Coloring questions

[PotterWatch]

I have several different breeds of hens but only one rooster. I think I know which chicks go with what breed of hen but I want to see if you all agree. My rooster was (he was killed by a fox about a month ago) a speckled sussex. My hens are speckled Sussex, Easter egger, Rhode Island Red, barred rock, and silver laced Wyandotte. My EEs lay green eggs so those chicks are easy to distinguish (plus they all have muffs and pea combs). The barred rock mix chicks hatched with white spots in their heads. The silver laced wyandottes hatched without a white spot but with a little white around their eyes. The RIR eggs are easy to distinguish from the others due to their slightly elongated shape and darker color so I didn't set any of those. My assumption is that a chick hatched out of a brown egg that has the chipmunk look of a speckled Sussex should be a pure SS. Am I correct on that?

These are the chicks from my last hatch. Three of the chipmunk chicks came from EE eggs, I believe the other two are SS chicks.

Here they are about three weeks later (there are two keets in with them).

As soon as they hatched, I set another group of eggs. I didn't include any EE eggs in this hatch but I did put in two RIR eggs that haven't hatched yet. Except for the RIR eggs, any chipmunk looking chicks that hatch from the new batch can be assumed to be pure SS right?

 

[donrae]

Sounds good to me. Your other breeds are distinctive enough you should easily tell the pure birds from the mixes. I think the RIRs might mess you up, cause they and the Sussex both have mahogany (if I'm not mistaken) so you might have to wait until they feather in. The speckling is recessive, so your mixes won't have the white.

Just an fyi, you said the barred rock mixed hatched with a white spot......well, the males did. Your roo over a barred Rock hen would make sex link chicks. Males white spot, females solid head. Your female sex links will probably look like your slw mixes, but you should be able to tell a comb difference as the rose comb's usually dominant.

 

[PotterWatch]

Interesting. I didn't realize that would be a sex linked mix. I got one chipmunk patterned one this time that I don't believe is a pure SS. I think it's actually a SLW mix and it does appear to have a rose comb. If that's true, it probably means that all my black ones without a spot are BSL females. I must not have had any SLW eggs in the last batch. One of the RIR eggs hatched today and it looks just like it thought it would... Adorable!