to get back to the breed persay. Thanks again!!

The reason you got mixed results with the golden buffs is because they aren't a breed, they're a hybrid that doesn't breed true. All your other birds are actual breeds and the offspring should look just like the parents.