Heritage Large Fowl - Phase II

[NYREDS]

Excel is your friend!
All breeding pens and egg collection cartons are color coordinated. Crayons in the same colors mark the eggs.
Then those same colors are used to track on the charts in excel which calculate automatically the laying & hatching rates for individual pens and each breed as a whole creating monthly and annual reports automatically.

Strips of vet wrap (yes in the same corresponding colors) mark the chicks according to pen (until toe punching is done) and special extra colors to represent various chick down colors and patterns on the F1s, F2s, Etc.

A complication arose this year with one trio when I discovered a consistent laying pattern in 2 different places in that pen. So I modified the spreadsheet for that pen to track the stats (and chicks) for those 2 hens separately. Apparently my animals feel the need to keep me on my toes.

I toe punch as chicks come out of the incubator. Why add an extra step?

 

[RedRidge]

I toe punch as chicks come out of the incubator. Why add an extra step?

I toe punch the HRIR immediately. The Rhodebars are not as straight forward so I save my toe punching options until I have eliminated the first round after the first week or two. Toe punching with them indicates more than simply what pen they came from.

 

[saladin]

I totally agree with NYReds. That is way to complicated to me.

I use the netted bags that they sell at the Dollar General for one buck as hatching bags. (The laundry type lingerie bags).

Whether you single mate or mate using trios, you can easily keep up with who is who and how many each pen produced by penciling some mark on each egg as they are collected; then placing each pens eggs in different bags: very simple.

I have hatched 150+ chicks so far this year and I can tell you who came from who; all I have to do is know the toe marks.

 

[RedRidge]

This type of detailed tracking is for my Rhodebar program only. Yes it would be overkill for purebred breeding, but absolutely necessary to track all the genes involved to maintain the proper barring and autosexing for the Rhodebars. It isn't just who came from who that I am tracking. Because I am creating F1s and F2s and some BC1 using two different breeds, it is important to track "down color" to maintain the proper barring and autosexing traits for future generations. The Rhodebar breeding improvement using HRIR is not like my purebred breeding program. It is not complicated, it simply requires more detailed tracking and a LOT more culling.

 

[gjensen]

I made some hardware cloth baskets large enough that I can hatch the eggs upright.

They are a little aggravating opening and closing the tops, but they will do until I put something else together. It is not that I will be getting in and out of them a lot.

 

[bnjrob]

I'd like to roast them in the oven but don't want them to be tough and dry.

Brine, brine, brine.

Cannot recommend brining enough if you are really concerned about a bird being tough and dry. Brining also gives you the opportunity to infuse some seasoning into it if you want. Just make sure you rinse it off with clean water, pat it dry, and let it sit just a little before you roast it - won't have a salty flavor that way and lets the skin dry so you can get a crispier skin easier.

 

[gjensen]

This type of detailed tracking is for my Rhodebar program only. Yes it would be overkill for purebred breeding, but absolutely necessary to track all the genes involved to maintain the proper barring and autosexing for the Rhodebars. It isn't just who came from who that I am tracking. Because I am creating F1s and F2s and some BC1 using two different breeds, it is important to track "down color" to maintain the proper barring and autosexing traits for future generations. The Rhodebar breeding improvement using HRIR is not like my purebred breeding program. It is not complicated, it simply requires more detailed tracking and a LOT more culling.

I got what you were saying. You are tracking genetic inheritance that might not be obvious later.

I have not thought through your project, or if you would benefit from the extra steps. I do however, understand the logic behind it. I think that part was missed.

 

[gjensen]

Many of the more experienced would say that I would be making too much of it myself. I get that, and have considered the same.

This is the challenge though. No one is going to teach me this specific process. I am not going to find directions on the internet, and it is not in a book. I am going to have to figure it out myself. I need to collect some information, or I will depend on memory. Memory that I do not trust. I may also miss some details.

And at the end of the day, it is just a project anyways. The worst that will happen is that I will eat a lot of chicken. Expensive chicken. LOL. The best that will happen is that I will have a few birds that are better than junk.
No matter the result, I will know more then than now.

 

[RedRidge]

Quite true. I'm a genetics freak, and love my HRIR, so improving a breed with the genetics I love has been a fun project. And as someone pointed out earlier, we should all be having fun. ;-)

 

[gjensen]

And I am not disputing what has been said. There is just some things I feel like I need to sort out. So in that sense, I can relate.