International Black Copper Marans Thread - Breeding to the SOP

[Chooks man]

I have two BCM hens that have the best combs of the group but mostly black eyes :-\. Should I culling them?

great comb is an asset ,very hard to find those days .
dark eyes can be corrected by using a Rooster with orange eyes .

chooks man

 

[Chooks man]

Here's my young man. Looking pretty good He's 22 1/2 weeks old. Is there any hint at all of red on his wing? Or is it just wishful thinking lol?

he is great . love his body type .his eyes color ,his comb and tail .
he is lucking the red shoulder Autossomal red ( not sex linked ) so a well colored or over colored hens will fix that .

I like him a lot .he look and if I had him I ll use him for sure .

chooks man

 

[Chooks man]

Here is an updated pic of one of the cockerels I am currently growing out. He is FRF x LA (Mud is his sire). Unfortunately the list of cockerels is very short and gets shorter it seems by the day. I have lost all but one of my FRF cockerels, including the nicest one that my husband had to cull today due to a broken wing. He was being bullied pretty bad and he wasnt doing well with the injury. Rotten luck.

Anyway, I definitely think I will be able to use this cockerel. He has an open tail from the rear view, even copper color, good eye color, and for now his tail angle and back length looks good. No white underfluff so far. I have a couple darker hackled pullets I think he would go nicely with to help correct his small amount of copper leakage. He could use more depth to his chest. He does have a goofy looking comb with that one tall point in the middle but that can be corrected also. Lol. View attachment 1131134 View attachment 1131136
*Disregard my messy yard.. my son leaves stuff laying everywhere.*

he is good .
great on body type and body color .
with him you only have to worry about his comb ,nothing else .

he is young and a big type ,give him a time to mature .
those type of cockerel will take to 10 month to fully express they big body type

love him and love the chunky pullet next to him

chooks man

 

[Chooks man]

he do have a bad comb BUT
he has a best wattle too .small round and free from any split or folding .VERY VERY VERY hard to breed true .
those days we see a lot marans rooster champion with they wattles almost touching the ground .

he is a asset to you I see a lot great progeny coming out of him .keep him safe

Chooks man

 

[Chooks man]

I wish I had such a cockerel!

I don't need anyone to make my yard messy. somehow I always manage to do it myself, lol. I desperately need to move to a bigger place.

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chooks man

 

[Chooks man]

Thank you! It has been quite the challenge raising one or two decent cockerels to breed from. And I swear I hatched a ton of Marans chicks thinking it would be a sufficent number to cull through. Lose one here and one there, cull for this and for that and the numbers go down quick.

it is one of the reason I always say we need to hatch at lease 20/25 chicks of each paring.

I hatched over a 120 chicks from Zambezi over his 6 BCM hens .now I selected 6 cockerels and 15 pullets
From Djabel over a BLCM hens I hatched less than that around 50 chicks ,they are over 6 month old ,selected 4 cockerels and 5 pullets.

genetic/nature prefer a large number .

chooks man

 

[Chooks man]

I think he is nice! Give him time to color up. My Marans cockerels take a long time to develop their full color. Like 8-9 months. Apollo keeps getting more and more copper color as he matures and he is going on 9 months old. When he was 5 months old he still had a lot of black. They are very slow to mature. My next two oldest cockerels are 5 and 6 months old and they're still not crowing.

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chooks man

 

[Chooks man]

Ok so I have read about as many pages tonight that I can . I will pick up tomorrow. I did have 1 question. I have 5 fbcm that are about 6weeks old right now. The all have the feathered shanks. one is a roo for sure poss. 2 3-4 hens. At what age do I know if there worth breeding to standard or culling and starting over. I will be picking up more eggs soon too.

Thanks
Scott

first let them do some growing .than post photos of them so we can help you select the good one .

I never rush to cull any chooks .I give them the time they need to fully express them selves ,specially if I have a little number of chicks from a any line.

we can always use the chooks we have to improve them if we want to put some time .

TO MUCH CULLING WILL KEEP YOUR CHOOKS WARD EMPTY .

chooks man

 

[Chooks man]

Hello everyone,

I wasn't going to come on here and whine about my situation but so much good info and knowledge here I would be remiss not asking for advice. Hurricane Irma is headed for my house. I have open coops. I am debating turning the chickens out tomorrow morning (Irma comes in the morning) and letting them flee to the woods. If I tarp or put plywood on the coop it will become a flying object. So my friends..... what do I do?

I never face a Hurricane so I have no clue what could be done .

I ll pry for you and your chooks to be safe and sound .

chooks man

 

[Chooks man]

both cockerel are yellow .they still carry the Autossomal Red . genetically speaking they are Ar/ar+ not Ar/Ar.
they body type and marking are great .
Cockerel 1 seem more wider @ the shoulders .

both of them if mated a a well colored Birchen hens with a pure silver hackle .half of they progeny will be pure silver

chooks man

PS = nice turkey flock you have there .