International Black Copper Marans Thread - Breeding to the SOP

[Chooks man]

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Agree with you ,her half sibling will fix that if mated to him because of the inbreeding effect . they ll throw some progeny with dark egg genes and other with lighter egg genes .

it is actually recommended to be done like that( half sibling mating ) , better than mated to unrelated cockerel .( dominant effect .

chooks man

 

[Chooks man]

I am tying to decide on whether I want to keep this cockerel or not. He is pure LA. I have posted pics of him before but he was younger then and in his awkward phase. He has lots of white underfluff, especially under his hackle. He has a halo also. He seems a tad too fluffy in his back end. I didn't get a shot of his breast, but it is solid black - no leakage. His type and tail angle are probably his best qualities. He looks a lot like his sire, Cooper (last photo).

I really want to attempt to eliminate parasitic white from this line, but his type and tail set may earn him a free pass.

What do y'all think?

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Here is a pic of his sire, Cooper I have saved on my computer. Cooper also had a lot of white under his hackle.

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he is thicker than his Sire Copper. better type too .

he is a keeper even if he was half white .

post me photos of the dark pullets/hens you have and I ll help you find a much for him . because you are not going to throw that cockerel away .

big dark hen with a gorgeous comb will be good,, so you can lock that body type and tail .
work on breeding out the parasitic white in different line ,even if they are related . just breed them separately for few generation ,,tell you breed the trait in ( bred true) than join the 2 lines . less culling this way and better control ,

chooks man

 

[KF0002]

you gave your luck away to your neighbor s.

she lay very nice dark eggs .

I ll not give a pullet like that to any body even if she has not got a tail and the wings ,as long as she can lay those gorgeous eggs .

I keep telling you guys ,the eggs color is very complex matter .we should trait it that way .
any thing else is very easy to fix or to breed out , but not the eggs .

i still think this pullets should be a breeder .personal opinion

chooks man

I can always get her back if the LA pullets I have left dont lay as dark. My neighbor wouldnt mind a trade. Lol. We're close friends. I gave her the Marans pullet because she wanted one so bad. She loved my dark brown eggs, and at the time the high tailed one was the only one I would have parted with. No worries.. if I need her she isnt far away.

And I still have her mother who lays about the same color egg, maybe even darker. And I have her brother, Apollo.

 

[KF0002]

he is thicker than his Sire Copper. better type too .

he is a keeper even if he was half white .

post me photos of the dark pullets/hens you have and I ll help you find a much for him . because you are not going to throw that cockerel away .

big dark hen with a gorgeous comb will be good,, so you can lock that body type and tail .
work on breeding out the parasitic white in different line ,even if they are related . just breed them separately for few generation ,,tell you breed the trait in ( bred true) than join the 2 lines . less culling this way and better control ,

chooks man

Okay I will look through them and take pics. Thank u!

 

[Chooks man]

Okay I will look through them and take pics. Thank u!

I think you have all the ingredients to breed your own BCM /BLCM line s .
all the great genes to make a great marans chooks are there ,you need to pair them specifically to get the best of what you got.Example Short back X long back . bad tail X good tail etc.......... we call this method .Breeding the extreme s ( the opposite ).
breed from as many combination you thinks they are going to work as you can and you ll see wonders .
don t forget ,we are not working with a stable strain ( except few of us ,not me any way )so they ll throw a lot variation .
we are working with a lot hidden recessive genes .and we don t know who is carrying what .
select well .work pen by pen NOT chooks by chooks .
let say select cockerel/Rooster for pen 1 and select few girls to compliment him .
go to pen 2 .cockerel /rooster and select few girls to compliment him .
keep going like this tell all your breeding pens are full .
you need a lot pens for this method to work , you know that .but will get quicker to your goal .

I selected 1 cockerel for 2 pullet this year . total of 100 pullets and 50 cockerels . that will give me 50 trios for one breeding season and 100 pairs for other breeding season .

next year I ll to keep more cockerels .I like 1/1 ratio ,less chicks to hatch and more feed to the breeders but better genetic diversity and expression .better progeny
this ways to good can be fixed quickly and the fault can be bred out as fast as well .

chooks man

 

[littlepeeps81]

Hope everyone is doing well, sorry I have been gone for a few weeks. Been sick, and really busy. I have several post to catch up on. Hope everyone and their chooks are well. Just wanted to introduce Jazz. My very first F1 generation chick. Hatched this morning. I threw this egg in with some wheaten maran eggs I ordered. Got one little wheaten so far. Hopeful that two more will make it. Jazz is Onyx x Zorro mating. Can't wait to catch up on what I have missed. Very happy with this babies feathered shanks. Not covered up in parasitic white on the face. Onyx was free of parasitic white, so I was hopeful this would help her progeny. Zorro has good color, and Onyx doesn't have enough copper in her hackle. Zorro needs work with his comb, and Onyx has a fairly descent comb, and a very good tail. Zorro does not have much of a tail. Excited to see what this little fella turns into.

 

[littlepeeps81]

Here is Jazz front facing.Just love my little Jazz.

 

[Chooks man]

Hope everyone is doing well, sorry I have been gone for a few weeks. Been sick, and really busy. I have several post to catch up on. Hope everyone and their chooks are well. Just wanted to introduce Jazz. My very first F1 generation chick. Hatched this morning. I threw this egg in with some wheaten maran eggs I ordered. Got one little wheaten so far. Hopeful that two more will make it. Jazz is Onyx x Zorro mating. Can't wait to catch up on what I have missed. Very happy with this babies feathered shanks. Not covered up in parasitic white on the face. Onyx was free of parasitic white, so I was hopeful this would help her progeny. Zorro has good color, and Onyx doesn't have enough copper in her hackle. Zorro needs work with his comb, and Onyx has a fairly descent comb, and a very good tail. Zorro does not have much of a tail. Excited to see what this little fella turns into.

he is a boy and gorgeous one too .
he has a true BCM chicks hatch down shorter and minimum white.

chooks man

 

[Chooks man]

@littlepeeps81

you have one of the purest and true BCM chick there .Jazz
true marans hatch down
free from any parasitic white
lovely blue eyes
lighter colored shanks and well feathered

Zorro and Onyx did very well .
hatch more chicks from them as many as you can .

BRAVO

chooks man

 

[KF0002]

lovely hatch down . not a lot of white . few spot on her face that alright . better if there is none . but one step at the time .
brown dot on the head is a sign of purity . true marans

she have a lighter feet for a girl .not dark all the way through like we see most of the time . great trait .she ll pass it to her son s .

chooks man

Thanks! Yes one step at a time they will get there. I have to keep reminding myself to appreciate the important things, and not sweat the small stuff as much.

As the saying goes, Rome wasn't built in a day. And nothing worth having comes easy.