Faverolles Thread

[hcammack]

I will have to cull a lot later this spring plan on hatching at least 40+ fav bantams and culling down to the best 10 pullets and 2 cockerals. I will pretty much be looking for everything you listed but in minature thanks for the timeline though that will be very helpful.

 

[Spore]

where is the 5th toe supposed to be? does anyone have a photo of correct toe placement for faverolles? thanks.

 

[Chickie'sMoma]

he definitely is the smaller of the 2 that hatched, so he already has a lot going against him with that toe issue. if it ends up being a pullet it would be in with my layers when it gets old enough and not be bred for future chicks.

 

[hcammack]

Chickie'sMoma :

he definitely is the smaller of the 2 that hatched, so he already has a lot going against him with that toe issue. if it ends up being a pullet it would be in with my layers when it gets old enough and not be bred for future chicks.

Good stuff hope its a pullet and she can have a happy layer home.

Henry​

 

[hcammack]

Hear is the page from Peter Merlin about culling
http://peterfmerlin.tripod.com/culling.htm

It may sound cruel and unusual but with birds from my later hatches from my flock this is what I am going to be doing:

"Start the culling process right at the hatcher when removing the chicks. How each breeder chooses to do away with culls is each breeder=s choice. If you choose to raise the inferior ones for whatever purpose grow them in a different area and DO NOT go retrieve anything that may be pretty or you will wind up perpetuating the same faults of that faulty pretty bird. I personally put them down immediately. Then, there is not the chance of that cull Faverolles getting older and getting pretty." (Peter Merlin)

I am not doing that with the chicks from Rose Isgrig because they are from a new bloodline and the ones from Pasofino will be used for layers if they are culls. But not many people want little bantams for laying or meat so why should I raise unwanted low quality birds. I have very limited space anyway.

Henry

 

[Ispahan]

Quote:
How many people consider the bantams to not be useful for egg production? I would like to raise the bantams due to their small size which would be easier for me to handle in a small yard, but I would also like to use their eggs for eating, baking, etc. Their eggs would still be useful even though tiny, right? I have heard they are about 2/3 the size of a standard faverolles egg, which to me is still large enough to be useful. And from what everyone here is saying, they seem to be great little layers too!

I find it funny that people will swoon over the largest possible chicken eggs and consider them to be almost miracles, and yet the small eggs are frowned upon and held with suspicion and sometimes even contempt by the general public.

 

[hcammack]

T
Quote:
How many people consider the bantams to not be useful for egg production? I would like to raise the bantams due to their small size which would be easier for me to handle in a small yard, but I would also like to use their eggs for eating, baking, etc. Their eggs would still be useful even though tiny, right? I have heard they are about 2/3 the size of a standard faverolles egg, which to me is still large enough to be useful. And from what everyone here is saying, they seem to be great little layers too!

I find it funny that people will swoon over the largest possible chicken eggs and consider them to be almost miracles, and yet the small eggs are frowned upon and held with suspicion and sometimes even contempt by the general public.

I know many people want bantam layers but its a cold hard reality that many people think in this country bigger is better. I will raise many more pullets then cockerals and sell the culls as egg layers but I cannot find enough people to take all the bantams there is a much greater demand for LF layers. I also don't want to spread birds missing the 5th toe around even as cull faverolles. The culling I am talking about doing would be for chicks who from day one don't meet breed standard. I will be selling the other older culls at auction and locally as bantam layers. What I am talking about culling is a very small % of chicks. My point was mostly that breeders with LF like melissa can raise many of their cockerals up and use them as meat that's not really pheasable wirh bantams and there isn't a high demand for bantam layers in my area.

 

[pasofinofarm]

Hey Henry.

I googled up that page last night before you posted the link and studied it, I had not seen it before... It was uncanny how many of the same things we both are culling for. One of the things I had not read/heard/thought of until recently was to stop trying to add new bloodlines. Last year really told the tale for several of my flocks. I introduced new birds from Pontius and started throwing white recessives Favs (no surprise now that someone posted old pages from their now defunct website and I see they also had whites) and more pullets with freckles in their beards. While I can not say I am totally sorry because I love whites, it would be a huge job to eradicate it now if I wanted to and I can no longer expect a 100% Salmon/Blue Salmon hatch.

I introduced a new roo from another breeder of Wade Jeane Black Copper Marans and got webbed toes in about 5% of my chicks for my trouble. I also hatched a small group of pullets from him before I knew of the defect and have now intermingled them in my flock... another issue to sort out since I didn't band. I have removed them (I think).

It took me years to breed out the clean heads I introduced with my Cree birds in the Wheaten/Blue Wheaten Ameraucanas but they came with so much more body and weight that it was worth it and I knew about it in advance. These birds have a very short breeding life and spend much time not in production so it can be a painful process to fix a fault.

The lessons I have taken away from this have been to band or raise separately a large enough sample of a new line or even the same line that has been worked by another breeder to be able to see even more rare defects before introducing new birds. It is no short cut to simply buy a really nice adult (especially a roo) and add it to your flock. Even very pretty birds come with a complicated genetic code and can introduce all kinds of unwanted traits.

I think many of us (or maybe it is just me) have trouble wrapping our minds around the whole 'inbreeding' issue but sometimes very tight breeding is good.... maybe something for discussison.

 

[pasofinofarm]

Quote:
I used to have pics of toe placement in chicks and adults but had a computer crash and lost all my (yes, not backed up) photos. I have searched my photobucket and don't seem to have ever uploaded any there. If no one else posts one I will take some this weekend and post them for you. I had some of bad feet too but all my babies now have very correct feet so I can't help there.

 

[Wifezilla]

Their eggs would still be useful even though tiny, right?

Oh heck yeah. I raise quail and their eggs are even smaller than a bantam egg. They are just as delicious as my big duck eggs...it just takes a little longer to open them up