Is tail feathers sexing accurate?

[Iluveggers]

So I saw on a blog that someone did a sexing experiment with wing length at 3 days, and tail feathers at 1 week. I was NOT about to hold 15 chicks down on day 3 to investigate their wings, but tail feathers are pretty clearly visible. They will all be 1 week by Thurs morning. (They were hatched from Tue-Thurs). They were all vent-sexed by the hatchery & should all be females, but we know how that goes 😂. I have 4 that do not have tail feathers yet. Is tail feather growth at week accurate at all? Should I post pics of their fluffy little rumps on Thursday just for fun? You guys have lots of experience...whatddya think? ❤️
Second question, if one of my EE ends up being a roo, will the colored egg gene pass down to his offspring? Thanks all!

 

[Overo Mare]

IME, no. Not at all.

 

[Fluffy Lambs]

I notice with my mutts that pullets don't have tail feathers when cockerels have them. But those are all from same genetics and chickens so you can't use that with everything. If one of your EEs ends up being roo, I read that chicks with pea combs will lay blue/green eggs (not roosters of course😂) but I haven't bred EEs yet to mine so don't know. But the ones that get the blue gene will layblue eggs. And I don't know if this will happen, but green eggs (or atleast some of them) are blue eggs with brown pigment over the blue. You can scratch off brown to reveal blue. So some of them might lay green eggs, but like I said before I haven't bred those yet so don't know. I think @cherrynberry breeds them.

 

[nuthatched]

Chicken blogs are rife with wives tales and misinformation.

 

[Overo Mare]

Chicken blogs are rife with wives tales and misinformation.

This. This. This.

YouTube channels as well.

 

[nuthatched]

This. This. This.

YouTube channels as well.

Yep.
You ever see a new member here and you just know they got chickens because it looked fun on someone's cutsey chicken channel blog? Even worse when they don't listen to y'all and stick with bad info they got somewhere else.

 

[LadiesAndJane]

In one word, no. 😊

 

[LadiesAndJane]

For your second question about the EE rooster. Impossible to know which color egg genes he is carrying, as EEs are not pure breds. 😊

 

[JaeG]

Wing feather sexing can only be used when the chicks are from a mix of a fast feathering rooster over slow feathering hens.

I've got 2 different lines of English Araucana. With one I can sex them by the rate of feathering but with the other line there's no difference, so it all depends on if that's something the breeder has selected for.

It depends on if your EE rooster is carrying 1 or 2 genes for the blue egg shells (or he may be carrying none at all). If he's only carrying one then it's a 50% chance he'll pass that on to his offspring. If he's carrying 2 then he will pass it on as it's a dominant trait.

 

[sourland]

Feather sexing of chicks may work in some breeds/strains, but across the board NO.