International Black Copper Marans Thread - Breeding to the SOP

[BlueTheBrahma]

After moulting, Chanel had grown in a single black, shiny feather with just a streak of blue. Interesting to see how the Bl and bl alleles have interacted differently in this single feather.

 

[Bantambird]

This legbar hidden behind the haystack. I was sure all the chicks would be olive eggers, but for some reason, all the chicks are definitely purebred. There is one splash and one blue silver marans chock, from whatever blue or splash hen decided to add to his sneaky legbar lady's nest.

 

[Chicken_overlord]

I'm attempting to start a breeding flock of blue and splash copper marans. I was directed here for advice. Let know what you think for a first-time marans flock!

Splash roo from Alchemist farms. He was a little beat up in these pics since he was lowest in the pecking order of roosters when he was given to me this spring:

First BCM pullet from local breeder:

Second pullet:

Third pullet:

Blue copper marans pullet from Alchemist Farms lines hatched from a dark chocolate egg:

Splash marans from Alchemist Farms lines hatched from a dark chocolate egg:

BCM pullet eggs (blue and splash are too young to lay):

 

[Bantambird]

overall these look healthy and they look like Marans. The black copper ones have a bit of an extra fluffy cushion giving them a more u shaped back instead of a wide flat back, but that is definately not unusable and can be worked with.Tail angles on black copper pullet 2 and 3 seem rather high in these pictures, the aim is for about a nice 45% tail angle. I like their overall shape otherwise, nice leg feathering, the aim is on outside toe and shanks, avoiding feathering on middle toe. Blue pullet and splash pullet seem a little young to fully judge just yet, but they look great so far. Everything about those 2 is coming along very nicely, tail angles, leg feathering, body shape, I would like to see some more filling out on those. Eye color on black copper pullet number 2 is your best among all the pullets so far, but your blue and splash pullets haven't had their eye color settle yet. I really like the comb on black copper pullet number 3 a lot. She would make some sons with beautiful headgear. The low tail set on your splash male will really help your three black copper hens bring that tail set down. Using 2 different lines can really help your overall flock vitality, so good job on that. My biggest concern in using splash males when you are breeding for pattern is that you won't see the quality of his copper pattern since the splash covers any underlying patterns. Since you only have him, then you work with what you have, but I would recommend that if you wish to breed blue coppers and copper based splash, you keep an eye in your grow outs for a nice blue copper male so you can see the pattern. It isn't as big of a deal with the hens, since you can use one male to cover a number of ladies, it makes more of a difference in his pattern. I would like to see if you can get a better picture of him in a relaxed side pose, so we can get a better view of his natural tail angle and back shape, and perhaps a squared up front picture so we can get an idea of his width and stance.
Overall, it is a good little starter flock in terms of blue and splash copper marans. Your copper on the girls is a little sparse, and the splash mostly hide their copper patterns so we will need to see how that goes for you.