Cream Legbar Working Group: Standard of Perfection

[nicalandia]

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Good luck trying to make people to rename their Egg layers just because you want Dual Purpose CCL.... since you are persuing this, its up to you to do the Re-naming...
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oh but there is.. the British SOP and it should be followed

 

[chicken pickin]

I only raise dual purpose chickens(with the exception of my bantam group) so seeing the CLs in with all the dual purpose birds makes them look so tiny/scrawny, I understand that is their build and they are a smller laying breed. I for one dont necessarily want to see them as a dual purpose breed but wouldnt mind if the SOP called for a slightly heavier bird. A heavier bird means a better meal when if comes to having a lot of extra cockerals on your hands.

 

[DCchicken]

I only raise dual purpose chickens(with the exception of my bantam group) so seeing the CLs in with all the dual purpose birds makes them look so tiny/scrawny, I understand that is their build and they are a smller laying breed. I for one dont necessarily want to see them as a dual purpose breed but wouldnt mind if the SOP called for a slightly heavier bird. A heavier bird means a better meal when if comes to having a lot of extra cockerals on your hands.

Thank you. Most of us are not hatcheries that will kill extra cockerels by the thousands. We raise the extra cockerels for meat birds. Therefore having a larger size makes the breed (or at least the cockerels) more useful.

 

[normanack]

Apologies for the double-post, but the issue does seem more relevant in this thread.

I hesitate to step into the fray, but must note that writing an SOP, let alone creating and running a viable club, is beyond an enormous amount of work. At least 8 people that I know of have put the equivalent of a full-time job's work into the endeavour. Curtis and Kestlyn put an unbelievable number of hours into research alone. Something as paltry as the newsletter takes me at least 50 hours to complete, which of course is partially due to my ineptness but is also due to the simple scope of it.

Of course anyone is free to write an SOP and form a club. Just be aware of what you are getting into, all for the sake of defining the breed as one which lays or lays and is eaten. Creating a whole new breed club over such hairsplitting -- for surely a layer may be eaten -- seems like an appallingly inefficient use of your time.

 

[nicalandia]

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I agree, But that still does not make them Dual Purpose, so no name chang is required

 

[WHmarans]

One thing (out of several) that is funny about this is we all want to breed them bigger.

 

[nicalandia]

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because they are undersized.. but not because you want a Dual Porpuse bird...

 

[WHmarans]

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because they are undersized.. but not because you want a Dual Porpuse bird...

True.

 

[blackbirds13]

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I have to admit I like lurking. I do it on a lot of threads. But sometimes I just feel the need to respond regardless of how pointless I know it is. Just the big mouth woman in me.

I will not be breeding them as dual purpose in the 'true' sense of the word. All chickens can be eaten if need be, some just make a more cost-effective meal by how big and fast they get and where their meat source lies on the body. I like the cost of feed to the egg ratio that I get with the CCL and the size of the bird works for the purpose it was created for and make an efficient flock, especially this far north with how much snow we get and the work needed to keep things going for the 4-6 months of winter we can get up here.... I would like to get the bird closer to it's stated SOP size as that would make it more dual' but I cannot imagine moving it from it's stated 'small-standard' size to something else as holding to the provenance, as British as it is. Everyone has their own agenda regardless of how open minded they may claim to be. I intend to hold as true as I can to the history, purpose and Standard of the original.

I only breed Cream Legbars. I raise Marans and hope to add Cemani soon but I don't have a slew of birds that I need to market or account for financially so I admit I am invested in this breed specifically and enjoy watching my flock improve.

Edited by Staff

 

[Laingcroft]

I will be working on my own draft SOP that focuses on Cream Legbars as a dual-purpose instead of just be a layer breed. It's too bad that just a few individuals think that they get to control the future of the Cream Legbar breed. It should be an open discussion amongst real CCL breeders.

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. "FlyingMonkeyPoop" 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 "FlyingMonkeyPoop"