How many frizzles to get?!

[hd_darcy]

Okay, I am officially chicken-brained....ha..ha.. I have ordered and received four frizzles. I am now wondering if four was enough!? I want them because I think they are neat, and because we have three silkies (unsure of the sex), and 3 cochin hens, and 1 turken roo. I want to only keep one sex of them. I was thinking I would just keep the hens. But, now..duh.. since my cochins are all females, would it be smarter to keep the roos? (I want babies). For the frizzles, we have 2 red, 1 white, and 1 black (unsure of the sex, as they are only 4 days old).

I keep thinking maybe I should go back and buy a couple more....but then I think I'm crazy because I'm at my limit. Tell me I have enough!! ha..ha.. and tell me should I keep the hens, and just planning on them breeding the silkies, and not the regular-feathered cochins?

Have I confused you enough?

Thanks for reading, if you did! You guys are my chicken 'heros' so whatever you tell me to do, I'll listen!! ha..ha..

 

[rancher hicks]

This is what you need to know. It won't become apparent which chicks are frizzled and which are not. I hatched 2 chicks one frizzed one didnt' . Ordered 4 chicks 3 frizzed one didn't. Now you can't breed a friz to a friz. It's a genetic thing. If all you cochins are females you will want at least on rooster that is Frizzled. Since this is the only one you can breed to the non-frizzed hens. You can in fact breed a frizzed roo to any non frizzed hen. It's been said that half will be frizzed and half won't but that percentage is not exact. Some will be frizzed and some won't but how many of each is unknown.

Now if you had a frizzed hen you could breed her to any non frizzed rooster of any breed.

At this time I have a bantam frizzed hen (Frenchy). She was bred to a Cuckoo marans standard roo and a Delaware standard roo. She produced chicks that are frizzed Delaware in appearance and 2 chicks Cuckoo marans in appearance one frizzed and one non frizzed. Laying eggs fertilized by both roosters.

Frenchy however is a mix of red and black or blue, I'm not sure. I got her from Ideal hatchery.

 

[Sonoran Silkies]

Frizzling shows up at approximately 1 week.

If you breed two frizzled birds together, each of the resulting chicks has a 25 percent chance of not inheriting the frizzle gene, a 50% chance of inheriting one copy of it and a 35% chance of inheriting two copies.

If you breed a non-frizzled bird to a bird carrying one copy, each resulting chick has a 50/50 chance if inheriting a copy of the frizzle gene (versus not inheriting it).

If you breed a non-frizzled bird to a bird carrying two copies of the gene, ALL resulting chicks will inherit one copy of the gene.

If you breed a frizzled bird with one copy of the gene to another frizzle with two copies, each chick has a 50/50 chance of inheriting two copies of the gene (versus one copy).

Gender makes no difference in these results, however, realize that a rooster can father more chicks than a hen can mother, so choosing which gender should be frizzled, and in how many doses should be considered. If your rooster has two copies of the gene and none of your hens are frizzled, all chicks will be frizzled.

There are a lot of comments about "never breed frizzled birds together" that I think take it beyond what is reasonable.

A bird with two doses of frizzle often has feathering issues as the overly curled feathers tend to be more brittle (I wonder if anyone has ever considered modifying diet to include more oils to see how that affects the feathers). I would suspect a hard feathered breed would have more issues with curlies than would a soft feathered breed, but I do not know that for a fact.

 

[InsaneBreeder]

Quote:
So a frazzle bred to a flat-feathered can produce 100% frizzles?

 

[Sonoran Silkies]

Not can; WILL.

 

[rancher hicks]

Quote:
Well the "proof is in the pudding" as they say and I bred a Frizzled hen to a non frizzled Cuckoo marans and got one frizzled and one non frizzled. Out of this same hen and not too many days she laid an egg that hatched out to be a Delaware cross and frizzled. So she laid 3 eggs and two were fertilized by the CM roo and one by the Del roo. I am very certain neither roo had a friz gene.

From what has been posted here a frizzeld roo to a frizzled hen will result in a lethal genetic combination. If I had known these people were wrong I would not have sold Cowboy Curtiss.

I believe there is a Frizzle post on BYC, perhaps you can repost your cross combinations and set them straight. I have regretted selling Cowboy Curtiss and miss him.

 

[InsaneBreeder]

Quote:
Hm, that could be very useful....

 

[olliecatch]

So how do you know if your chicken has one copy or 2 copies of the gene? You said frizzling should show up in about a week? Does that mean the feathers are all messy looking by then or what.... This is interesting...