Clan mating

[Knight101]

Has anyone ever clan mated their gamefowl and how many family’s did you use? How did you keep track?Is it a good way to breed your gamefowl? How do select a hen out of all the sisters and a rooster out of all the brothers to represent the families in the clan mating? Or other breeds you have clan mated as well. Just need ideas and proven suggestions

 

[Egghead_Jr]

I don't clan or spiral mate. Not enough pens/coops so I line breed. But the general plan with clan or spiral mating is to have 3 to 5 groups. The hens stay in each individual group and you move the cock bird each year. Say three pens- A, B and C. Cock from pen A moves to pen B, B to C and C to A. As your quality and numbers increase you can make up another pen and grow from there.

To make up pens you select the best birds and don't cull the cock unless the offspring is better or equal to the sire. Cull out hens as grow outs are better in quality. The clan mating takes pens and if you only pen the birds for spring mating then you'd want to band them to keep track who belongs to what group. Another popular tracking method is toe punching. That would work very well with clans. Between the two feet and webs there's quite a few combinations to track generations and pen. Either way you have to keep notes in a record book or on the cloud. If your personal electronic dies the info is still there. Far less notes to take with clan mating than line breeding as the hens/pullets stay with pen, only the cock moves.