First time raising chicks, can you tell me what breed these are?

[kurui]

And yes, my chicks have yellow legs- the two darker ones have some black on them, but their legs are definitely yellow.

 

[Kev]

Haha! you're gonna have fun with chickens.

Yellow skin gene lays down the yellow pigment in the epidermis, if I remember right. It's a certain layer inside the skin throughout the entire body. That is why the yellow shows on the beak, eye ring, legs. White skin gene doesn't do this so their skin is well, white/pink/flesh colored as a result.

The black on your chick's legs is due to pigmentation in a different layer(the dermis) on the legs.

Normally they would be all black, however the barring gene that puts the white bars on the feathers also happens to have a side effect of blocking the dermal pigmentation, making their legs yellow or mostly yellow. This is the same reason why cuckoo Marans have white legs- it's a combination of white skin with the cuckoo removing the black dermal pigment from the legs.

I should explain a little more- barred birds like cuckoo Marans and barred rocks are actually solid black chickens with the barring gene 'added'. The gene for black feathers also makes black pigments in the dermis...

 

[kurui]

Oh I see- it's a bit like with cockatiels I guess. I'm guessing their blue/grey eyes are just because they're babies, and they'll get to be the same brown as our pullets when they're older?
When would I know for sure my chicks are boys, 100% certainty? I'm going to have to prepare to fight to keep them if they're all boys, my stepdad was already complaining about us having one 'useless' chicken He's been tolerating mum and I because our three pullets are such good layers but I doubt he'd be as thrilled as I am about the idea of three beautiful cockerels competing to make the daftest noise haha

 

[chickengirl1230]

You should know by the time it's 8 months at the latest but if it starts getting thicker legs and bigger combs its a rooster. You can have multiple roosters as long as you can in your area and they are docile. I have three right now and they all get along because I have lots of hens so they don't fight over who gets to lead them. You can have a rooster for every ten hens

 

[keesmom]

The barred ones certainly look to be male, possibly the 3rd as well. They will need a bachelor pad if you want to keep them. Three cockerels and 3 hens is unlikely to be a workable situation.

 

[kurui]

OK, thanks for the help everyone. I suppose I'll have to ask mum what she thinks we should do. I don't want them killed... it's possible the people we got them from might swap two for pullets as they did say they had sold us two girls and one boy, and that's what we asked for. We have a lot of agriculturally classified land out here in Spain so plenty of space for lots of chickens, but convincing my stepdad to get enough to keep three roosters happy is pretty unlikely to happen It's sad, I'm attached to them, but what else can I do?


(ah, sorry, did you mean they can be kept, just separate from the hens? that might be workable...)

 

[kurui]

Got in contact with the couple we bought the chicks from and they said they're happy to swap two of the boys for girls. Thanks so much for your help Kev- We're going to keep the paler one as he's the most cuddly of the bunch and we'll be sent some pictures of the girls we can swap the other two for later today. Relief!