Crossbreeding dual purpose breeds for sustainable flock

[U_Stormcrow]

Ya it does look like those hen pics, but hers still doesn't go back that much. But she's only just a year old so may be that too.

Haha, ya I just meant that's what I ordered so she should be one of those breeds, at least according to their hatchery stock. They all lay fairly light eggs but hers are very cream, not brown at all. Not expecting like dark marans eggs or anything, just funny the way they are all called brown eggs.

My SLW eggs all have a slightly "pink" cast in the right light, but are otherwise cream, or perhaps cream with a spot of tea. If hers look very pale pink under some light until you look at them directly, its another Wyan indicator - and the only way I can tell my SLW eggs from my Brahma eggs.

 

[HomesteadNowhere]

Congrats @U_Stormcrow made the 250th post on the thread

Chicks are growing good. I didn't weigh them as day olds, I probably should on the next hatch. I'm going to call Tuesday one week since they hatched mon/tues. So I'll be weighing them.

I've been writing on the eggs and turning them back and forth in the egg flat. I'm already up to 36... Since I really want to get offspring from the FR I'm going to pull out the rest of the eggs. The brahmas are kind of dirty anyway. That's 18 FR x NH eggs and 4 FR x Bielefelder eggs (from the caged hens). So I think it will be lots to fill the incubator by the time I plan to set. And if it's shy of full I can collect some of the brahmas eggs right before setting date.

That way I can focus on getting offspring from the FR and cull them down. If I have just a few of them then I can have them in the tractor pen, easier to manage. And then the brahmas, NH, and white hen can have the Shaw.

 

[U_Stormcrow]

Sounds like an excellent plan

 

[HomesteadNowhere]

I upgraded the chicks to the big cage and the brooder plate. I'll be checking on them to see how they're doing. I'd been reading the threads here like the heating pad cave etc. I think the problem with the chicks last year was: they were shipped chicks, so needed more coddling at first.. and the first week the chicks seem to really need the heat. Now they didn't seem to want to be right under the lamp anyways, they would all cuddle up and sleep. We'll see.

Chick weights! Wk 1, all in grams.
Chipmunk-
Bl/bl 79
Bl/or 103
Bl/gr 92
Bl/p 95

Faint chipmunk-
Gr 82
Or 87
Bl 78
P 109

Feather legs-
62
82
93

Blonde-
87
92
93
94
94
95
104
*108
*109
*116
*122

The blonde chicks I had put on the spiral leg bands. I only had a couple more so the ones with * I put another leg band on so they have one on each leg.

I think I'm going to see how they look next week and decide about banding. There are 8 above 100g. I may band the heaviest 10 for recording purposes.

The next hatch being for sure only from FR hens (and the NH hen) will be a better show of how the first cross offspring do. From those I'll keep the best for breeding.

 

[HomesteadNowhere]

Yesterday I had opportunity to catch the white hen so I put her in with the brahmas. So for sure there shouldn't be any of her eggs going into the incubator. Then today 8 eggs from 8 chickens in that pen today.

Our weather is all over. Night before last was 13*F. Day temps of 25* then yesterday 40*. Today it's 70*F. We've already had a day of 74* in March. We're just ping-ponging from winter weather to early summer. Back and forth, back and forth.

 

[Molpet]

Yesterday I had opportunity to catch the white hen so I put her in with the brahmas. So for sure there shouldn't be any of her eggs going into the incubator. Then today 8 eggs from 8 chickens in that pen today.

Our weather is all over. Night before last was 13*F. Day temps of 25* then yesterday 40*. Today it's 70*F. We've already had a day of 74* in March. We're just ping-ponging from winter weather to early summer. Back and forth, back and forth.

Spring rollercoaster here too

 

[U_Stormcrow]

FL too. We had 74, then 18, then back to high 70s. It was 83 today.

oh yeah, and tornados.

 

[HomesteadNowhere]

Well still all 22 chicks. Seems like some like to hang out on top of the heat plate, a few like to be under the heat plate, and most are so active they don't seem to care about the heat plate at all. There is often a sleeping chick pile not under the heat plate. It is 70 in the house so I'm thinking to unplug the heat plate on Tuesday, at 2wks old. See how they do, if they even notice. They are really feathering out and are always very warm when I pick one up or am being trampled trying to put the food back down for them.

I don't remember if I said this already or not. I'm feeding them the same 16% pellet as the flock. I got soybean meal (36% protein I think) to mix with it to up the protein but I haven't been measuring it closely. They all seem to be growing great though. I've been wetting the feed just enough for the pellets to soften and to somewhat evenly distribute the meal and pellets. They are eating so much more I'm going to have to upgrade them to the long metal trough feeder.

 

[HomesteadNowhere]

The chipmunk stripe chicks all have serious tails grown in. I'm going with the assumption that these will be like the FR were and they are males, the ones still without tails grown in or just starting to grow in assuming females.
The faint chipmunk stripe chicks look to be female. Feather leg chicks all three female. Blonde chicks look like 7 male and 4 female.

Chipmunk- (male)
Bl/bl. Wk1 79g. Wk2 147g.
Bl/or. 103g. 195g. (Band 007)
Bl/gr. 92g. 150g.
Bl/p. 95g. 174g.

Faint chipmunk- (female)
Gr. 82g. 136g.
Or. 87g. 155g.
Bl. 78g. 163g.
P. 109g. 200g. (Band 006)

Feather legs- (female)
Wk 1: 62, 82, 93g
Wk 2: 108 151, 152g

Blonde heaviest-
(Note, last week I had 5 that were the biggest and I double leg banded 4 of them. So this week I wing banded those 4 and the next biggest.)
Wk 1: 104, 108, 109, 116, 122g
Wk 2-
225g (M, band 001)
205g (M, band 002)
198g (M, band 003)
219g (M, band 004)
190g (F, band 005)

Blonde, the rest-
133g, F
166g, F
175g, F
181g, M
182g, M
186g, M

The spiral leg bands were a pain, I had to pull and unwrap them off. Won't get those again. I also took off the zip ties, which were a pain to get off too. They have to be so small to stay on and the chicks grow so fast.
So the 7 that are wing banded will be weighed still but I won't bother with the rest. I weighed them before putting more feed down so they didn't have huge crops full of food for weighing.

The colors are interesting. I think a couple are penciled black lines, like barring is. There is definitely alot going on in the background that will be popping up breeding from the FR. From the variations in mine and what I've seen in others pics, I'm thinking that for the parent/grandparents breeding they are only weeding out colors like too much dark or darker pin feathers. Not for any certain color or pattern. Just for heavy meat production and cutting off colors or patterns that don't work for light pins and more fiddly plucking. Which makes sense for that market.

 

[HomesteadNowhere]

Tag number- wk2 grams/ wk3 grams (% growth)
001- 225/ 352 (156%)
002- 205/ 322 (157%)
003- 198/ 311 (157%)
004- 219/ 346 (158%)
005- 190/ 303 (159%)
006- 200/ 314 (157%)
007- 195/ 295 (151%)

After last weeks weights I realized the chick "bl" went from 78g to 163g.. a 209% gain..! But it was later that day and I had removed the bands and I couldn't identify which it was anymore. It would have been interesting to see if it kept a high growth rate.

I don't have hatchery chicks to compare them to side by side but I think they are doing better as a whole than the mixed bunch were last year. They seem to be nice meaty little guys. The feather leg chicks are the slackers but I expected that. Of the three one is definitely bigger but still not a competitor for meaty traits. The second is obviously the smallest and the third is only a bit bigger.

It's really nice out today so the chicks went out to the tractor pen. I have an upside down tote with a door cut in it for them to cuddle in. They were all scaredy cats at first but quickly started scratching and investigating.