d'anver lovers,discuss the breed and post some pics!

[speckledhen]

The patterned shoulder feathers on the mille pullets as opposed to the more solid colored ones of males works just as well or better than any comb sexing. Thanks for that tip early on, Aubrey. It's almost impossible on porcelains because they are so hard to see the spots on with that light base color.

 

[K Epp]

Rusty Jr. 5 weeks

 

[speckledhen]

Penny and Carly have four beautiful chicks, three porcelains and one mille, the latter being Mina's and the rest belonging to Maura, my only porcelain hen. Maura is sitting on four eggs on Day 15 herself, two of her own, one of Penny's and one of Mina's. I think Mina's mille chick belongs to Spike, since they are both visual Milles, though 1/2-3/4 porcelain genetically. Spike seems to have claimed Mina as his hen and I rarely see Aubrey mate her.

I'd post photos but I have no upload capability until I get the new modem, hopefully today. Thought it would be here yesterday. It's driving me crazy since I do a lot of uploading, both here and to my own Blue Roo Creations site. Been upload-impaired for several days now.

 

[speckledhen]

No modem. Called and they didn't even send it. ARGH! So, we will be without really decent internet and no upload capability until next week sometime. And I have some adorable pics of the new babies, too, dang it. I couldn't even edit my previous post, only post a new one (I think it will post).

 

[ShadowsFIAL]

9.

8. One is dead.

 

[FairLeaBantams]

Here is "pistol" who I got from Boggy Bottom, he/she is a little ball of energy! I wish I had had a better hatch, but 1 is better than none

 

[gillyfleur]

So, pictures to evaluate for Aubrey and/or other knowledgeable folks here. I had four chicks hatch from my dun cuckoo BBB eggs. 2 are obviously cuckoo, and from reading recent comments I'm guessing that the one which has a large spot on the back of the head is (hopefully) female and the one that has a faint line on the back of the head is male. So far so good. Here is where my inexperience shows--of the 2 remaining I have one that looks like a calico cat and one that started out solid pale grey, but is now starting to get white feathers on the shoulders. I understand the percentages and some of the genetics (college bio class was a long time ago), but I'm not familiar enough with the baby feathering and how it changes as they mature. So, are these guys dun cuckoo, khaki cuckoo or blacks? Any input would be most welcome! Pics below:

 

[speckledhen]

Quote: Usually, with the barring gene, it's the opposite. Males have larger, more irregular spots. Females have smaller, more defined spots. It's one of the sexing traits for all barred breeds, though it works more on the hatchery stock than the heritage stock, so it's only marginally useful with those. I've never had any of the cuckoo varieties of the D'Anvers, but would assume it would be the same for those, if it works at all with them. I'd think there would be other color cues that Aubrey or JJ could tell you about.

 

[Backwoods Bntms]

Cuckoo

green = pullet
Red = single factored male
blue = double factored male

 

[speckledhen]

Yeah, that is one issue, the single factor barred male. I bred from one of those over my heritage line Barred Rock hens. Got a gorgeous double barred male, two barred pullets and two solid black pullets. At least I got four pullets, right? I'll be keeping the male as he is even better than his sire, at least in the coloring department.