Chicks w/ Crest - any breed easy to tell sex?

[paulinachickies]

Hi all!

Been looking through the forum for months but first time posting. Thank you for sharing all your knowledge!

I am looking into getting a couple chicks with crests into our flock in the spring (I'm obsessed with how cute they are). The thing is that our town doesn't allow roosters, so I'm trying to find breeds that are easy to sex. I have heard that polish, polish frizzle, and silkies are hard to determine gender until they are a few months old.

Any breed recommendations would be appreciated, as well as any hatcheries you've ordered from in the past. I'm in Massachusetts so likely won't be online ordering until March/April.

Thank you so much!

 

[azygous]

Crested Cream Legbars have auto-sexed hatches. Girls have dark triangles on heads while boys have white splotches. That's generally true.

I happened to receive a Cream Legbar chick from MyPetChicken that had a dark triangle and it turned into my four-year old Cream Legbar rooster Strawberry. Strawberry appears to lack the gene for autosexing, and his offspring have been ambiguous at hatch, resulting in another rooster, three-year old Tootsie Pop. Thankfully the two get along well and are perfect gentlemen.

 

[featheredplanets]

There’s really not many crested breeds that are easy to sex from hatch unless they are vent sexed, which isn’t always 100% accurate.

Cream Legbars are an auto-sexing breed, which means you can tell male from female at hatch. Any chicks in which this cannot be deciphered shouldn’t really be bred from (if creating more CLs). However, Cream Legbars have a relatively small crest, and as an owner of one myself, they aren’t the prettiest crested breed. I believe there are pure white Legbars, though I am unsure if they are auto sexing. Nor am I sure if Legbars come in bantam.

If you can’t keep males and don’t want to try to rehome any you may end up with, I would suggest buying pullets from a breeder. You can be 100% sure of females and you can see the quality of the bird you’re buying. I can’t suggest hatcheries that sell sexed crested breeds as I’m not from the US.

 

[keesmom]

McMurray has sexed buff, gold laced and silver laced Polish as well as Crevecoeurs and Houdans. Meyer has similar offerngs. My Pet Chicken has Legbars, buff, gold laced and white crested blue/black/splash Polish, Sultans and Spitzhaubens. They do offer sexed silkie chicks but it will cost you (an aditional $18 per chick).

If you know what you want I wouldn't wait until March to order. Many hatcheries are taking orders now and some breeds are already sold out through May.

 

[paulinachickies]

Thank you! Good advice to order ahead now...I'll also look into pullets and see if there are any breeders nearby.

 

[keesmom]

Thank you! Good advice to order ahead now...I'll also look into pullets and see if there are any breeders nearby.

Where in MA are you? The Poultry Congress is in Springfield Jan 19-20. I believe the ABA national is being held there this year too. There are always a LOT of birds there. Worth checking out just to look around and there are birds for sale. Jan Brett has bantam white crested black Polish and is usually there.

 

[paulinachickies]

Where in MA are you? The Poultry Congress is in Springfield Jan 19-20. I believe the ABA national is being held there this year too. There are always a LOT of birds there. Worth checking out just to look around and there are birds for sale. Jan Brett has bantam white crested black Polish and is usually there.

Ooh. Thanks for the intel!! I'm just a little North of Boston so will definitely check out Springfield. white crested black polish is one of the breeds I'd love!