does anyone use breeding or hatching charts ? ?

[catwalk]

You could get yourself a different color Sharpie for every pen or bird you have. When an egg is laid from that pen, put that color of dot on the round end of the egg. If you want to keep track of how many eggs you get from each pen, put an additional mark on that day of the calender. If you use multiple incubators, or you have the ability to set eggs every week, you can also write a number on the top of the egg, so you can keep each week's eggs together. In the hatcher, you can keep each pen's eggs separate, and mark the back of each chick with the appropriate color food coloring (some mixing may be required).

For written records, dedicate a notebook, and give each chick 4 or 5 lines. Write down the date, the parents or pen, and the down color. Write any other significant information, such as leg color, if needed. As the chick ages, use the remaining space to record other findings and info. Gender, adult color, name,defects, leg band, etc. When the bird's time with you is over, write in date/cause of death, or contact information for the new owner.

This is my mastermind plan for when I can figure out how to hatch well. I just hatched one chick, a black one from an unmarked egg. As I have one black hen in a sea of wheatens, master plan isn't really needed right now....

 

[java girl 2]

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It is much easier in my opinion to make you one in excell, you can update based on teh number of eggs set, number hatched by sex, and keep and cull records for each mating. that way you know where your good birds came from as well as how many it took to get them. Some matings will result in better numbers of one sex or the other, its a great tracking tool when built the way you like to use it, rather than just an off the shelf solution that doesn't take other things you want to know into account.
The other advantage is that you can insert a photo of teh breeder birds with the information and ability to track progress over generations.

where can I get excell???

 

[sjarvis00]

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I like my breeding spreadsheets, and when tast mating and pair mating one cock to multiple hens or one cock in two trio matings. I like to assign toe punches with the cock bird being the left foot and hen/ pen being the right foot.
I number my eggs based on the pen so it is simple as an example Columbian pen 1 egg is marked C1, Pen 2 C2 etc. When I move them to the hatcher I place them in different hatching trays and toe punch acordingly and watch them come up. the first year with a new variety is all about learning how the line and variety develop and color phases and development stages for them. You can plan what needs to be done after watching the birds for the first year, second year on work to improve where needed.

 

[java girl 2]

Yep, this is how I want to do it as well. but 2 things, I use colored zip ties and wing bans to mark my birds. I just needed the breeding sheets to keep track!!

 

[stoopid]

I got a program from someone on e-bay called "the chick chart"
It is (for me) kind of a pain in the butt entering all the info, I haven't gotten that far yet to document everything.
Seems to be a good idea, though.

 

[sjarvis00]

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I have never tried wing bands, the colored ties and spirals I had tried before but some of them would fall off and tracking became very difficult. I went back to toe punching so I did not need to band until after culling. I just cull then read the toe punches and note the # of birds kept from each mating by sex and thier intended purpose based on plumage and body whether it is set asside as a breeder or show since I often need slightly different characteristics in a breeder, colorwise, to resolve issues i am seeing.
I only band the birds that keepers and move forward from there.

 

[mrheinz77]

My toe punch doesn't make a hole. It leaves a flap of skin attached at one point. What am I doing wrong?

 

[SundownWaterfowl]

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Mine will do that sometimes. I just take the punch and "clip" the flap off.

 

[sjarvis00]

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Sometimes you have to hit it more than once to remove the skin, they do not always cut clean. I like to punch it 2-3 times to make sure it has been removed. For a lot of bantams it is almost as easy to remove the full web with teh toe punch.