How many roosters to start with?

[fluffycrow]

I would say look at Sussex. They seem to have a lot of the qualities you desire, and can handle both heat and cold temps

 

[DarkAngel77]

I love them. But I'm bias of course
You may get some that don't like them. It's all individual birds. Someone here said they can be chatty. I have a couple girls that are chatty but others will lay eggs and come out silent.

I'm just getting into genetics so fairly new there. And only have a couple breeds your looking to get, @NatJ and @fluffycrow can give you some pointers for some of your other breeds you picked for crosses.
But I can tell you if you thought Black Copper Marans roo and a few hens would get you your darker eggs.
Your BCM roo x your Barred Rocks hens would give you sex linked Midnight Majesty Marans. Boys will be barred and girls will resemble the BCM's and lay not as dark but often speckled eggs.
Your BCM roo x blue egg gene Easter Egger will give you your Olive Eggers. (Olive eggs)
The genetics for the EE egg color is still a little confusing to me, @NatJ can explain this in more detail.

So there's some cool egg colors to add to your basket.

Honestly a noisy hen wouldn't be an issue, I only have 2 neighbors and I'm pretty confident they wouldn't be bothered by a noisy hen, now if the rooster decided to start crowing in the middle of the night, 1 of my neighbors may eventually get tired of it, but hopefully that won't happen and if it does hopefully I can find a solution to stop it.


Yes, I've been looking into some of that, the crossing certain breeds for certain egg colors and all of that. Just earlier I was looking into welsummer roo x bpr hen and from what I read it would basically make black sex links, which I think is pretty cool. I've been looking up alot of different crosses/hybrids because I think it's pretty interesting. I don't think I'd ever get crazy with it, but it's interesting because I'd like to eventually hatch my own chicks and it'd be nice to know ahead what to kind of expect as far as coloration, temperament, egg color, etc. I know what someone else hatches as far as crosses isn't guaranteed that mine would be like, but it is all interesting to read about.

 

[DarkAngel77]

I would say look at Sussex. They seem to have a lot of the qualities you desire, and can handle both heat and cold temps

I will definitely look into them, I haven't seen alot about them or seen alot of them on the hatcheries websites I've been looking so I haven't really looked into them, but I will. Being able to handle both heat and cold is pretty important, it's not often we get really cold temps but itd be nice to know that they can hopefully handle some of the cooler temps we do get (ofcourse with precautions taken to try to help them through the cold spells).

 

[wrathsfarm]

Honestly a noisy hen wouldn't be an issue, I only have 2 neighbors and I'm pretty confident they wouldn't be bothered by a noisy hen, now if the rooster decided to start crowing in the middle of the night, 1 of my neighbors may eventually get tired of it, but hopefully that won't happen and if it does hopefully I can find a solution to stop it.


Yes, I've been looking into some of that, the crossing certain breeds for certain egg colors and all of that. Just earlier I was looking into welsummer roo x bpr hen and from what I read it would basically make black sex links, which I think is pretty cool. I've been looking up alot of different crosses/hybrids because I think it's pretty interesting. I don't think I'd ever get crazy with it, but it's interesting because I'd like to eventually hatch my own chicks and it'd be nice to know ahead what to kind of expect as far as coloration, temperament, egg color, etc. I know what someone else hatches as far as crosses isn't guaranteed that mine would be like, but it is all interesting to read about.

Both my boys compete thru out the day back and forth but it's not constant, but I've had them both since day olds so their used to each other, now when I was raising a son up the crowing did get out of hand. That boy needed to crow constantly because I had him separated from pullets. The last 3 Olive Eggers cockerels I sold just as the crowing started.

I'm also fortunate enough to only have one neighbor and she loves the sound of roosters. The eggs I hope smooth it over ...
Always a toss up if one is going to crow after hours but keeping the coop dark from traffic lights/any lights helps.

Your doing good with all your planning, but always prepare for it to go off the rails. I have spare pens and coops available for this reason but I'm also dipping into the breeding world....

 

[NatJ]

Yes, I've been looking into some of that, the crossing certain breeds for certain egg colors and all of that. Just earlier I was looking into welsummer roo x bpr hen and from what I read it would basically make black sex links, which I think is pretty cool.

A Welsummer rooster can produce red sexlinks too, with some kinds of hens. Examples of hens that would work: Columbian Rock, Delaware, Silver Laced Wyandotte, Silver Spangled Hamburg. It doesn't work with hens that are all black, or ones that have much gold/red in their coloring, and usually doesn't work with all-white hens.

I've been looking up alot of different crosses/hybrids because I think it's pretty interesting. I don't think I'd ever get crazy with it, but it's interesting because I'd like to eventually hatch my own chicks and it'd be nice to know ahead what to kind of expect as far as coloration, temperament, egg color, etc. I know what someone else hatches as far as crosses isn't guaranteed that mine would be like, but it is all interesting to read about.

Yes, it can be fascinating!

 

[NatJ]

If having several cockerels, they are to busy fighting each other to attack a human, when it gets narrowed down to 1 roo, how likely is it that he will then start attacking humans?

I was just reading another thread, and got reminded: if you keep the cockerel who was at the top of the pecking order, his behavior is less likely to change when you remove others. If you remove the dominant cockerel to keep one of the others, the one you keep may change his behavior now that the dominant one is not pushing him around. The change could be fine or it might not be, it is just something to be aware of and re-evaluate after a while.

 

[wrathsfarm]

Very true... "It could go either way" applies a lot in flock management.

 

[wrathsfarm]

Off topic just slightly... @NatJ
Black Copper Marans Roo x SLW hen produces? I haven't thought of that cross until you just mentioned it. Is there a name for them or just BYM?

 

[Major_in_MS]

Was wanting orpingtons but keep seeing mixed answers on how they handle heat (I live in the southern U.S.

I live in central Mississippi and I have some Orpington hens and an Orpington rooster. They are very sweet and calm birds and they don't seem to mind the humid and hot Mississippi summers.

 

[wrathsfarm]

I live in central Mississippi and I have some Orpington hens and an Orpington rooster. They are very sweet and calm birds and they don't seem to mind the humid and hot Mississippi summers.

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He's a looker...