I need some of you guys that understand genetics to explain something to me...

missnu01

Songster
7 Years
Nov 16, 2012
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I hatched 13 eggs from my mixed flock 5-18 and most of the chicks make sense and I can sort of make out who fathered who? But I have 3 that don't make sense. They are definitely salmon faverolles mixes because they came out of faverolles eggs, they have a beards and feathered feet and 5 toes, but---but they are feathering in white...

One has one black wing feather--the outermost feather on each wing is half black and half white, the rest of the chicken is white. One has really light tan speckles on the outer edge of its wing feathers, and one is totally white.
Here's the line up. And I know my rooster to hen ratio is way way way off, but I'm working on that. This past winter when I thinned out my flock people wanted to buy more birds than I could really sell them and keep any for myself, but I have a really hard time saying no to cash...
So I was left with 4 hens and 4 roosters

Hens:

2 salmon faverolles
1 barnyard bantam
And one EE that I think is probably an EE buff orpington mix. Orp shape and size, layer jumbo eggs, has a pea comb no beard, lays cream colored eggs, and does have the green legs...

The roosters in order of rank:

Buff Orpington
Marans ( might be a mix)
EE
And a Salmon Faverolle that sees no action from what I can tell...

Now for pictures...

Hens with BO
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Supposed EE hen next to BO for shape and size comparison.
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And now the other roosters..

Marans (mix?)
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EE
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And my lone ranger
The Salmon Faverolle
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The chicks Troubling me are huge wide bodied things, and here one of them is, but they all look the same right down to the pretty reddish comb that I'm really hoping doesn't mean they are all boys...
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The other color variations on the chicks make sense to me except these 3 white ones.

Here's a few more of the ones I can tell who fathered them.

Salmon mom EE dad

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Salmon mom thinking Marans (mix?) Dad
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EE mom EE dad
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The white chicks are bigger and much slower feathering than the other chicks as well. They've stumped me.
 
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That explains why all the white ones look like boys and the orange ones look like girls! !! I had no idea!!! How awesome is that?!
 
I love sex links! So, if you want to get to hatching, you can just pull your other roosters off a while, fill an incubator and be able to sell sexed chicks! Plus, the Faverolle mixes are just the cutest, with the beards and extra toes
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Well I hatched another 17 on Sunday and now I know who is who..5 toes feathered feet and orange is girls...5 toes feathered feet and yellow is boys. Wow! That's really neat.
I really had no idea. Lol. Now I feel like a dummy wondering where these big white birds came from. Knew they had to be from the buff because they are huge. The biggest in the brooder. But not buff like the ones I could tell were BO X faverolle. Now I know the obvious buffs are my girls. Sort of sucks though because I hate the look of the solid orange...it's boring with a capital B
 
And I got 2 girls and 3 boys I think out of the 5-18 hatch. I also have some EE X faverolle and BO X EE in there as well so a lot of orange chicks hopping about. And other random colors. That sex linked thing is awesome though
 
Those girls may feather out like a red sex link hen, with the white tips and tail. That could be a pretty look!

Or, you know, sell them and buy birds you want
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If you butcher your cockerels, sounds like this cross makes great meat birds! I'll bet the pullets will go broody and be really nice, docile backyard birds, also. I think you could get a little market going with them....
 
I'm going to look at the pictures of the most recent hatch and see what I've got now. Lol
 
Jeez 5 and 5... talk about 50% and from the older hatch I did in fact get 3 boys and 2 girls. Super obvious now. The salmon X buff are the only chick's born a solid color. The buff X ee and salmon X ee are all striped. I will pen the Salmons and the BO together for a bit I think. ..nah..but I will sell sex linked chicks. I really like the salmon X ee. What I need to do is get more salmon hens. Lol. I'll see if I can't find someone with hatching eggs and hatch me some more and maybe they will be all I hatch from. They do make the cutest babies and now I know that they are sex linked. You just made my chicken year. Lol
 
Glad to be of service!

Why not just breed your own Faverolles? You have a rooster, correct? Set up a breeding pen and make some bebbes!

And I'd be thrilled with a fifty/fifty split. So far this year, I'm two pullets (one died at 4 weeks, so now down to one) for 4 cockerels. Sigh.
 
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