How long after separating birds will eggs be true?

[RememberTheWay]

I have seperated all my hens and roosters into breeding pens but they were running together with several roosters for months prior to separating them this way. I read that hens can actually hold on the semen for quite a while after breeding with a roo and that she also has the ability to reject semen from a rooster that breeds her that she doesn't like. If all of that is true, how long do I need to consider any eggs laid as barnyard mix eggs and not pure bred? I thought I had read four to six wks for you to be sure the eggs were true to the new rooster and not still the previous rooster she was housed with? Is that true? Was hoping it didn't take quite so long....

What has everyone's experience with this been? How long do you wait to hatch eggs after switching roosters?

Thanks in advance. Much appreciated

Photo for attention

 

[Iluveggers]

About 4 weeks I believe.

 

[AprilWC]

I leave my breeding pens together 4 weeks before I start collecting eggs.

 

[Egghead_Jr]

If you're not too concerned about "perfection" three weeks is very good. Maybe 1 in 10 will have a different father in that time. If running two breeds or colors it's extremely easy to see the outlier chicks. If running the same variety and breed the outliers are just adding some diversity to your first hatch. By the time the pens are coming together I'm down to my last cut of that years breeder and it can be a coin toss between which takes the spot.

 

[getaclue]

Hens can retain sperm at high levels fertility levels for 1 week, moderate fertility for 2 weeks, some fertility for 3 weeks, and occasional fertility for up to 4 weeks. To be certain, wait 5 weeks.

 

[Chey1214]

About the rejection part…. My girls were refusing my ayam cenami. I took a very long time to get their eggs fertile. They just kept rejecting him

 

[RememberTheWay]

About the rejection part…. My girls were refusing my ayam cenami. I took a very long time to get their eggs fertile. They just kept rejecting him

Interesting. What breed were they? Did they have a rooster before him? Could they still see the old rooster? And how long did it take?