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

[Backwoods Bntms]

sjarvis00 - the only splash hens I have are splash quail from a blue quail x blue quail so will that result in pattern loss?

It was already in my head about rotating the male, thanks for the confirmation.

jj

 

[Boggy Bottom Bantams]

no JJ,
By using quail splashes you wont loose the pattern, but then you'll just get blue silver quail pullets again and blued yellow males

I was talking about a solid splash, which for your F1 would be a total loss of pattern, they'd just be blues, but would carry the silver quail genes. It would take a back cross from those to start getting quail patterned birds again.

I forgot you had that splash quail though, so that would save you a year as far as getting to the blue silver quail pullets at least

Breed those girls back to your silver male and you'll get 50% silver quail and 50% blue silver quail in both sexes. You can do this with blue quail too, but the splash work best for me in blue projects because they have a double dose of blue in them.

Do bare in mind, If I remember right, your splash quail are hatchery birds right? Make sure they end up decent quality before you breed them to the silvers. No need to use inferior birds in a project like this, you'd end up with more silver quail, sure, but would they be worth the effort in the long run quality wise.

Any time you go into a 2-3 year or better breeding project, starting with quality birds is a big plus. No need to spend all the time and money then have to worry with correcting type after its all done

 

[Backwoods Bntms]

The hatchery birds are looking pretty good, A little light on beards. How hard are they to get back?

jj

Well at least 4 out of 25 after weeding out single combs, wry tails and just plain bad ones.

 

[Boggy Bottom Bantams]

ah ok wasnt sure what they were ending up like. Beards are easy to get, it's a dominate trait, but a fat full beard takes some work. Making good full beards and muffs off thin ones will be tuff, but if the silvers have good ones, that'll be a big plus. Just keep going back to the heaviest bearded birds with your best offspring until they get there. Like I said, Tom's silvers came from me and all these here have always been nice and full, so I would hope the ones you get from him will be too.

 

[sjarvis00]

Quote:
That should work, use a male from that line over the silver pullets.

 

[Boggy Bottom Bantams]

oh, the rose comb is dominate also, so if you have some of those culls that look great type wise, but just have a single comb, dont be scared to use them, their offspring when bred to a rose comb bird should mostly all be rose combed chicks. Cull the ones from there that arent.
The combs may not be a big the first cross, but the second cross will look great.

This has at least been my experience with my out crosses to single combed breeds.

F1's 90% or better small , smooth rose combs
F2's correct full sized , and properly spiked rose combs

 

[Backwoods Bntms]

Thanks to every one for all the answers, I gues I will be building more pens this winter.

jj

 

[Boggy Bottom Bantams]

welcome to the club JJ.

Seems like every winter I have to add on 20 or so more pens

 

[Bantam Username]

Can anyone tell me whether this little silver quail guy is a roo or not, this is my first time raising D'anvers and I'm smitten, I will be hatching lots more of these feisty little meepers in the spring.

He's 4 weeks old.

 

[Boggy Bottom Bantams]

bit young to tell for sure, but based off how mine look at that age, yes he's going to be a boy. This is just based off the comb base he has going right now. In a couple more weeks, the quail feather pattern will start to show. Then you can look for solid white patches verses black lacing. Laced will be your hens, no lacing will be the boys on all quail patterned birds.