International Black Copper Marans Thread - Breeding to the SOP

[Kung_pao]

View attachment 4277834An interesting egg today. Think it’s from the pullet that’s already been laying the darkest eggs, but a bit blotchier today. Nice shape, better than Chanel’s, likely comes from Loki’s genetics.

That’s a beautiful egg!

 

[BlueTheBrahma]

Watched this egg get laid, it was from Ratty, potentially her first. Five Marans eggs today. Ignore the blood, I was plucking pheasants.

 

[BlueTheBrahma]

@Chooks man do you have any experience/advice on breeding silver cuckoos with dark cuckoos?

I’m thinking of keeping a dark line, even though most of them were bought for my golden cuckoo project, but only have the silver cuckoo cock to start with.

Obviously I’d have to breed out birchen E^R and make sure they’re E/E.

 

[Chooks man]

@Chooks man do you have any experience/advice on breeding silver cuckoos with dark cuckoos?

I’m thinking of keeping a dark line, even though most of them were bought for my golden cuckoo project, but only have the silver cuckoo cock to start with.

Obviously I’d have to breed out birchen E^R and make sure they’re E/E.

first of all the E/E will not make a proper golden cuckoo pattern , they have to ER /ER so they hackle will be nicely golden .
I don t know what SOP you are going to apply for your future Golden cuckoo ,but the French ER /ER call for a lighter under fluff and golden hackle with a vague cuckoo pattern .
in the UK all the silver cuckoos and Dark cuckoos where E/E but not sure now , the English breeders are not very good at replying to the question I have I asked them in they Facebook page or pm .
the English silver cuckoo I worked with was imported from the UK was ER/ER because never got solid black from his F1 X F1 ,got Birchen instead . so he was nor E/E for sure ,
I never worked with E/E dark English cuckoo but you will know when you breed the F1 progeny together to flush out the hidden genotype
chooks man

 

[BlueTheBrahma]

first of all the E/E will not make a proper golden cuckoo pattern , they have to ER /ER so they hackle will be nicely golden .
I don t know what SOP you are going to apply for your future Golden cuckoo ,but the French ER /ER call for a lighter under fluff and golden hackle with a vague cuckoo pattern .
in the UK all the silver cuckoos and Dark cuckoos where E/E but not sure now , the English breeders are not very good at replying to the question I have I asked them in they Facebook page or pm .
the English silver cuckoo I worked with was imported from the UK was ER/ER because never got solid black from his F1 X F1 ,got Birchen instead . so he was nor E/E for sure ,
I never worked with E/E dark English cuckoo but you will know when you breed the F1 progeny together to flush out the hidden genotype
chooks man

I’m using black coppers to breed in both birchen and gold. I’ll breed to the UK standard, which calls quite a dark cuckoo base with gold where birchens code for.

From what I’ve seen, silver cuckoos here seem to be birchen based usually, at least the best ones. The standard calls for the neck and back to be almost entirely white, and a lighter barring than darks. This is best achieved with a Birchen base, otherwise it’s basically hard to tell from a faulty patterned dark.

To better clarify my use for the dark cuckoos, I ordered them before I realised the cuckoos I hatched were silver cuckoo. Assuming the silver cuckoos are indeed birchen based, I’ll cross them to the black coppers so I’m only dealing with the barring and gold genes.
If I find they’re too pale for the UK standard, then I’ll start to work the dark cuckoo blood in slowly and carefully, breeding out E.

This all being said, even the marans club of GB president told me he hadn’t seen a golden cuckoo for a long time, so I have little to actually compare it to adhering to the English standard.

 

[TexasBlues]

I always enjoy my marans eggs.

Anybody on here have backcrossed marans? I’d like to see what the 3/4 marans eggs look like.

I bred this 1/2 Black Copper Marans/ 1/2 whiting blue rooster back to the pure black copper Marans hens and have a few young birds out of them.

 

[Chooks man]

I’m using black coppers to breed in both birchen and gold. I’ll breed to the UK standard, which calls quite a dark cuckoo base with gold where birchens code for.

From what I’ve seen, silver cuckoos here seem to be birchen based usually, at least the best ones. The standard calls for the neck and back to be almost entirely white, and a lighter barring than darks. This is best achieved with a Birchen base, otherwise it’s basically hard to tell from a faulty patterned dark.

To better clarify my use for the dark cuckoos, I ordered them before I realised the cuckoos I hatched were silver cuckoo. Assuming the silver cuckoos are indeed birchen based, I’ll cross them to the black coppers so I’m only dealing with the barring and gold genes.
If I find they’re too pale for the UK standard, then I’ll start to work the dark cuckoo blood in slowly and carefully, breeding out E.

This all being said, even the marans club of GB president told me he hadn’t seen a golden cuckoo for a long time, so I have little to actually compare it to adhering to the English standard.

let make this clear, it is not about the standard that I m concern ,the genetic side of thing what bother me , E/E phenotype does not express gold or silver ,when the phenotype is well bred we can no tell if the solid Black /Blue are e+( gold) or S ( silver ) because it is solid pattern ,the old school English breeders used a solid Black E/E to create a English Dark Cuckoo Marans ,dark body uniform throughout with a vague cuckoo pattern . doesn t show any silver or Gold because it is uniform .
what I m saying it i genetic fact not some one else said ( they own opinion ).
if we are talking about what the SOP call for lighter upper body pattern almost white ( or light golden ) compare to the the bottom part than we are talking about Birchen base ER/ER .
solid pattern E/E should no show any hackle leakage silver or gold because it is a disqualification should be pure solid pattern free from any colour .
what you want to breed it is up to you ,I m just trying to make it easier for you to understand the low of genetic ,because there is a lot confusing about all this cuckoo marans thing even here in Australia peoples are all over the place saying this or saying that. and I m telling them you can not challenge the low of nature ,it is madness .
chooks man

 

[Chooks man]

I always enjoy my marans eggs.

Anybody on here have backcrossed marans? I’d like to see what the 3/4 marans eggs look like.
View attachment 4280972
View attachment 4280976View attachment 4280977View attachment 4280978

I bred this 1/2 Black Copper Marans/ 1/2 whiting blue rooster back to the pure black copper Marans hens and have a few young birds out of them.
View attachment 4280979

I haven t done that but my friend manage to back cross few time all sort of color ( eggs ) very interesting.
chooks man

 

[BlueTheBrahma]

let make this clear, it is not about the standard that I m concern ,the genetic side of thing what bother me , E/E phenotype does not express gold or silver ,when the phenotype is well bred we can no tell if the solid Black /Blue are e+( gold) or S ( silver ) because it is solid pattern ,the old school English breeders used a solid Black E/E to create a English Dark Cuckoo Marans ,dark body uniform throughout with a vague cuckoo pattern . doesn t show any silver or Gold because it is uniform .
what I m saying it i genetic fact not some one else said ( they own opinion ).
if we are talking about what the SOP call for lighter upper body pattern almost white ( or light golden ) compare to the the bottom part than we are talking about Birchen base ER/ER .
solid pattern E/E should no show any hackle leakage silver or gold because it is a disqualification should be pure solid pattern free from any colour .
what you want to breed it is up to you ,I m just trying to make it easier for you to understand the low of genetic ,because there is a lot confusing about all this cuckoo marans thing even here in Australia peoples are all over the place saying this or saying that. and I m telling them you can not challenge the low of nature ,it is madness .
chooks man

I think I may have been confusing by talking about both projects in the same message.

I have:
1 x silver cuckoo cock
1 x silver cuckoo hen
dark cuckoo hens
black copper hens
1 x blue copper hen (Chanel)

My main project is the Golden cuckoo project. Crossing the silver cuckoo cock to the BCM hens will get the F1s. I know they wouldn’t be perfect straight away, especially the hens as they will be silver. But using the resulting S/s+, B/b+ cockerel over the silver cuckoo hens should throw some double barred, S/s+ cockerels, and breeding him to black coppers should get some pure gold, single barred cockerels. And half of the hens will be golden cuckoos.

If I used the dark cuckoos, it would be experimental and I know it would take a few generations to breed out the E allele.

My other idea was a project, to get more dark cuckoos, breeding the silver cock to the dark hens, then test mate future progeny to breed out any birchen alleles, so they are E/E.


Feel free to point out problems I’ve missed, I struggled to follow which one you meant here, but I think that’s my fault.
Thanks!

 

[Bantambird]

I’m using black coppers to breed in both birchen and gold. I’ll breed to the UK standard, which calls quite a dark cuckoo base with gold where birchens code for.

From what I’ve seen, silver cuckoos here seem to be birchen based usually, at least the best ones. The standard calls for the neck and back to be almost entirely white, and a lighter barring than darks. This is best achieved with a Birchen base, otherwise it’s basically hard to tell from a faulty patterned dark.

To better clarify my use for the dark cuckoos, I ordered them before I realised the cuckoos I hatched were silver cuckoo. Assuming the silver cuckoos are indeed birchen based, I’ll cross them to the black coppers so I’m only dealing with the barring and gold genes.
If I find they’re too pale for the UK standard, then I’ll start to work the dark cuckoo blood in slowly and carefully, breeding out E.

This all being said, even the marans club of GB president told me he hadn’t seen a golden cuckoo for a long time, so I have little to actually compare it to adhering to the English standard.

If I were to pick up fresh blood, I'm probably going to get Cuckoo myself, especially if I can find silver cuckoo. There would be a much easier time refining them with my birchen based flock, plus no cross concerns.