Eggcellent advice all around.
One of my biggest criteria in choosing a cockerel is who his mom is. It sounds like you might not have that information- most of us starting with our first chickens usually don't- but this may help down the road. Choosing cockerels from productive hens with longevity sends you off in a good direction. I'm lucky enough to have chosen the "right" cockerel from the offspring of my original group of then 1-yr old hens, now 4 yrs old and still laying large eggs consistently. So, there is some guessing involved in the beginning!!
I took an applied genetics course as part of my degree once upon a time in a land, far far away. It was focused more on selective breeding for meat and milk production in cattle/goats, that kind of thing. An example of the application side is using data to choose a pairing that will give a low birth weight (so the cow/goat has an easy birth) and a high weaning weight and of course, carcass weight, for profitability. In other words, small, easy to birth babies growing into heavy, money-making meat animals.
I was shocked to see how little of an impact selective breeding has on egg layers. One of these days I'll unpack the box with my text book so I can look at the actual numbers again, but they were very low. Ridgerunner touched on this in saying it matters more who the ROOSTER's mom is to the future babies, especially pullets.
Chickens are opposite from mammals. Females are XX and males are XY. Therefore, the female always passes along one of her X chromosome to her offspring, whereas the male will either pass along his X chromosome to a daughter or his Y chromosome to his son.
In chickens, females are Zw and males are ZZ, so it's backwards. This is important, because lots of "information" that we selectively breed for is carried on the Z chromosome (our "X" chromosome). By comparison, the "w" has very little on it.
That is important, because the hen only gives her daughters that "w". The daughter's only "Z" with so much more information on it- comes from the rooster. The rooster got one of his Z's from HIS mom, and one from HIS dad. Now, the annoying part is roosters don't lay eggs, so we don't have a production record on him as an egg layer.
I think this is why the heritability/selective breeding (don't hold me to those exact terms, it's been a long, long time) numbers are so low when it comes to chickens and egg laying. The newly hatched pullet's only Z chromosome comes either from her paternal grandmother or her paternal grandfather.
SO: How to make this information work for you. If you can, try to keep a laying record on each hen. Then in the future, when you're choosing whose eggs to set under a broody, or which eggs to put in the incubator, you've got an objective measure. If you can keep track of which baby is which (mom, dad), you can start to build your data and make more calculated decisions. If meat is part of your equation, weighing the offspring at consistent ages and keeping a record.
One of my biggest criteria in choosing a cockerel is who his mom is. It sounds like you might not have that information- most of us starting with our first chickens usually don't- but this may help down the road. Choosing cockerels from productive hens with longevity sends you off in a good direction. I'm lucky enough to have chosen the "right" cockerel from the offspring of my original group of then 1-yr old hens, now 4 yrs old and still laying large eggs consistently. So, there is some guessing involved in the beginning!!
I took an applied genetics course as part of my degree once upon a time in a land, far far away. It was focused more on selective breeding for meat and milk production in cattle/goats, that kind of thing. An example of the application side is using data to choose a pairing that will give a low birth weight (so the cow/goat has an easy birth) and a high weaning weight and of course, carcass weight, for profitability. In other words, small, easy to birth babies growing into heavy, money-making meat animals.
I was shocked to see how little of an impact selective breeding has on egg layers. One of these days I'll unpack the box with my text book so I can look at the actual numbers again, but they were very low. Ridgerunner touched on this in saying it matters more who the ROOSTER's mom is to the future babies, especially pullets.
Chickens are opposite from mammals. Females are XX and males are XY. Therefore, the female always passes along one of her X chromosome to her offspring, whereas the male will either pass along his X chromosome to a daughter or his Y chromosome to his son.
In chickens, females are Zw and males are ZZ, so it's backwards. This is important, because lots of "information" that we selectively breed for is carried on the Z chromosome (our "X" chromosome). By comparison, the "w" has very little on it.
That is important, because the hen only gives her daughters that "w". The daughter's only "Z" with so much more information on it- comes from the rooster. The rooster got one of his Z's from HIS mom, and one from HIS dad. Now, the annoying part is roosters don't lay eggs, so we don't have a production record on him as an egg layer.
I think this is why the heritability/selective breeding (don't hold me to those exact terms, it's been a long, long time) numbers are so low when it comes to chickens and egg laying. The newly hatched pullet's only Z chromosome comes either from her paternal grandmother or her paternal grandfather.
SO: How to make this information work for you. If you can, try to keep a laying record on each hen. Then in the future, when you're choosing whose eggs to set under a broody, or which eggs to put in the incubator, you've got an objective measure. If you can keep track of which baby is which (mom, dad), you can start to build your data and make more calculated decisions. If meat is part of your equation, weighing the offspring at consistent ages and keeping a record.
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