Icelandic Chickens

[karimw]

Here are the chicks from Jake's eggs. 7 hatched out of the 10 that survived the Post Office. Probably my best hatch from shipped eggs yet! Thanks Jake!

 

[RedIII]

Karimw, congrats on the good hatch! And I am loving the pics of our Alaskan Icee's

I just got word from the friend that I gave eggs to - Five of the original seven eggs made it into lockdown, and three of the eggs have pipped a day early! Yaaaay!! There is hope for my flock, yet! And, now there is someone else in Utah who has Icelandics

 

[mlm Mike]

Congratulations on the hatch karimw!

RedIII

 

[Desert Springs]

Karimw, congrats on the good hatch! And I am loving the pics of our Alaskan Icee's

I just got word from the friend that I gave eggs to - Five of the original seven eggs made it into lockdown, and three of the eggs have pipped a day early! Yaaaay!! There is hope for my flock, yet! And, now there is someone else in Utah who has Icelandics

Hi Red

And here they are... just moved to the newborn chick cage.... not quite dry yet. Notice the awesome assortment of color.... light, cinnamon and looks to be black.

Thank you so much for the honor in sharing in this breed!!

 

[drumstick diva]

Karimw what beautiful babies, Jake must be a proud grandpa

 

[NotAFarm]

Congratulations on all the chicks!

 

[RedIII]

Hi Red

And here they are... just moved to the newborn chick cage.... not quite dry yet. Notice the awesome assortment of color.... light, cinnamon and looks to be black.

Thank you so much for the honor in sharing in this breed!!

Haha, I was going to post one of your pictures over here, but I guess you beat me to it. It's awesome to see that you got a nice variety of colors. Thanks for sharing the pics!

 

[ChicksandWeeds]

Ig, thank you for addressing this in such a well-reasoned manner, and thank you for the question. My Icelandic chickens were hatched from eggs imported directly from Jóhanna Harðardóttir at Hlésey farm www.hlesey.is. Jóhanna is the founder and first president of the Owners and Breeders Association in Iceland, her stock is of the absolute highest quality. I have received two shipments of eggs from her and hatched a total of 9 chicks, 2 of which you have (Heiðar and Síríus). Jóhanna has recently passed the torch to the current president, Júlíus Björnsson, the owner of Tjörn farm, which I believe is the largest settlement chicken preservation in Iceland. Jóhanna and Júlíus are probably the most reputable breeders in Iceland, and I couldn't be happier about haven gotten my (still juvenile) gang from one of them.

As to the frey issue I understand that, as a general proposition, "frey" or non-barbed feathers is the result of a gene that commonly gets expressed in prolonged inbreeding in most or all chicken breeds. I asked Júlíus Björnson about it and he said he did not have this problem with his chickens (they are probably too diverse) so I am inclined to agree with you that it is a genetic defect or at least an undesirable trait, and should not be upheld or celebrated as part of the "genetic diversity". I understand (and my understanding cold be wrong) that since all or most chicken breeds have a "frey" gene, it is just one of those things that are bound to happen after a while of breeding a too few birds that are too related and can be corrected by breeding it back out. Since it is anomalous and--it appears--limited to the U.S. strain of Icelandics you might be able to simply breed it out by using the two Hlésey roosters you got from me and breed Pala with one rooster and then the resulting offspring with the other rooster, and then those offspring with its "grandfather", if need be. This may allow you to suppress the frey issue while preserving the rest of Pala's genetic diversity. Successful or not, we would at the very least learn whether the frey condition can be bred out, so I would support you in attempting this, if you decide to do it.

I have tried to follow discussions in Iceland about genetic issues and I have not seen "frey" mentioned as an problem (likely because it is uncommon) and I have not seen any frey-feathered chickens when trawling through untold numbers of pictures from local Icelandic breeders. A few breeders have expressed the view that leg feathering and large crests are not desirable or "unnatural" and that, in particular, that leg feathered chickens should not be bred. Needless to say, not all breeders agree, and some are breeding leg feathered birds and others are not. But I digress.

I can also imagine that frey-feathered chickens would not do very well in the winter in Iceland (located at 66 degrees north), where you need all the insulation you can get. (I am speaking from experience!) So natural selection may be to thank/blame that the frey birds are only surviving because they've moved 20+ degrees south and are living in lavish american luxury accomodations...

Is an Icelander myself, I feel very strongly about preserving the Icelandic chicken breed. In terms of my own flock, preservation is my absolute mission. They will not be mixed, and will try to avoid even mixing them with established U.S. strains of Icelandics if I can, I know they are a treasure and I want to keep them as pure and original as possible.

That said, I have had the pleasure of meeting Totalcolour (once, but we spoke at length about chickens) and she did not strike me as someone that would wilfully or negligently contaminate her Icelandic strain for monetary gain or otherwise and seems to have a great deal of love for, and knowledge about, chickens. I do understand that, unfortunately, dishonest people do exist and vigilance is important and as such I understand the feelings behind the reactions of some of you. I am also extremely thankful that vigilance exists, the Icelandics need it. But, I also want to say that it is not exactly the same thing to breed some Icelandic into a non-Icelandic breed as it is to destroy the Icelandic breed by introducing foreign genes into it, at which point, I agree, the breed ceases entirely to be Icelandic. As long as the main focus is on preserving Icelandics and breeders make absolutely sure beyond all shadow of a doubt that only true Icelandics (i.e. 100% pure, not 99.99% or less) are being sold/show/claimed as Icelandics, I don't see the harm. However, I think that ideally breeders should avoid keeping a pure strain with/near/and mixed strains in the interest of not creating unecessary risk. But these are just my personal opinions and I respect that others may disagree.

Thanks for reading, sorry for the length but this is not an easily navigated issue!

Vala (Icelander)

very well said, thank you - and it answered my question as to what the problem is with a fray feathered chicken .... So I have a question, as I am thinking to get Islandics next year. I am able to keep them separate for breeding, but I also would be hesitant to kill any just because of fray feathers but like to let them be in the mixed flock I have. What problem, if any, do you see with that?

 

[karimw]

I'd be surprised if you ever got any. I had one I thought had funny feathers but he outgrew it. As long as you don't let them reproduce I don't really see why you couldn't keep it.

 

[karimw]

Karimw what beautiful babies, Jake must be a proud grandpa

I don't think he's been on in while, so I suppose he doesn't know yet!