Cochin Thread!!!

[Painted Calls]

Hard to say exactly what they will look like when you're mixing breeds.

 

[Cinnamon11]

The chicks will most likely just look like a mix of the two breeds.

I’m exited to breed them but she is only less than a month old so I still a long time to wait but just thinking if breeding her would work!

 

[ShrekDawg]

Consider yourself lucky! Often, packing peanuts and extra surprise breed chicks are cockerels. You are blessed to have received a little pullet ❤

I think that her solid coloration will compliment your birchens and vise versa. Light areas look brighter when juxtaposed to something dark. Pattern looks better when complimented by a solid. I was a little bummed that all three of my dark bantam bin grabs were 'just' black. But now that 2 are obviously not all black, I'm so glad one is entirely black! Your little favorite will now stand out because of her uniqueness

As for what to call her, I'd just go with black. If she did have birchen genetics, I still wouldn't call her Birchen. From what I can gather, chicken identification is descriptive and largely based on appearance and differs from how we identify horses or dogs, etc. There was a great discussion on BYC somewhere regarding this and the one commenter seemed pretty knowledgable and made a good argument but no clue where/who that was. Since Overo Mare has a horse name on a chicken forum, maybe I'm lucky and it was her and she can explain! My understanding was that you could show a chicken that 100% conforms to a certain breed standard ...as that breed...even if they have 0% of that breed in them. Conversely, you could have a bird that is genetically 100% of a breed and not show or even call it what is is if it doesn't conform to the standard. Chances of either extreme happening are pretty slim..but there's a huge gray area in between. So for me, if it is genetically a birchen and looks like a birchen, I'd call it Birchen. But if I don't know, I'd just refer to it as my black Cochin (as opposed to Black Cochin).

As for breeding, some of my favorite birds are random barnyard mixes that are obvious hybrids between breeds that I'm not selling. But I probably wouldn't cross color varieties within a breed...as I'd fear I'd muddy up the genetics that make each variation look so cool. Unless of course, I had the brain span to delve into breeding another color variety. But black-to-birchen I fear would just result in more birchen with less distinct pattern :/

Thank you so much!! This is so helpful!!!

I’m definitely very lucky!!! Pretty sure I only got one cockerel out of this batch and they were straight run! Soooo much better than my hatch in November where I literally got 8 cockerels out of 9 chicks

This time I got 1 out of 5.

The 4 Brabanters are sexed females but I suppose there could have been a mistake with them too so technically it’s only 1 out of 9. exact opposite, reverse odds of my hatch lol

And yeah I’m kind of worried it might just result in a weaker pattern. Hadn’t thought of that. Although the male has a pretty strong pattern. I’ll get a picture of him later. I think Birchen is just a black bass with the birch around the neck so technically I suppose it’s possible she was supposed to be a Birchen and just got the wrong genes since the other one barely has any and they all looked the same as chicks aha idk. Either way I’ll just call her a black Cochin.

I’m kind of curious what I’d get if I crossed them with my Lavender Orpington cockerel too.

I wonder if I could get lavender birchen or something.

He’s 7 months old.

I was planning on keeping the Cochins separate but I might let them mingle. Not sure yet haha

 

[renk777]

Thank you so much!! This is so helpful!!!

I’m definitely very lucky!!! Pretty sure I only got one cockerel out of this batch and they were straight run! Soooo much better than my hatch in November where I literally got 8 cockerels out of 9 chicks

This time I got 1 out of 5.

The 4 Brabanters are sexed females but I suppose there could have been a mistake with them too so technically it’s only 1 out of 9. exact opposite, reverse odds of my hatch lol

And yeah I’m kind of worried it might just result in a weaker pattern. Hadn’t thought of that. Although the male has a pretty strong pattern. I’ll get a picture of him later. I think Birchen is just a black bass with the birch around the neck so technically I suppose it’s possible she was supposed to be a Birchen and just got the wrong genes since the other one barely has any and they all looked the same as chicks aha idk. Either way I’ll just call her a black Cochin.

I’m kind of curious what I’d get if I crossed them with my Lavender Orpington cockerel too.

I wonder if I could get lavender birchen or something.

He’s 7 months old.

I was planning on keeping the Cochins separate but I might let them mingle. Not sure yet haha

I have no clue when it comes to genetics...I've followed some threads where someone asked what x X x might produce and I'm always amazed how the experts explain the result being nothing I'd expect..especially when you start including dilution genetics and such. I doubt you'd get a lavender birchen tge first time around but depending on which color is the roo and breeding daughters back to roo or sons back to mom, maybe? An expert on genetics would have to weigh in! I'd be interested to know as well. How beautiful would that be?!!

 

[HappyClucker7]

I'll post some pics when I get my cochin bantams this weekend.

 

[renk777]

Okay...so I have a little task for all of you with chicks growing out I study my birds a lot. As in, frittering away hours just watching the little buggers. This year, I figured out that the ear fuzzies at 3+ weeks are indicative of the eventual head color with more mature plumage. I had 3 dark chicks and 3 wild pattern chicks that all had different ear fuzz despite having similar down color. And each one matured with adult plumage on head and upper neck that matched ear fuzz. Not a big deal with most breeds but super helpful if you have no patience and bought a bunch of EEs!

I'm now determined to find another way to sex older chicks since combs and wattles and rate of feathering isn't always accurate. I doubt any method is. So I pulled out a few chicks and examined their wings. Since I don't know for certain the sex of all of my chicks, my observation could be way off base but if you have chicks around the same age as mine (4 weeks) and you have a few free minutes, pull out the ones you're fairly certain regarding gender and check their wings. I'll attach a little drawing I made but it seems as though males have only 1 or 2 feathers at the joint and the sweep/angle of the top layer of feathers closest to the top of the wings starts out shorter towards the body and gets longer towards the joint. With females, it seems to be the reverse...there are a few+ feathers at the joint and the shortest feathers in the top layer are nearest the joint and the longer ones are toward the body. Anyone else have the same or is it just a coincidence?

 

[renk777]

And I just realized a mistake in my drawing... hold on... (Correction tape doesnt work so great on paper towels ) haha the boys' top layer sort of follows the curve of the lower feathers...the girls' are opposite....had to correct the curve of the lower feathers!

 

[birdlover2]

My mother just got two bantam Black Cochins a few days ago, both not mature yet, one that looks to be def a hen and one that looks to be a roo, so they're her Bantam Cochin pair! Here's some pics, (they're with our likely part EE barnyard mix we also got when we got them):

 

[renk777]

And if you find the same with your chicks, I promise I'll create a better graphic!

 

[birdlover2]

Okay...so I have a little task for all of you with chicks growing out I study my birds a lot. As in, frittering away hours just watching the little buggers. This year, I figured out that the ear fuzzies at 3+ weeks are indicative of the eventual head color with more mature plumage. I had 3 dark chicks and 3 wild pattern chicks that all had different ear fuzz despite having similar down color. And each one matured with adult plumage on head and upper neck that matched ear fuzz. Not a big deal with most breeds but super helpful if you have no patience and bought a bunch of EEs!

I'm now determined to find another way to sex older chicks since combs and wattles and rate of feathering isn't always accurate. I doubt any method is. So I pulled out a few chicks and examined their wings. Since I don't know for certain the sex of all of my chicks, my observation could be way off base but if you have chicks around the same age as mine (4 weeks) and you have a few free minutes, pull out the ones you're fairly certain regarding gender and check their wings. I'll attach a little drawing I made but it seems as though males have only 1 or 2 feathers at the joint and the sweep/angle of the top layer of feathers closest to the top of the wings starts out shorter towards the body and gets longer towards the joint. With females, it seems to be the reverse...there are a few+ feathers at the joint and the shortest feathers in the top layer are nearest the joint and the longer ones are toward the body. Anyone else have the same or is it just a coincidence?

Hope it works out for you! I don't know a whole lot about chicks and genders and breeds, (though I can usually tell gender from looking at comb and know how to identify a few breeds)