***Crevecoeur Thread***

[alexisrambles]

Hi Alexis,
yes. Germany is sometimes cold and wet, too. And my Crevecoeur go out with every weather, even rain and snow. I and they had no Problems with that the last 4 years.
I would really recommend to carefully take away the small feathers from the eyes. The fist ones very short and then step by step a bit longer. Then they will support the other feathers. I made a YouTube Video about that. Right now it s only in german. But if you like I could translate it. But you can see anyway how I did it:
https://youtu.be/Hcq8V5FWg3U

When you hold them in front of you: The chicken s eyes on the same level than your eyes. Then you should be able to see the Creves eyes. If not, please cut some feathers carefully. I try to select that out but its a task on the long term...

I've got the opposite weather--HOT and wet! But yes, they seem like very strong birds so far! Also very aware of danger. Not like my Cochins, who often go off on their own in areas with no tree cover.

I did not have time to watch your previous videos yet, but I did watch this one. Your birds are beautiful! I would definitely appreciate a translation, but I think I understand most of it from just the video.

This is great thank you guys! I was worried that maybe the feathers had a purpose or... oh I don't know. I was just worried I suppose.

Really she needs to be able to see so she can stop running into my other hens! They are NOT happy when she does so.

 

[333113]

Dinosauer,
Thank you for the website links. Our American Poultry Association doesn't publish its standards on their website, either. They want us to buy their standards book!

A sport is a sort of spontaneous mutation. The sport Crevecoeur hen that I have is white with a few flecks of dark grey. She is out of a 100%
Crevecoeur flock. I understand that this is a typical sport from Crevecoeurs, and these sports were crossbred and selected to produce the white Crevecoeur. My reading about black and white genetics indicates that from black and white crosses it's a few short breeding steps to blues and splashes. However I am dubious about the "barred," which seems like the result of crossing out to another breed, to me, as does the smaller crests. In your video, your original black Crevecoeur rooster looked very true to type, especially his large crest.

I am relieved to see that you are not cross- breeding outside the Crevecoeur breed. There is a long history of line-breeding where roos are bred to their mother's line and hens are bred to their father's line to enhance the characteristics that the breeder wants to emphasize. It takes a long time or bad genes to begin with before line breeding becomes a problem.

When I first became aware that Crevecoeurs were rare, I worried about not having other Crevecoeurs to breed to. So, I split my flock, and began developing and breeding the two flocks separately. This gives me a better chance to have "outside" Crevecoeurs to breed to if I needed to outbreed. I know that most people don't have the means (space, time, feed) to do this but I do.

I am glad to hear that you have found a source for French birds. I have been pleased with the results of crossbreeding to my French roosters. I am still keeping separate lines in my breeding program so that I can be prepared in case I would not be able to find outside Crevecoeurs.

Thank you for all your feedback.

A lot of Points in a short time:
--> the german poultry association is the "BDRG = Bund deutscher Rassegeflügelzüchter" https://www.bdrg.de/
the Website is not so brilliant and there are no Standards to look at. But I m a member of the club for rare and crested breeds in Germany. There we are giving our german Standard for our supervised breeds:
http://haubenhuehner-seltene-huehnerrassen.blogspot.com/p/creve-coeur.html

Sorry I confused me and you with the polish and Paduaner. I m just starting to figure out whats going on in other contries. Dont care about that then.

ConnieA:
In my Video I said I will mate a Crevecoeur rooster in dark barred to a crevecoeur hen in blue-laced. This will hopefully result in a 25% chance to get lavender Crevecoeur. I only showed a Picture of the english Araucana to show how the Color profile of Lavender looks like. So at this point I m NOT planning to cross with another races.
But still with only 70 animals of Crevecoeur left in Germany this breed would die out of incest if we dont cross in other races from time to time. Every breed resulted form crossing other breeds to elaborate a special look or perfomance (maybe in laying eggs). So if we dont want to let them extinct we have to cross in other breeds - let s say every 10 years or so.
For now I managed to get hatching eggs of France crevecoeur 2 times (with A LOT of efford!) to get new blood of crevecoeur and I mixed the colors of the Crevecoeur to make them more robust, healty and bigger/heavier again. That work very good for now….

Sorry I dont get the meaning of "sport" as you used it.

Concerning the good breeders and the amateurs: This breed it over 500 years old. Right now we are at the end of this timescale but from a greater view we are not. In the last 500 years for sure there was a lot "Intrusion from other breeds" that made the Crevecoeur the way they are (or should be) right now. For example 150 year ago for sure the english breeders put in Dorkings into the French Crevecoeur, and somehow they put on a beard to them, too. And we are totally fine with that. A friend told me he had some Crevecoeur chicks with 5 toes… We can easiely select that out with only a little efford. After the alien breed-in the number of strange DNA goes rapidly down 50%, 25%, 12,5% 6,25%, 3,17%.... Sure it s inside but a "good breeder" will work with this and dont fear it. Just my opinion of a "good" breeder.
Looking foreward to the reply

 

[Sylvester017]

Sylvester017, do you actually have Crevecoeurs?

Edited to ask, in what way do you think they are not as "hardy" in the USA?

Sadly, I never had a Crevie or even a Polish. I looked into getting Crevies but after consulting with a couple USA owners/breeders about 6 yrs ago I got feedback that the USA Crevies were not hardy, or seemed to have too much Polish crosses in them, were independent/self-willed or a bit standoffish to people. I love the beautiful appearance of crested breeds -- Silkies, Breda, Polish, Crevies, La Fleche, Sulmtaler, Houdan, etc etc.

Since the feedback I got from USA Crevie owners was not as positive as I hoped for in health or temperament I opted for Silkies and Breda -- Silkies because of their calmer gentle disposition and Breda because of their less combative temperament with other flock members. The Polish are another gentle calmer breed but I didn't think I should have hens with such skittish temperaments -- I let my backyard flock free in the yard so I didn't want a breed with excessive hampered vision. The little Silkies surprised me with their savvy tendency to hide well and the standard size Breda surprised me with their gentle disposition for being a larger breed in the flock. I love rare chickens and there are so many breeds I would love to have but because of space I had to make choices as to which breeds flocked well together.

Every bird is an individual and I don't want to catergorize a breed as always being one kind of temperament or hardiness so if any owner has a perspective of Crevies from their experiences it would be nice to hear how present day Crevie flocks are doing in the USA today.

 

[333113]

Sylvester 017,
In my opinion, a lot of reputation damage is done to many rare breeds by people who do not have personal experience with the breed. They are simply quoting old texts, without realizing the context of those remarks. Or they are quoting other people who say they have Crevecoeurs, without any detailed knowledge of how that person actually raised the bird.

Many of the rarer breeds were at one time serious contenders to be -the- meat bird or -the- layer for the USA market. Large-scale breeders mounted active campaigns to sway popular opinion on yellow skin versus white skin, brown eggs versus white eggs, etc. These campaigns reached out to producers, too, to discourage them from raising competing breeds by claiming those breeds are poor candidates for a backyard or production bird...too delicate, too intolerant of small cages, not fast-enough growers, too few or too small eggs, etc. Many hatcheries looking to say something to distinguish one bird from another mindlessly and inaccurately quote these old texts, too.

We are all somewhat aware of the birds that producers use to put chicken on the American table. They are bred to produce lots of meat very fast, and are not good birds for the backyard because they are not selected for long-term health and vigor.

Traditional breeds for the table were selected for flavor, texture, and could be raised in the backyard or in large groups. They could be meat birds this year or next year. I am old enough to remember when you could buy a "stewing hen" (a fully mature bird, two years or older) that really tasted good, in any supermarket. Now, every chicken sold in the supermarket is under six months, with very little flavor, in my opinion. And they are crosses, because these birds don't stay healthy enough to breeding age.

When I ordered my first Crevecoeurs from Murray McMurray in the late 1990s, the description included the "not hardy in cold wet weather." Honestly, what chicken breed do you know that can be healthy if you keep them cold and wet? I ignored that and ordered them anyway. I also keep other breeds, so I have Delawares, Rocks, Sussex, Ameraucanas and Easter Egger mixes to compare. The Crevecoeurs are easily the hardiest, longest-lived and healthiest of all the breeds I have. I have eight-year-old hens in my yard right now who lay a couple eggs a week for most of the year. They are in outdoor cages with a covered roost, and with a shady area. I break the ice for them twice a day in the winter. They are not heavy eaters, and don't produce a lot of fat, and I suspect that is why the French force-fed them for royal tables. However, they are excellent foragers and mousers. I think they prefer moving food! Here is a link to Crevecoeurs foraging in my yard. Notice how there is always at least one rooster on lookout:

Here is a link to a trio foraging in the winter:

The white hen is a natural sport of the Crevecoeur, and may be the original source of the white Crevecoeurs in Europe.

As you can see in the video, the crest hides the red comb, making it more difficult for overhead predators to spot them. We have red-tail hawks and vultures.

I have more information and photos of my birds in the Crevecoeur breed review area:
https://www.backyardchickens.com/reviews/crevecoeur.10847/

Another great source of Crevecoeur information is Jeannette Beranger's Crevecoeur Project page on Facebook.

Sadly, I never had a Crevie or even a Polish. I looked into getting Crevies but after consulting with a couple USA owners/breeders about 6 yrs ago I got feedback that the USA Crevies were not hardy, or seemed to have too much Polish crosses in them, were independent/self-willed or a bit standoffish to people. I love the beautiful appearance of crested breeds -- Silkies, Breda, Polish, Crevies, La Fleche, Sulmtaler, Houdan, etc etc.

Since the feedback I got from USA Crevie owners was not as positive as I hoped for in health or temperament I opted for Silkies and Breda -- Silkies because of their calmer gentle disposition and Breda because of their less combative temperament with other flock members. The Polish are another gentle calmer breed but I didn't think I should have hens with such skittish temperaments -- I let my backyard flock free in the yard so I didn't want a breed with excessive hampered vision. The little Silkies surprised me with their savvy tendency to hide well and the standard size Breda surprised me with their gentle disposition for being a larger breed in the flock. I love rare chickens and there are so many breeds I would love to have but because of space I had to make choices as to which breeds flocked well together.

Every bird is an individual and I don't want to catergorize a breed as always being one kind of temperament or hardiness so if any owner has a perspective of Crevies from their experiences it would be nice to hear how present day Crevie flocks are doing in the USA today.

 

[333113]

I am happy to report that my trip to the Tulsa State Fair this past weekend was perhaps my best show ever, from a Crevecoeur point of view. My roo was best roo, my hen was best hen.

I brought two cockerels hatched within a day of one another at the end of April. The cockerel with the French sire is almost half again as big as the cockerel out of the all-American Crevecoeurs.

Best of all, Sue Dobson's Crevecoeur pullet was reserve Continental champion of the open show, and another Crevecoeur pullet from Sue's flock was Continental champion in the junior show.

 

[alexisrambles]

Oh WOW! Great turnout guys!!!!! I'm so happy for you!

My experience with my Creves is very similar to Connie's. My Creves (from McMurray) are the most sprightly, aware, and decidedly healthy of all my birds. They are doing VERY well in the Louisiana heat that averages a heat index of 105 every day with 60% humidity. I was worried, but the gnats seem to just bounce off their tight black feathers! They also don't even pant from the heat. They seem entirely unbothered.
I'll never try Cochins again here, I love them but they suffer so much in this heat...

As far as personality, my cockerel is exceedingly standoffish and wants nothing to do with me. Both pullets stick to me while I'm outside. One likes to be petted, one hates it and just wants to be near. They LOVE to run full tilt across the yard, and if scared will fly straight up into a tree!

As far as build goes. Both hens are still a little thinner than I'd like to see, but my cockerel is really filling out beautifully. He looks completely different from a Polish now. VERY broad chested. I've got real high hopes for the offspring he throws.

Side note--they seem to have fewer issues during the adolescent moults than my other chickens. There are never bare patches, just thinning areas, and they are never picked on by my other birds.

 

[minus10gmt]

Hi all - I have two little Crevecoeur chicks and I'm curious about the beak on one. They're less than a week old... about 5 days now. It doesn't appear to have any comb, but the beak seems to have an indentation (like a V maybe?) at the top. Not a great photo but I think you can see it. I just haven't been able to find anything that resembles it online and the chick seems healthy so far. Very active!

 

[333113]

Your chickies are just fine!

Crested birds are structured differently than non-crested birds. Crested birds tend to have larger nostrils along with their crests. Most judging standards for non-crested chickens don't even mention nostrils, but they do for crested breeds. For example, the American Poultry Association Standards book says that Polish nostrils should be "Large, wide, cavernous," and Houdan and La Fleche nostrils should be, "Wide, cavernous," and Crevecoeur nostrils should be, "Broad, highly arched."

Those broad, highly arched nostrils are what you are seeing in your chickies. As they grow, you will see that the indentation between the nostril arches may be a bit harder to see, due to crest feathering and comb growth.

It will be easier to see the nostril arches if you take a look through the photos in the Breeds Review section here:
https://www.backyardchickens.com/reviews/crevecoeur.10847/

 

[minus10gmt]

Your chickies are just fine!

That's a relief! Thanks so much. It's still a little hard for me to see how the beak and nostrils will develop but the pics do help a lot! It's a lot of fun seeing them grow and change day by day. And, I must say I'm the most excited about the Crèvecœurs.

 

[minus10gmt]

Since you're all way more expert than me I'll take advantage. I am wondering if the Crèvecœur chicks ever show a single comb appearing when they're very young? I'm talking about 9 or 10 days old but there's definitely a single comb on one of the birds I *thought* was a Crèvecœur.