Development of USA Lavender Orpington - Update PICs pg 8

[knjinnm]

Hi All,

Check Snowbirds set up if you want to intensively breed birds for faster results.
https://www.backyardchickens.com/forum/viewtopic.php?id=426622&p=130

Great job hinkjc working from scratch.

Joe

 

[hinkjc]

Thanks for your nice comments. I agree with the challenges of time, money and space. I think it presents itself very quickly once you get a project like this going. I am fortunate to have a very supportive husband, who loves my birds and projects as much as I do. We will continue our work on our line because we enjoy it.

 

[HorseFeatherz NV]

Quote:
Those lucky, lucky people.

 

[Ritavale]

These are nice looking birds.

Glad to see you are getting nice feather structure, lavender can be hard in that respect! Just wondering what standard you are aiming or regarding shank, beak and eye colour? I'm not quite sure what the US standards are (I'm in Australia), but I assume they would have to be like the blues and blacks and attain black/brown eyes etc? Have you managed any with that eye colour yet, this to me is the hardest part to get right, can take awhile to get the orange/red eyes out! Do you guys have Coronation sussex over in the states? You coud have used one of those too over a black female orp to start of lavs as well if you had them available. Great work, very impressive, have yet to see Lav orps unveiled here in Oz, but I know they are nearly there along with reds and creles.

 

[hinkjc]

Thanks Ritavale. Since there's no standard written for lavender orps in the US yet, it can be whatever we want it to be. The leg color is consistently slate/gray. The one's with the white shanks are carrying the mottled gene, so I would consider that a defect. The eye color is consistent as well and seems to be driven lighter by the lav gene. Not sure if this is why, as all of the blacks we have used have standard dark eyes. And even after several recrosses back to black orps, they do appear lighter. We do have coronation sussex in the states, but I'm not sure if the columbian gene would cause more problems than benefits. Since we're so far along, it's probably not worth it to look back, but to continue improving them with good selections and crosses to good quality black orps.

Do you have jubilee's in Oz? We are working on developing those as well. They are coming along pretty nicely this year. I'll have to get some updated pics of them. We really just like to work with the birds and enjoy them, but it's fun developing different colors on a breed we love.

 

[Ritavale]

I havn't heard of Jubilee's being done here, that would be one awesome birdy!

But you never know what people have kicking around in their backyard now do you!

I know there is red, gold barred buff and gold/blue partridge in the making as well, we also have blue cuckoos over here, I had two myself for a breeding project but the foxes decided they looked tasty!

The coro sussex is a great donor bird, easy to pick the lav out and no troubles, I'm using it with Autralorps here. Interesting about the eye colour, I'm having a similar problem with whites I am cleaning up, using a blue to remove the odd black feather, shanks are nice and dark but beaks and eyes have lightened, the standard for white Australorp here states that brown eyes are acceptable along with white/horn coloured beaks, leads me to believe these colours, like blue and self blue, have this effect on both, but leave the shank colour intact. There really isn't much to read, that I can find, on shank, beak colour etc and what makes them tick. Looking forward to seeing more of your work!

 

[hinkjc]

Oh, the gold/blue partridge sounds beautiful! I don't think I've ever seen that color. Will have to look for a pic. Is a gold barred buff the same as what others call buff/lemon cuckoo? Best wishes for your australorps. It sounds like you're putting a lot of work into them too.

 

[stonecottagefarm]

Just got our chicks! I will post a pic later. What are some traits/flaws/qualities I can start watching for as they develop? They are beautiful!

 

[Ritavale]

Quote:
Thats what I'm assuming, its just a buff cuckoo, but then again we should never just assume! lol Stone looking forwrd to seeing pics of your chicks!

 

[hinkjc]

Congrats stonecottagefarm on your new chicks! Where did you get them? You would want to look for all the qualities of a standard orpington as they grow (correct skin color, comb and no obvious defects). Once they're grown, you can assess them for type, color, etc.