I posted this in an FB group but never got any answers. Here are 2 out of the 7 chicks that hatched on Easter. We have a flock of production red hens...5 are Golden Comets....the rest are a mystery sex-linked red hybrid. We have 2 roos....a Silver Braekel and a Black Copper Marans. 4 chicks are definitely out of our BCM....2 look like BCM chicks and though 2 are white with a couple black spots, they have the tell-tale feathered feet. The light one pictured here and another we believe are out of the Braekel. The lighter one had the Braekel chick pattern on it's back and has the brownish head...though both the head color and pattern are faint. No feathered feet and the shape of the skull reminds me of our Braekel as a chick. Then there's the little dark chick...Chipmunk...who's a glorious chocolate color
She doesn't have feathered feet, and again...has the chocolate head though any pattern that exists isn't visible. I suspect this one is out of the Braekel as well though if she keeps the dark chocolate color, I don't know how that's possible out of the silver roo crossed with a red hen with underlying white? Unless she's out of the mystery red hens and the red in the background is out of a much darker bird? Hoping you all can weigh in? I suspect the dark one is a pullet...wings and tail feathered out fast and feathers have a pattern that's very similar to Braekel chicks at 1 week old. The lighter one...not sure. Feathering out just as fast but is much more assertive and holds tail feathers very erect when excited or pushing 'her' weight around. Incubator went cold a few nights during incubation and I'm now reading that eggs cooling can result in 10% of male eggs becoming female...though if bred with a normal rooster, the resulting 'pullets' will only ever lay male eggs. Interesting study. I tried the thread and ring test with this hatch just for fun and found it odd that the ring first moved in a straight back and forth line over the light chick but then proceeded to circle? The ring circled immediately over the brown chick. I know that's hardly conclusive but the ring was right with my pregnancies and our hatch last year and so I'm interested to see if this chick develops into a pullet or roo. Regardless, I have no clue about chicken genetics. Do you agree that the father of both of these is the silver braekel or does coloration somehow indicate it's the BCM despite the lack of feathers and difference in head shape? And if it is the Braekel, could color somehow help predict gender or does the fact that the moms are already hybrids ruin any chance of that?
