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Frustrating. So you've saved a cock/el or two to breed forward. From the F4s, I presume? I think you said you culled all the F5 cockerels.
My second F4 female (of 2) is coming through molt enough now that I can see her buff barring all over her body like the photo of the one I posted earlier. I guess that means *all* my F5s have the Buff Barring gene in them. That explains why so many of the F5 females have brown. Maybe all of them do. We'll be doing the Big Look later this week/this coming weekend.
What I'm getting with the F5 males is more barring throughout the body on the birds that have more correct barring in the tails. The guys with the whiter bodies have blacker tails and are looking more likely to go brassy. But they also change so much color-wise as they continue to mature, and several of my birds are weeks & weeks behind. That big brassy guy with the black & gray barred tail is one of the older F5s... they could all end up looking that way, more or less.
Frustrating shame as they are looking so nice with size/shape. One could even say they look "tasty," which is pretty much the point. Unless you're breeding.
I tried to get a photo of one of the bigger F5 males that shows black wing feathers low on one side, but he wasn't cooperating today. Most of the other wings look fine from a distance. We'll unfold them during The Big Look.
EDITED: This photo shows the body shape of the bird in back with the better tail ... kinda puffed up in the photo, so looking more solid than he probably is. It's cold here today. It doesn't show his color well -- he has barring in his saddle, etc. The iPhone camera chose to focus on that leaf caught in the fence instead of the birds.
Edited again: This photo shows the color of the more barred cockerels a bit better. The big brassy bird is in the bottom right. I was trying to photograph the right wing of the bird on the left. You can see some black wing tips there, but his bodyguards are in the way.
