Cubalaya Thread For Sharing Pics and Discussing Our Birds

[Henny Penny04]

Hello~
I am listing a cubalaya pair for sale on BYC, as well as Craigslist, but have no idea about the color description. We're pretty new to chickens in general. Could someone here tell me what color these two are? I would really appreciate it! Thanks! (We're in SE Michigan, in case anyone is interested in them...)

 

[gallorojo]

Brown Red. AKA Red Birchen, Black Copper, etc, etc. In game type birds, that color is typically called brown red. That's what I would call it. I assume those are from Sandhill stock?

 

[Cuban Longtails]

The female has the wrong tail angle to be cubalaya.

 

[gallorojo]

Agreed---

Tail angle above the horizontal is a disqualification in Cubalayas. Unfortunately some of the Sandhill stock has too high of tails. It seems more an issue with the females from what I have seen. The tail should look like the picture in Cuban Longtails avatar.

 

[Henny Penny04]

Brown and Red... well I suppose I could have figured that out! Yes, they are from Sandhill. I think he has ridiculously long legs, and you're right about the female. I have even wondered if they sent the wrong breed at times. I was hoping that she would start to hold it lower after she molted, but who knows. It's too bad that Sandhill doesn't have better stock. I would hope that they are working on improving it. You all have amazing birds, by the way. Beautiful.
Thanks for the help- hopefully I can get these two off my hands soon.

 

[cubalaya]

they are brown reds. they are how old? the brown reds from sandhill were the slowest to mature. best to keep them until they are 2 to really tell how good they are. any bird will hold their tail up at times. look at the tail when they are relaxed or perching. the bird in my avatar was downright ugly until he was about 10 months old.

 

[Henny Penny04]

They're 7-8 months old, so still babies. We acquired them at 8 weeks and they hadn't been handled. They are the most skittish of any bird I've had. They panic when we approach them, which is why her tail is so high. She usually carries it fairly horizontal, but not as low as the pictures you folks have. I'd keep them, but we've reconsidered having a rooster- he's awful loud for around here. We don't want to cause trouble with the neighbors. But I was looking forward to seeing him in all his glory! I'm not sure that we'll find anybody to take them. Cubalaya or not, roosters are hard to get rid of around here.

 

[shelleyb1969]

Quote:
Did you get them from a lady in Brown City? If so, IT WASN'T ME

, but I do know who she is.

 

[cubalaya]

well, there is your chance to get a pair, minnesotachikenwrangler. i am guessing that this pair survived a cold winter up there?

 

[gallorojo]

I just wanted to clarify I don't think all of Sandhill's stock is bad, and, I really think overall they are doing good work there. Sometimes the tails will drop in their 2nd year, I have seen it happen. I would not breed a high tail unless I had no better correct tail birds, I would only breed it to a bird with the correct tail, or, I may use a high tail if it had some trait I wanted to add into another bird. I myself have definitely bred birds with disqualifications, however, you need to be sure to only breed them to another bird that will fix or compensate for the fault. Ideally it would be better not to use them if they have DQ's. The legs on the males ought to be rather long. His leg length looks fine to me.
One final thing-Cubalayas should be extremely TAME, all of mine have been incredibly human tame/friendly/docile. A real joy to work with. Should never be flighty, even if never handled. I don't make pets out of mine, and seldom handle them, and they are super tame.