International Black Copper Marans Thread - Breeding to the SOP

[TexasBlues]

Is the black copper marans color and pattern always dominant in first generation olive eggers?

What would the offspring from a BCM rooster crossed with a whiting true blue hen look like?

The hens in the picture are good examples of what the WTB hens look like.

 

[BlueTheBrahma]

Is the black copper marans color and pattern always dominant in first generation olive eggers?

What would the offspring from a BCM rooster crossed with a whiting true blue hen look like?

The hens in the picture are good examples of what the WTB hens look like.
View attachment 3679641View attachment 3679642

You will get either black or blue coppers, as these hens are blue copper and I think blue duckwing. Either way, when crossed to the BCM, the pattern will be birchen, the ground colour copper/gold (same base gene), and the pattern colour blue or black (50/50).

 

[Tstraub]

At what outside temps does everyone fire up their incubators? Consitant overnight lows of?
Or do you just start hatching at a certain month because they are going to need additional heat anyway? I have heatlamps and a brooder plate. My coops are in the barn (pole barn, concrete floor) and I have a brooder pen attached to the Marans coop for separation when needed.

I’m just figuring this out as a go but what I’m hoping to do is set eggs so they hatch out on Easter Sunday, March 31 this year. That’s 2 weeks later than the ones I bought last year so I’m fairly confident I can brood them without any issues. This is of course dependent on the birds that I want to breed laying constantly and normal weather patterns in the spring. It’s more of a goal than plan I guess nothing set in stone

 

[wrathsfarm]

I’m just figuring this out as a go but what I’m hoping to do is set eggs so they hatch out on Easter Sunday, March 31 this year. That’s 2 weeks later than the ones I bought last year so I’m fairly confident I can brood them without any issues. This is of course dependent on the birds that I want to breed laying constantly and normal weather patterns in the spring. It’s more of a goal than plan I guess nothing set in stone

Yes I get it. Hard to judge Michigan weather. As you can tell I'm getting hatch antsy already. Won't be hatching any of the newest 3 pullets until at least July but got a lot of test mating to do.

 

[Tstraub]

Yes I get it. Hard to judge Michigan weather. As you can tell I'm getting hatch antsy already. Won't be hatching any of the newest 3 pullets until at least July but got a lot of test mating to do.

If you would have set eggs when you got that new incubator you would already have new babies

 

[wrathsfarm]

If you would have set eggs when you got that new incubator you would already have new babies

Lol.... Not a good decision but I'm pretty good at not making good decisions.

 

[Bantambird]

At what outside temps does everyone fire up their incubators? Consitant overnight lows of?
Or do you just start hatching at a certain month because they are going to need additional heat anyway? I have heatlamps and a brooder plate. My coops are in the barn (pole barn, concrete floor) and I have a brooder pen attached to the Marans coop for separation when needed.

i start up my hatchery at the beginning of January, so they girls have gotten a good rest from fall molt. I start getting calls for chicks by February so I try to have some ready to go by then, and so my daughter can have birds for the show by fair time. I will usually hatch up to 80 in one go, but usually I will hatch between 30 and 50 at a time, until my brooders are full. They pay the bills, although I realize that I probably end up selling some pretty fantastic birds right at the beginning without knowing because I use these chicks to buy the food to feed everyone else. Sometimes I can get enough to feed the rest for half a year from chick sales. I shut down the hatchery shed by June, as it starts getting hotter, and it is an old brick homesteader shack with no air conditioner, and I want all the birds to be ready for winter in time since our weather in Montana can start turning cold as early as September, and I want to have all my butchering done before it gets really cold. It is not fun to butcher in freezing weather, we do all the plucking outside, before they head to the kitchen for the gutting. I get to do most of the plucking and I don't like frozen fingers.

I guess I should add, it doesn't matter what the outside temp is when I fire up the incubators, I have a milk house heater I keep in the old brick shack, and it has pretty good insulation. I have hatched when it is -40 outside. The biggest hinderance to hatching in extreme cold is humidity can get real low at extreme cold. I have a room humidity monitor and one in the incubators, so if I need to I add another tray, but Marans tend to do better at a bit lower humidity.

 

[wrathsfarm]

i start up my hatchery at the beginning of January, so they girls have gotten a good rest from fall molt. I start getting calls for chicks by February so I try to have some ready to go by then, and so my daughter can have birds for the show by fair time. I will usually hatch up to 80 in one go, but usually I will hatch between 30 and 50 at a time, until my brooders are full. They pay the bills, although I realize that I probably end up selling some pretty fantastic birds right at the beginning without knowing because I use these chicks to buy the food to feed everyone else. Sometimes I can get enough to feed the rest for half a year from chick sales. I shut down the hatchery shed by June, as it starts getting hotter, and it is an old brick homesteader shack with no air conditioner, and I want all the birds to be ready for winter in time since our weather in Montana can start turning cold as early as September, and I want to have all my butchering done before it gets really cold. It is not fun to butcher in freezing weather, we do all the plucking outside, before they head to the kitchen for the gutting. I get to do most of the plucking and I don't like frozen fingers.

I guess I should add, it doesn't matter what the outside temp is when I fire up the incubators, I have a milk house heater I keep in the old brick shack, and it has pretty good insulation. I have hatched when it is -40 outside. The biggest hinderance to hatching in extreme cold is humidity can get real low at extreme cold. I have a room humidity monitor and one in the incubators, so if I need to I add another tray, but Marans tend to do better at a bit lower humidity.

So much information here, thank you so much. Setting up an hatch/brooder room in the barn would be completely doable for me by late fall 2024. That's a super great idea I didn't think of.

Would you mind posting some pics of your hatch room when you can? What size? How many brooders? I have a good supply of different electric heaters and even a small gas heater I could plum into a 100 lb propane cylinder. Just got to change out the orifice from natural gas to propane. I wouldn't need it to be as big as your hatch rate but would give me some ideas on layout mainly. Maybe big enough for a hatch table and a 2 separate brooders. 2 hatches a month, 1 for Marans and 1 for crosses and then rotate the out when feathered out and start again for however many hatches I want to do.
I'm shooting to try and sell Marans hatching eggs by spring 2025 on a small scale if I can get my lines of course up to better standards, but I could start selling Olive Eggers and Midnight Majesty's eggs and chicks starting this spring 2024. These would give me a good start getting my experience level up without having all the breeding worries.
Thank you again for all the info. This is all very helpful.

 

[Bantambird]

So much information here, thank you so much. Setting up an hatch/brooder room in the barn would be completely doable for me by late fall 2024. That's a super great idea I didn't think of.

Would you mind posting some pics of your hatch room when you can? What size? How many brooders? I have a good supply of different electric heaters and even a small gas heater I could plum into a 100 lb propane cylinder. Just got to change out the orifice from natural gas to propane. I wouldn't need it to be as big as your hatch rate but would give me some ideas on layout mainly. Maybe big enough for a hatch table and a 2 separate brooders. 2 hatches a month, 1 for Marans and 1 for crosses and then rotate the out when feathered out and start again for however many hatches I want to do.
I'm shooting to try and sell Marans hatching eggs by spring 2025 on a small scale if I can get my lines of course up to better standards, but I could start selling Olive Eggers and Midnight Majesty's eggs and chicks starting this spring 2024. These would give me a good start getting my experience level up without having all the breeding worries.
Thank you again for all the info. This is all very helpful.

So it's a little dirty right now because I don't spend a lot of time in there June through November, I'm about to do the big mouse cleaning again. It's probably the original house on the property. The brick was not reinforced, it was bowing out badly and needed repoinring among other things. It was a one room house, no electricity or water. It still has no water but we wired it. To save the structure, we built a wooden reinforced frame around the outside, then spray foamed it with a rigid structural foam that also insulated it. Then we put the steel siding over the top of that. It used to have windows, but those are all covered because the weak points were all at the windows on the original brick structure. The door on the outside is original. Dad framed a little ante-room to help mitigate drastic temp swings in the hatchery room itself, snd to serve as tack storage and other stuff storage. He framed the hatchery room for wiring, as the original walls are straight up plaster over brick, no lathe or anything, so needed a space for wires. The incubators are old gqf cabinets from I think the 80s, I got them from my great uncle. My dad and I modified them to be digital and put readouts to the outside so I can monitor at a glance. Modern incubators already have all this, so if you can afford a modern one, you ate already ahead there. While I do have a propane heater, I had a hard time keeping the nozzles clear during hatching time because chicks and poults release A LOT of feather dust when hatching and fluffing. Don't underestimate how much feather dander those little guys produce! I tend to use coil heater more due to this, because the Littles gunk up propane heaters and the flame didn't always stay lit. There is a vent in the ceiling. I don't shut it off during hatching time. Fresh air is important to babies, even if you have to be constantly heating it. If you use propane heat, you will definitely require good ventilation. The baby brooder is an old sears catalog Farmall broiler tower, I pretty much just use the top. It's from 1944 so it's had some adjustments but it functions quite well for what it is. Found it in the back of a neighboring ranchers old storage barn and he knew I'd use it. Heck yes, I use it.
There is a small old dest in there. I can keep essential record keeping supplies close to the hatcher and baby brooder. There's enough room in there for all the little medical things, bands, all the old calenders, and numbers. It's from my great grandpa's farm. Keeping a desk nook right there can help encourage good record keeping and you can have a work space when working with wiggly new chicks, too, if they need medical care or a place to take their pictures. The room itself is pretty small, say, 8 by 8? 8 by 10? I'm not sure. Every vertical space not otherwise used has storage, either way.
When it does get really cold, I lay an old ratty towel down to cut down on drafting, but the fan will still draw fresh air in.
I guess that's a tour, right?

 

[Chooks man]

View attachment 3680394View attachment 3680396View attachment 3680399View attachment 3680400View attachment 3680401View attachment 3680403View attachment 3680410
So it's a little dirty right now because I don't spend a lot of time in there June through November, I'm about to do the big mouse cleaning again. It's probably the original house on the property. The brick was not reinforced, it was bowing out badly and needed repoinring among other things. It was a one room house, no electricity or water. It still has no water but we wired it. To save the structure, we built a wooden reinforced frame around the outside, then spray foamed it with a rigid structural foam that also insulated it. Then we put the steel siding over the top of that. It used to have windows, but those are all covered because the weak points were all at the windows on the original brick structure. The door on the outside is original. Dad framed a little ante-room to help mitigate drastic temp swings in the hatchery room itself, snd to serve as tack storage and other stuff storage. He framed the hatchery room for wiring, as the original walls are straight up plaster over brick, no lathe or anything, so needed a space for wires. The incubators are old gqf cabinets from I think the 80s, I got them from my great uncle. My dad and I modified them to be digital and put readouts to the outside so I can monitor at a glance. Modern incubators already have all this, so if you can afford a modern one, you ate already ahead there. While I do have a propane heater, I had a hard time keeping the nozzles clear during hatching time because chicks and poults release A LOT of feather dust when hatching and fluffing. Don't underestimate how much feather dander those little guys produce! I tend to use coil heater more due to this, because the Littles gunk up propane heaters and the flame didn't always stay lit. There is a vent in the ceiling. I don't shut it off during hatching time. Fresh air is important to babies, even if you have to be constantly heating it. If you use propane heat, you will definitely require good ventilation. The baby brooder is an old sears catalog Farmall broiler tower, I pretty much just use the top. It's from 1944 so it's had some adjustments but it functions quite well for what it is. Found it in the back of a neighboring ranchers old storage barn and he knew I'd use it. Heck yes, I use it.
There is a small old dest in there. I can keep essential record keeping supplies close to the hatcher and baby brooder. There's enough room in there for all the little medical things, bands, all the old calenders, and numbers. It's from my great grandpa's farm. Keeping a desk nook right there can help encourage good record keeping and you can have a work space when working with wiggly new chicks, too, if they need medical care or a place to take their pictures. The room itself is pretty small, say, 8 by 8? 8 by 10? I'm not sure. Every vertical space not otherwise used has storage, either way.
When it does get really cold, I lay an old ratty towel down to cut down on drafting, but the fan will still draw fresh air in.
I guess that's a tour, right?

love the desck in a corner ,classiacal poultry breeder . love your work my dear friend .
chooks man