International Black Copper Marans Thread - Breeding to the SOP

[Chooks man]

Taking into account everything i have read on this thread, i can safely cull the obvious high fan-tail birds then as i have read this indicates high tails later on. Yes?

At this point, starting out, i just keep the ones that wont take many generations to correct their faults (if thats even possible) even if it means keeping a small flock to begin with. Or am i delusional?

My OE flock will consist of EEs and ccl with the nice blcm cockerel over them. I will take some cull bcm hens that lay the darkes eggs and put them in there. Makes a nice color variety in the egg carton for sale.

Of course this is only my PLAN for now.

you do not need a thousand birds to build your flock ,
what you really need is a good trio or 2 pairs . I prefer working with 2 pairs { 4 different progeny }

I think you have enough blood lines and enough chicks to start you own lines .
not complicated ,just need dedication and time .

chooks man

 

[Chooks man]

Im assuming around 6 -7 months is when i start looking at my birds and deciding which ones to use as breeders and which ones to get rid of. Correct?

I wish the legbands would get here. It would be nice to band which ones came from eggs and which ones came from on- line breeder before their too old to accurately band....or does it matter if their all staying together as line A?

yes the final selection will take place @ 6 months for cockerels .
pullets need more time tell they lay they first 20 eggs .than we can select .because we don t want to select pretty girls who can not lay dark eggs .as mush as we don t want to select dark egg layer pullets but with horrible conformation faults .
we need to find a balanced bird .never go for extreme ,except if you are breeding specific line to specific trait .

chooks man

 

[Chooks man]

That I think will be my problem Harvey's line has lots of color so some of my BC chicks are mossy. Middle toe feathers can also be a issue.

my friend don t worry about this things any more .now you know witch hen lay what egg ,you will see how much breeding become simpler and fun .
those hens/roosters who are throwing faults ,soon they will be found and removed from breeding flock .

you will see how a same rooster mated to different hens will give different progeny .
chooks man

 

[Chooks man]

Im assuming around 6 -7 months is when i start looking at my birds and deciding which ones to use as breeders and which ones to get rid of. Correct?

I wish the legbands would get here. It would be nice to band which ones came from eggs and which ones came from on- line breeder before their too old to accurately band....or does it matter if their all staying together as line A?

to be honest to you ,when you start building your flock ,don t go for a large gene pool .but go for the more correct chooks even if small number .
you can always breed them for few generation and ad some thing to them if needed .

comment mistakes peoples do when starting they lines =
1} starting with many different blood line and mixing up without planning .
2} starting with one blood line from fertile eggs and trying to keep the line pure from chicks that hatched .very bad .
3} no knowing the SOP of the breed they working with .
4} start breeding from they flock without test mating . selecting by look not by performance .
5} not hatching and marking enough chicks from each breeding pair .marans hen can lay over 150 eggs a year .no many of us can say they hatched more then 20 chicks from 1 hen .

to be continued ............................ many mistakes ..............................

chooks man

 

[marchick]

My line is not as dark as I would like. I think it is mainly that my line lays more eggs than most lines. The fewer the eggs the longer the eggs stay and get paint. When it is not winter mine lay about 5 to 7 eggs a week. They still have nice color and lay lots of eggs so I am pleased. Actually for as often as they lay I am impressed with the color of their eggs. Hopefully the color will improve with future generations and still lay 5 to 7 days a week. Is that too much to ask for?

 

[KF0002]

welcome back . nice to hear you are fine .
still plenty of time to hatch few marans chicks , it is Summer in US now ?

chooksman

Thank you! It is almost summer. Less than a month of spring left. The birds need to get a move on and start laying better. Our weather has been inconsistent so I guess that is what their problem is. I have to move some birds around and hopefully will get better results.

 

[RoosterML]

11 weeks old now and I have 4 cockerels that are looking really nice. Here’s one of them. The hens I am really liking also. This is photos of one of the hens. Really love the copper color they are showing.


I have 8 cockerels and 5 hens. Had a hawk attack and or course it took a hen. Had plenty of cockerels to spare

 

[Chooks man]

My line is not as dark as I would like. I think it is mainly that my line lays more eggs than most lines. The fewer the eggs the longer the eggs stay and get paint. When it is not winter mine lay about 5 to 7 eggs a week. They still have nice color and lay lots of eggs so I am pleased. Actually for as often as they lay I am impressed with the color of their eggs. Hopefully the color will improve with future generations and still lay 5 to 7 days a week. Is that too much to ask for?

yes that is too much to ask for from marans hens ,4/5 a week super large 70/80g and dark number 6. oval shape . is the goal to select for .
marans hen should lay around 180 super large eggs a year and they can leave long productive life .
we need to select for those traits .most of marans breeder are only selecting for dark egg layer and body marking .
we need to select for more traits so ours marans will reach they potential .

chooks man

 

[Chooks man]

11 weeks old now and I have 4 cockerels that are looking really nice. Here’s one of them. The hens I am really liking also. This is photos of one of the hens. Really love the copper color they are showing.
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I have 8 cockerels and 5 hens. Had a hawk attack and or course it took a hen. Had plenty of cockerels to spare

absolutely stunning .a pullet is high class .she has every thing going for her ,hope she will lay you a dark eggs .
cockerel has a good marking for his age ,but very bad comb .

chooks man

 

[Chooks man]

@RoosterML
this pullet need to be looked after and protected from any harm ,she is of high quality .I do no see any conformation fault from this angle .
need photos of her from the rear and front to see if she wide and deep .
gorgeous hackle marking ,gorgeous copper quality and tail to die for .

Bravo .
chooks man