I’ve got 3 12 week old chicks that have no tails! What’s up with this?!

[Skyleen13]

I this year I allowed decided to try incubating some of my eggs from my black langshans. All are pure black langshans including my rooster. Reason for this is my sister and some of my friends all loved my langshans & wanted some of their own. I had a lot of issues with my incubator at the time I was incubating these guys. Power outages. Temp fluctuations. It was a rough road. I’ve since fixed the temp issues but at the time it kept going either way to high or low. Couldn’t seem to stay steady. As a result I only had a 25% hatch rate. Strange thing is that while the babies I gave to my family/friends where the bigger healthier ones all have tails & are very healthy the 3 I kept all have no tails! Other then the no tails part their healthy. They’ve got a large run that’s 50ft by 60ft. Netting covered. 2 big coops that houses them & my other 20 chickens & pullets. They’ve got all natural grower feed & lots of water. Just no tails. I’m very confused. I’ll include pictures of momma & daddy with the babies so I’m hoping that someone can tell me what’s going on with these 3.

 

[cherrynberry]

I this year I allowed decided to try incubating some of my eggs from my black langshans. All are pure black langshans including my rooster. Reason for this is my sister and some of my friends all loved my langshans & wanted some of their own. I had a lot of issues with my incubator at the time I was incubating these guys. Power outages. Temp fluctuations. It was a rough road. I’ve since fixed the temp issues but at the time it kept going either way to high or low. Couldn’t seem to stay steady. As a result I only had a 25% hatch rate. Strange thing is that while the babies I gave to my family/friends where the bigger healthier ones all have tails & are very healthy the 3 I kept all have no tails! Other then the no tails part their healthy. They’ve got a large run that’s 50ft by 60ft. Netting covered. 2 big coops that houses them & my other 20 chickens & pullets. They’ve got all natural grower feed & lots of water. Just no tails. I’m very confused. I’ll include pictures of momma & daddy with the babies so I’m hoping that someone can tell me what’s going on with these 3.

They look like cochins! I know you said that you have all Langshans, but I just thought it was fun to point out...

 

[Skyleen13]

They look like cochins! I know you said that you have all Langshans, but I just thought it was fun to point out...

Agreed. They don’t look like my langshans but those are the parents! I don’t have Cochins. The closest ones I have are australorps but I had them separately from my langshan so I could get pure ones. I’m very confused.

 

[Mvan42]

Females tend to get their tail feathers slower than males. And they are young.

 

[Emily26]

I have a light Sussex at 10 weeks that doesn't seem to have any tail feathers so I've been wondering about this too! Funny I actually came on here to ask this but you've already done it for me let us know how you get on with them.

 

[Acre4Me]

In order to only have Langshsn daddy, you need to keep hen with desired daddy (or away from any other males) for 3-4 weeks. The male speed can survive up to 3weeks, so to be sure only Lanshsn genetics, you would want a female to be without a male or paired with the desired male for weeks before collecting eggs for incubation.

How old are these chicks?

in my Black Jersey Giants, the males are slow to get tail feathers. A BJG has Langshan in the genetics, so maybe a trait if the males in your group of chicks. Not sure.

we have a Langshan male from Murray McMurray that is 9 months old. He did take awhile to feather out. We did not have any females for comparison.

 

[Skyleen13]

In order to only have Langshsn daddy, you need to keep hen with desired daddy (or away from any other males) for 3-4 weeks. The male speed can survive up to 3weeks, so to be sure only Lanshsn genetics, you would want a female to be without a male or paired with the desired male for weeks before collecting eggs for incubation.

How old are these chicks?

in my Black Jersey Giants, the males are slow to get tail feathers. A BJG has Langshan in the genetics, so maybe a trait if the males in your group of chicks. Not sure.

we have a Langshan male from Murray McMurray that is 9 months old. He did take awhile to feather out. We did not have any females for comparison.

I only have 2 langshan roosters. No other roosters. I separated one of my boys with my langshan hens since I’ve got 3 other breeds of hens in my flock. I’ve got 3 langshan hens. Since I wanted to make sure I was incubating only those hens eggs I separated them so I could easily tell who’s eggs belonged to my langshan gals. I got 1 hen & 1 rooster from a local breeder who has a really good reputation for his breeds stock. The other 3 I got from hatching eggs from a hatchery that is known in my area for its show quality birds. I’m just concerned that they may have been influenced by the incubator troubles & now are suffering some deformities that is to that.

 

[JedJackson]

They look perfectly healthy to me. I think it's just going to be a matter of having patience, unfortunately. Adding a bit of extra protein to their diet could help. Meal worms are a favorite source.

 

[aart]

At 12wo they are probably n the middle of a juvenile molt,
tail feather should be coming in shortly.
Can you see any pin feather in there?

 

[Skyleen13]

At 12wo they are probably n the middle of a juvenile molt,
tail feather should be coming in shortly.
Can you see any pin feather in there?

Just fluff right now. They really don’t like me messing with them.