Danish Vs Light Brown Leghorn?

[Jfitz]

I am looking into getting some light brown leghorns this spring for a breeding project. I've seen light browns, danish, and light brown with danish.

Genetically speaking what is the difference? What added color genes would I be looking at with the danish vs regular light browns?

 

[HaikuHeritageFarm]

I am looking into getting some light brown leghorns this spring for a breeding project. I've seen light browns, danish, and light brown with danish.

Genetically speaking what is the difference? What added color genes would I be looking at with the danish vs regular light browns?

Dan Honour who I respect highly as a Leghorn guy told me the "Danish" browns are more or less the hatchery type in America. They're lighter birds, smaller, more narrow, you'll notice a lot of shafting in the hackle, etc. It's the same general color and pattern as standardbred light browns, but much less refined.

I don't think it'd be a stretch to say all hatchery browns are of this type. Standardbred Light Browns are very different creatures. I have a Cackle hatchery brown hen in with my standardbred browns and she sticks out like a sore thumb—small, pinched, lots of light yellowish shafts showing up in her hackle, mossiness galore. Generally inferior quality, basically. She also doesn't lay any better than the standardbred birds. The only reason I still have her is because I couldn't catch her when I sold the others.

Depending on your project and what else you're using, I'd say a hatchery brown would be a setback... unless you're going for small flighty birds. Bud Blankenship sells chicks once spring rolls around. Worth the wait.

 

[RoostersAreAwesome]

Dan Honour who I respect highly as a Leghorn guy told me the "Danish" browns are more or less the hatchery type in America. They're lighter birds, smaller, more narrow, you'll notice a lot of shafting in the hackle, etc. It's the same general color and pattern as standardbred light browns, but much less refined.

I don't think it'd be a stretch to say all hatchery browns are of this type. Standardbred Light Browns are very different creatures. I have a Cackle hatchery brown hen in with my standardbred browns and she sticks out like a sore thumb—small, pinched, lots of light yellowish shafts showing up in her hackle, mossiness galore. Generally inferior quality, basically. She also doesn't lay any better than the standardbred birds. The only reason I still have her is because I couldn't catch her when I sold the others.

Depending on your project and what else you're using, I'd say a hatchery brown would be a setback... unless you're going for small flighty birds. Bud Blankenship sells chicks once spring rolls around. Worth the wait.

Out of curiosity, do you have comparison pictures of the standardbred hens versus the hatchery hen?

 

[HaikuHeritageFarm]

Out of curiosity, do you have comparison pictures of the standardbred hens versus the hatchery hen?

This is the second time I've been asked this in a month, lol. I need to quit talking about this until I can illustrate it, i guess! I am just about done with my breeding coops for the leghorns and I'll be separating the birds this week, so I'll be sure to get comparison shots at that time.

 

[Jfitz]

Dan Honour who I respect highly as a Leghorn guy told me the "Danish" browns are more or less the hatchery type in America. They're lighter birds, smaller, more narrow, you'll notice a lot of shafting in the hackle, etc. It's the same general color and pattern as standardbred light browns, but much less refined.

I don't think it'd be a stretch to say all hatchery browns are of this type. Standardbred Light Browns are very different creatures. I have a Cackle hatchery brown hen in with my standardbred browns and she sticks out like a sore thumb—small, pinched, lots of light yellowish shafts showing up in her hackle, mossiness galore. Generally inferior quality, basically. She also doesn't lay any better than the standardbred birds. The only reason I still have her is because I couldn't catch her when I sold the others.

Depending on your project and what else you're using, I'd say a hatchery brown would be a setback... unless you're going for small flighty birds. Bud Blankenship sells chicks once spring rolls around. Worth the wait.

Thanks for your input! I am definitely looking to get good quality so that helps quite a bit!

I'm working with Isabel mottled leghorns as of right now. Currently I only have a trio. My idea is kind of back pedaling a bit, but being that the only genetics I know is on paper, I will start by working with the genes I understand. Those being Lavender and Mottling. Cross Isabel mottled back to the browns to create splits to both genes. And from there cross with the original Isabel and be back to more isabel mottled. Correct?

Is Bud Blankenship on BYC?

 

[HaikuHeritageFarm]

Alright, I came up with a solution to show the differences! I nabbed a few photos off Cackle's site that I feel best represent the bird I have and I have two shots of a young standardbred pullet, plus a video of the girls more recently.

First up, hatchery/Danish browns.


For comparison, a young standardbred pullet:



I think most importantly, even though this is a young bird and her color isn't actually that great and her type isn't perfect, you can see the difference in length and width and general body capacity. I wish I could show the size difference better, but suffice it to say that this girl has matured to be AT LEAST a full pound heavier than her hatchery counterpart. The hatchery bird also shows SIGNIFICANT "mossiness" which is that sort of marbled look in her brown feathers, and while this standardbred girl does have some shafting showing in her hackle as well, it's not nearly so severe as the hatcery bird.

If you can, please take a look at this video on TikTok. I tried uploading it directly here, but the quality was terrible. This shows a more recent view of this girl in motion with her sisters, an Isabella leghorn or two, as well as a standardbred brown male. You can see the length of body and width, nice fan on the tail. These standardbred browns are excellent dual-purpose birds, nothing at all like the "light, flighty" hatchery or production leghorns most are familiar with.

https://www.tiktok.com/@HaikuHeritageFarm/video/6899191817351204101?lang=en&sender_device=pc&sender_web_id=6881668037448238598&is_from_webapp=v2

 

[HaikuHeritageFarm]

Thanks for your input! I am definitely looking to get good quality so that helps quite a bit!

I'm working with Isabel mottled leghorns as of right now. Currently I only have a trio. My idea is kind of back pedaling a bit, but being that the only genetics I know is on paper, I will start by working with the genes I understand. Those being Lavender and Mottling. Cross Isabel mottled back to the browns to create splits to both genes. And from there cross with the original Isabel and be back to more isabel mottled. Correct?

Is Bud Blankenship on BYC?

I actually contacted Bud through Facebook, I'm not sure if he's here or not. I've since tried to move away from FB but we stay in touch on messenger. He ships from Ohio and we did pretty well, I had one bad shipment because they had the bad luck to be hatched during our only real cold snap of the year, but we made up for it with round two and had very good survival rates. I got birds from him for improving my Isabella stock. I actually was talking to Dan about breaking the link between lavender and feather fray when he mentioned that the "Danish" browns had been used to develop the Isabella leghorn at the start and he wasn't wild about that.

Do you have a nice exchequer line to use to bring in mottling? I've pondered adding that to the mix but haven't located Exchequers I liked much.

Instead I'm messing with my Opal Legbars and mottled Houdans to make a big ol' mess.

 

[Jfitz]

I actually was talking to Dan about breaking the link between lavender and feather fray when he mentioned that the "Danish" browns had been used to develop the Isabella leghorn at the start and he wasn't wild about that.

Do you have a nice exchequer line to use to bring in mottling? I've pondered adding that to the mix but haven't located Exchequers I liked much.

Actually the mottling gene is already there. All I'm trying to do is play around a little and get back to making more Isabel mottled.

I got what were advertised as Lavender Mottled LHs from someone on my local CL. I asked her where the parent stock came from and turns out they were from Eye Of The Rooster Farm in NC. They are advertised as lavender mottled there also. I contacted the owner and was asking questions about the breeding of them and was revealed they are actually Isabel Mottled Leghorns, being based from browns. They have red mottled there as well.

I also asked the breeder about the 'fray' and he said there should be no issues as far as he knows. It could be a good way to bring the mottling in your opal line without the feather issues. He's on FB as Eye Of The Rooster Farm.

These are the parents to my birds, I do not own them.

 

[HaikuHeritageFarm]

I looked up their FB page since @MIAMI LEGHORN was just asking about red mottled leghorns. (Those look great!) Unfortunately, there IS evidence of fray in their lavender birds. It's suppressed probably because they've been backcrossing to lots of undiluted birds to get these varieties going, but as soon as you stop breeding out to browns it'll come raging back.

I'm not aware of any line in the US that has successfully broken the linkage to the point that birds don't show fray or diminished feather quality after multiple generations of lavender only birds. Every time someone shows me nice feather quality in a lavender large fowl bird—of ANY breed—in the US I have found out that there's a black or brown crossed in in the recent history.

 

[Miami Leghorn]

Unfortunately, there IS evidence of fray in their lavender birds. It's suppressed probably because they've been backcrossing to lots of undiluted birds to get these varieties going, but as soon as you stop breeding out to browns it'll come raging back.

Wow.