DDChicken:
Since I was involved in the initial discussions and formation of the US CCL Club, I respetfully disagree with you. There has been from the beginning and continues to be today, an open discussion amongst "real (could you define what you mean by that???) CCL breeders." It seems quite clear to me from reading Punnett's published papers (citations in prior posts) that the Legbar was always intended to be an autosexing breed based upon the Leghorn and its exceptional laying ability. The Legbar's current form is based upon its function...as an egg layer. How do you propose to turn that form into dual purpose? One can always eat any chicken, even if it is only fit for soup. Do you plan to cull for size in your CCL flock? Or do you plan to outcross? And if so, what are you planning to breed it to in order to change its form and function?
As others have reiterated, the CCL breed was created in Britain (U of Cambridge, Punnett and Pease) and is therefore a British breed. They developed the Standard for their breed in 1947/58. I certainly don't claim to speak for everyone in the US CCL Club, but we - we being the first drafters of the US DRAFT SOP - based it, almost verbatim (with a few tweaks for stuff that didn't translate to APA format) on the UK SOP. I haven't heard or read of any discussion since on significantly changing that as to size or purpose, only discussions to figure out if the genetics we have available through Greenfire's importation efforts will match the proposed US SOP and the efforts of some to import stock that already meets the UKSOP i.e. Reese birds thus far.
Now I do love a good dual purpose breed and in fact raise a few of them; however, that does not mean every breed SHOULD be dual purpose. A dual purpose bird, while an asset to the homesteader/small holder, is a jack of all trades and master at none. To meet two purposes they sacrifice excellence in either. There is still a place for exclusive layers and exclusive meat producers. You might also be interested to know that dual purpose autosexing '-bar' breeds have already been done; the right margin of this link contains a list of them
http://www.harislau.info/autosexing-
If you haven't already done so, go back and review this thread from the beginning. APA Judge Walt Leonard (Fowlman) has provided some great advice. He is currently a member of the APA SOP Committee. They don't just approve a standard that reads as 'correct.' There must be enough breeders breeding to the proposed SOP with enough numbers to hold a qualifying meet i.e. show.
If you and others truly wish to create a dual purpose, auto-sexing, blue-egg laying, cream gene carrying, crested chicken based on the CCL and some meatier outcross, you certainly don't need to seek anyone's consent or approval to do so. "FlyingMonkey" is already working on a rose comb variety by crossing CCL with rose comb
Leghorns. However, the the
names Crested Cream Legbar and/or Cream Legbar already belong to a breed recognized in the UK, imported into this country by GFF and bred by
real CCL breeders dedicated to preserving that British breed. In my mind it would create confusion to do as you suggest and rename in the US that UK layer breed known as the [Crested] Cream Legbar in favor of a dual purpose bird that doesn't yet exist.
Just my 2 cents...
edited to correct user ID to "FlyingMonkey"
