Dominique Thread!

[flitter]

Hi! I thought I'd introduce myself... I've been reading the thread from the beginning and wanted to be part of the action.
We "got into chickens" two years ago with a mix bag of day old Dominiques, RedCaps and Minorca... all heritage and/or threatened breeds. We rehomed most of the 25 and ended up with 4 Dom hens, 4 RedCap hens and one RedCap rooster. Then we adopted an Appenzeller-Spitzhaben hen and rooster and a silkie hen from a school project. Our coop was full.
This spring we have added three small coops and runs for the RedCaps, Appenzellers, and Silkies. The Doms will stay in the big coop and I'm hoping the Dom eggs in the bator (shipped) will hatch out mostly hens but a real nice rooster. I love the Doms personality and want to increase their number and hopefully help to maintain the breed.

 

[tgrlily]

Quote:
That looks like a peacomb. Or am I seeing things?

 

[Up-the-Creek]

Yep,..that is what it looks like,....a pea comb.

 

[WallTenters]

Looks like a Dom with a bad comb.

 

[buffalogal]

Walltenters, I'd love to see pictures if you're up to posting them. I was thinking back about the cock bird I mentioned and it has been quite a while. We've been here six years, and it was at the county fair a few years before that, so almost a decade.

I'd taken Dominiques to the county fair for years, and out of the blue, one year I finally had competition; the male bird with the monstrous comb and wattles. It was not especially spikey, just overhanging both eyes, and the wattles looked like they hung half way down his neck. I was thinking they might be attached to "their guy" (i mean, they brought him to the fair), so, rather than try to give them a better male, I offered the people with the McM bird several pullets they could use to breed up, but they said the bird was mean (manfighter), and since he was the only Dominique they had, they were kind of hoping I would buy it. I respectfully took a pass on that one.

A couple of years later, there were four hens in the Junior show owned by a brother and sister. Their Mom told me they were from Atwoods, and I knew that year the store had bought chicks from Privett. I gave them the cockerel I had entered hoping they would stick with them, but they didn't show at the fair again.

Anyway, that's the extent of my experience with other hatcheries, so it would be great if someone with more recent stock would post pictures.

 

[WallTenters]

This is the one hen we kept...

A few of the ones we didn't keep, these were the best of the ones we got but since we've been able to get better pullets to replace them, they're either pets or soup by now...

This hen isn't as bad as many we culled earlier, but you can see how long her back is and she's got somewhat of a skirt going on there.

Good size wattles and comb I think. She was obviously a favorite of her young lover... Nice red, even though this hen laid lots of eggs.... she's a pet now.

This is the cock. He was a small bird, but he finally started gaining weight after we separated him from the hens and he started actually eating. Long summer days in full sun and lots of corn on the cob gave him some yellow ugliness (last time I saw him it's almost all molted out), but otherwise for a hatchery bird I thought he was alright. His comb was rather mutilated by a RIR as a chick, but compared to the other strains I'm not unhappy with his head overall.

Sorry I'm sure I have tons more female photos but they're burried somewhere... The side profile head shot I had as my avatar forever was a MM cockerel.

 

[WallTenters]

Oh, and compare that to this cockerel... from "show lines" in WA...

Huge comb and wattles, folds and all. Tiny, ugly little eye too.

 

[buffalogal]

Quote:
Your McM birds are much better looking than the one male I remember from all those years ago. And that male had an even bigger (albeit smoother) comb than the last cockerel you posted. Maybe that's what made it stand out; it was huge, flat, the wattles and earlobes were long.

Great pictures, thanks for posting them.

 

[flitter]

Our Dominiques came from Meyer Hatchery... is anyone familar with their birds? Of the 4 I have (based on reading this entire thread) 2 are fairly good and 2 are poor in body type, color (lacing) is fair. They have laid well for two years. Slowed a bit this winter but are laying an egg a day, and occasionally 2 right now. One of the hens hatched a small clutch last year when she was less than one.

I am hoping NYRED will list another batch of eggs... I missed the others. I would like to do some responsible breeding and not just let what happens, happens.

 

[gootziecat]

Flitter, I was interested to read about your Dom hens from Meyers Hatchery. I have one Meyers rescued-from-the-stewpot hen from a friend. I was impressed with her as a pullet right from the start. sShe would stand next to me calmly the first day she was here, which I thought was impressive since she wasn't handled much as a youngster. She laid medium sized eggs readonably well when she started but somewhere during the winter she laid less with bigger eggs. Her last egg was laid April 2 and I'm still waiting. My friend says her other Doms from Meyers don't set the world on fire with their rate of lay, but apparently no where as bad as my girl. If you're interested, you can see a picture of her on post #712.