Discussion of Legbar Standard of Perfection for -Alternative- Legbars - SOP discussion

[ChicKat]

Thanks Chicken pickin -

I didn't realize that you had hatchability problems - but I knew a couple of people did in other threads... I had thought that their eggs were from other flocks and not their own. So ...as with any problem, go through all the possibilities and when they are ruled out -- then what is left is possibly the cause.!! The person that they bought eggs from could have unknowingly had a respiratory disease in the hen and the eggs could have carried the disease -- or better yet - not hatched out. (so the disease would end there at the embryo stage).

It is good that NH tests for MG -- many - maybe even MOST states don't test for MG to get NPIP certification -- as strange as that may seem -- they only test for p/t. Perhaps this will change. I hadn't realized until I started researching it after suspecting it as a possibility how they are saying that as many as 90% of US back yard flocks have MG. If the chicken shows no symptoms - why would the back yarder pay to get the test?

I also have Blue Isbars. The only Isbars I have hatched are CL X Isbar - Ice Cream Bars -- and they are hybrid vigor to a 'T'. But I read that there was a LOT of non-hatch and a lot of chick mortality. in pure Isbars - I had attributed it to the degree that the breed must be inbred, because there are/were so very few blue Isbars alive. The ones that were available about a year ago too -- were so very similar -- they were like cookie-cutters and they even moved as if attached together...like their brains were working identically. Now since research on respiratory disease, I have wondered if some of the struggles Isbar people were experiencing were due to some disease passed hen to egg. I see that Greenfire Farms discontinued their original line of Isbars -- (The source of my first Isbars - someone who got their originals from Greenfires's first line - the ones with very DARK almost black eyes)--- I was working to introduce genetic diversity and got some from another source...the new Isbars do not have the same black-looking eyes... so there is/was some outcrossing involved I think. But it was almost expect pure Isbar eggs to NOT hatch - and then if they do hatch expect them to NOT survive.... and I was wondering if some flocks of Cream Legbars were getting to the same degree of what I considered close inbreeding - again - not known - because we don't know previous to GFF birds the source and the possible brother-sister pairings --

YOUR approach for your family and returning from poultry events is very wise... As I said - and you are so wise to do it the way that you do.... you have to maintain tight biosecurity almost as if you had something very contagous -- not as if you will get it. I guess there are some chicken diseases that are 'reportable' and they will put up signs on the property to keep people away from the chickens....

 

[chicken pickin]

Thanks Chicken pickin -

I didn't realize that you had hatchability problems - but I knew a couple of people did in other threads... I had thought that their eggs were from other flocks and not their own. So ...as with any problem, go through all the possibilities and when they are ruled out -- then what is left is possibly the cause.!! The person that they bought eggs from could have unknowingly had a respiratory disease in the hen and the eggs could have carried the disease -- or better yet - not hatched out. (so the disease would end there at the embryo stage).

It is good that NH tests for MG -- many - maybe even MOST states don't test for MG to get NPIP certification -- as strange as that may seem -- they only test for p/t. Perhaps this will change. I hadn't realized until I started researching it after suspecting it as a possibility how they are saying that as many as 90% of US back yard flocks have MG. If the chicken shows no symptoms - why would the back yarder pay to get the test?

I also have Blue Isbars. The only Isbars I have hatched are CL X Isbar - Ice Cream Bars -- and they are hybrid vigor to a 'T'. But I read that there was a LOT of non-hatch and a lot of chick mortality. in pure Isbars - I had attributed it to the degree that the breed must be inbred, because there are/were so very few blue Isbars alive. The ones that were available about a year ago too -- were so very similar -- they were like cookie-cutters and they even moved as if attached together...like their brains were working identically. Now since research on respiratory disease, I have wondered if some of the struggles Isbar people were experiencing were due to some disease passed hen to egg. I see that Greenfire Farms discontinued their original line of Isbars -- (The source of my first Isbars - someone who got their originals from Greenfires's first line - the ones with very DARK almost black eyes)--- I was working to introduce genetic diversity and got some from another source...the new Isbars do not have the same black-looking eyes... so there is/was some outcrossing involved I think. But it was almost expect pure Isbar eggs to NOT hatch - and then if they do hatch expect them to NOT survive.... and I was wondering if some flocks of Cream Legbars were getting to the same degree of what I considered close inbreeding - again - not known - because we don't know previous to GFF birds the source and the possible brother-sister pairings --

YOUR approach for your family and returning from poultry events is very wise... As I said - and you are so wise to do it the way that you do.... you have to maintain tight biosecurity almost as if you had something very contagous -- not as if you will get it. I guess there are some chicken diseases that are 'reportable' and they will put up signs on the property to keep people away from the chickens....

NH doesn't test for MG as part of the NPIP process. I request it and pay extra for the tests. I do this just to ease my mind and the mind of my customers.

 

[ChicKat]

NH doesn't test for MG as part of the NPIP process. I request it and pay extra for the tests. I do this just to ease my mind and the mind of my customers.

Ah Ha! Thanks for the clarification -- I may choose to go that route - for the same reasons.... we'll see.

I'm still thinking about exactly what bio-security procedures to put in place. It's a shame in a way to remove the fun of people coming to the pens and at least looking in...but I have started doing more "supervised free-ranging" -- so the chickens will be walking on the same ground. I think an 'authorized personnel only beyond this point' -- type of fencing off the coop area is the best approach from what I can think of now. And ALL my friends Here have chickens, and -- I have the brooder in the house -- go figure...being biosecure is going to require changes, changes, changes.......

 

[chicken pickin]

Ah Ha! Thanks for the clarification -- I may choose to go that route - for the same reasons.... we'll see.

I'm still thinking about exactly what bio-security procedures to put in place. It's a shame in a way to remove the fun of people coming to the pens and at least looking in...but I have started doing more "supervised free-ranging" -- so the chickens will be walking on the same ground. I think an 'authorized personnel only beyond this point' -- type of fencing off the coop area is the best approach from what I can think of now. And ALL my friends Here have chickens, and -- I have the brooder in the house -- go figure...being biosecure is going to require changes, changes, changes.......

It is a shame isn't it!? Lucky for me anyone I know or talk to either doesn't like chickens or is sick of hearing about them so I have no one trying to plow there way through to see them lol.

I have had a customer or 2 irritated at me for not allowing the to view my birds saying oh well I would no what you were talking about but your keeping your birds a secret or out of view etc. But I have absolutely no problem letting those people walk away if they don't like it. I also have absolutely have no problem at all bringing my birds down to them for them to view them if they have interest in seeing parent stock or want to see the birds before making a decision on buying, but they can not ever touch them until they buy them.

I have had customers ignore my instructions and come right up my driveway and start walking around all my pens

. I finally put a fence around all my chicken coops with an entrance/exit gate on either side of the yard. This is what I call my chicken yard. There are 5 coops that the fence surrounds. The fence helps people see that I want them to stay distant but they do free range also.

Ill look for a pic

 

[ChicKat]

chicken pickin... Like that fence idea. necessity is the mother of invention! I could see a fenc around all my pens in my future. good idea!

 

[chicken pickin]

I went the cheap easy route, just used green garden stakes and chicken wire. For the gates I cemented wood post in the ground and hinged some scrap lattice as gates.

Doesn't look as pretty in winter not to mention that was taken today during our blizzard. This pic shows about 2/3 of the chicken yard.

 

[ChicKat]

I went the cheap easy route, just used green garden stakes and chicken wire. For the gates I cemented wood post in the ground and hinged some scrap lattice as gates.
Doesn't look as pretty in winter not to mention that was taken today during our blizzard. This pic shows about 2/3 of the chicken yard.

Oh yeah - I have been hearing about your blizzard... OMG -- up to 3' of snow.... what fun, and then if the wind blows - what drifts. I had my porch covered in a blizzard one year when I live back east-- and I don't remember how the door ever got opened.

I like the look of your fence - it is a good inspiration for me. Then I would get big signs... 'bioHazard' all who enter/tresspass will be severely punished -- (maybe even fed to the chickens)

 

[ChicKat]

Summary 2

It has only been 389 posts since the last summary. I was awaiting an event that I won't hold off summary for any longer.

Here are some highlights and some unanswered questions:

1. Genetics and the Cream Gene - We had thought that the only way to achieve a 'cream' colored chicken was two recessive gold-inhibitor genes - that would be ig/ig. In his paper for the genetics journal Punnett talks about a hen crossed with a RIR cock-bird that produced cream offspring.

Here is a quote from the article Punnett wrote:
"...By happy chance a silver Light Sussex [female] was found which on mating with a cream [male] gave only silver [males] and cream [females]. Such [males] must be silver on cream, and one of them mated back to cream [females] gave silvers and creams of both sexes. A silver hen from this mating (i.e. silver on cream) was mated with a gold Rhode Island Red [male]. If silver, gold and cream form an alleomorphic series in the sex chromosome the [males] from this mating should receive silver from their mother and gold from their father, i.e. cream from neither parent. Hence such [males] mated to cream [females] should give silvers and golds of both sexes but no creams. Actually this mating gave 13 silvers, 9 golds and 8 creams, both sexes being represented in each colour class. Clearly this disproves the hypothesis of an alleomorphoc series in the sex chromosome. But the figures accord reasonably well with the assumption of two independent alleomorphic pairs where expectations would be silvers, golds, and creams in the ratio 2:1:1. * "

Punnett's asterisk pertains to this:
"* While this experiment was in progress I learned from Mr. M.S.Pease that he had obtained the following evidence telling against the supposition of a multiple alleomorphic series. A gold hen hen mated with a cream cock gave golds and creams of both sexes. On the supposition of multiple alleomorphs one would have expected all the male chicks to be gold and the females to be cream. "

extra long for completeness -- but the part about a RIR in the mating mix - would eliminate any chance for ANY offspring to be cream since he would not pass a recessive cream gene to his offspring. OR we really do not have the complete picture/formula details about Cream - as the simple recessive that we think that it is.OR - the research was flawed or RIR cock-bird DID have recessive cream? A zillion speculations could sprout - but IMO it shows one area where not enough is known about Cream. One of the reasons to not split out the more colorful birds as non-cream or less cream - etc. So we don't have enough information to start another variety based on genetics. ETA - this is not the case for Rose Comb and for White Recessive - they both have genetic variation that is not ambiguous.

2. Environmental Effects on Appearance/Color - Those with Cream colored Cream Legbars had the sun bleaching the hackles LIGHTER - those with possible split for silver or -- ?? some other factors had the light (white looking - or gray and white looking) neck hackles react the way silver does in the sun and turn a golden color. Obviously the difference in appearance based on sun exposure (or other environmental effect) wouldn't support being a different variety.

3. Newer information on the correct Appearance of the Cream Legbar - The 2014 winning Cockerel in the UK Poultry shows is certainly 'darker' or 'more colorful' than the direction that the breed had gone prior to that. The people who were dismissing CLs as 'wrong' 'cross-bred' 'too colorful' 'gold' etc. that pushed the color to a very light monochromatic CL and telling others this was the only acceptable appearance need to re-evaluate their position in light of the current top ranked chickens, IMO. The chickens from the Fancy Fowl Magazine that are attributed to David Applegarth's flock - are 'too colorful' in the eyes of some folks -- but the images that surfaced in late 2014 - seemed to match the SOP - with the exception that the females are not just simply Cream and Gray -- but seem to have more browns in the backs, wings etc. The probably correct appearance for the Cream Legbar female is lighter than the majority of CL females seen currently in the USA..... if we take the wording of the SOP literally. So these examples would also support that there is not a need for an SOP for a more colorful variety of CL.

The Rose Comb CL and the recessive White CL (providing it is autosexing for multiple generations) will need a separate SOP -- And the needed changes to the SOP on behalf of those varieties are pretty obvious and will be fairly easy to write up.

 

[sol2go]

3. Newer information on the correct Appearance of the Cream Legbar - The 2014 winning Cockerel in the UK Poultry shows is certainly 'darker' or 'more colorful' than the direction that the breed had gone prior to that. The people who were dismissing CLs as 'wrong' 'cross-bred' 'too colorful' 'gold' etc. that pushed the color to a very light monochromatic CL and telling others this was the only acceptable appearance need to re-evaluate their position in light of the current top ranked chickens, IMO. The chickens from the Fancy Fowl Magazine that are attributed to David Applegarth's flock - are 'too colorful' in the eyes of some folks -- but the images that surfaced in late 2014 - seemed to match the SOP - with the exception that the females are not just simply Cream and Gray -- but seem to have more browns in the backs, wings etc. The probably correct appearance for the Cream Legbar female is lighter than the majority of CL females seen currently in the USA..... if we take the wording of the SOP literally. So these examples would also support that there is not a need for an SOP for a more colorful variety of CL.

The Rose Comb CL and the recessive White CL (providing it is autosexing for multiple generations) will need a separate SOP -- And the needed changes to the SOP on behalf of those varieties are pretty obvious and will be fairly easy to write up.

Since it is included as a summary item, is #3 actually a definitive statement or a personal opinion?
As stated, it seems to 1) work against the established understanding of the Cream Legbar SOP in the USA to this point, and 2) does not incorporate the full range of "colorful" that could be considered if breeders were given some time to work with their stock and actually report the outcomes.

 

[ChicKat]

Since it is included as a summary item, is #3 actually a definitive statement or a personal opinion?
As stated, it seems to 1) work against the established understanding of the Cream Legbar SOP in the USA to this point, and 2) does not incorporate the full range of "colorful" that could be considered if breeders were given some time to work with their stock and actually report the outcomes.

Thanks for the insights and the comments.

If you will elaborate a bit more -- I would appreciate it - because I'm not sure I fully understand. 'work against the established understanding of the CL SOP in USA' -- is that because the birds I used in the SOP walk-thru above were from UK?

And regarding the full range of colorful - any examples maybe. Sorry if I am dense this morning.