JG x RIR x RIR

[LaurenRitz]

I have a JG x RIR cockerel, 17 weeks old. Hens are still in their first year but probably 8 months old. All eggs are showing fertilized, so I decided to set some of the eggs.

However, he also has a half sister in the group. I thought she was too young to be laying but there is a small brown egg in the set that doesn't match any of the others in color.

She is currently 15 weeks, also JG x RIR. She took entirely after the JG side, while the cockerel has more of the RIR traits, including early maturity. She is entirely black, black eyes, slow maturity. She looks like a pure JG.

I am keeping an eye on this egg. It's entirely possible that it isn't fertilized. I have never seen the cockerel mount her. However, if it does hatch is there any way I could differentiate the chick? Or is the mixing too difuse to tell?

 

[NatJ]

However, if it does hatch is there any way I could differentiate the chick? Or is the mixing too difuse to tell?

If the egg does develop, you could put it into a mesh bag or plastic basket to hatch, so you can identify which chick comes out of that egg. After that, you can track the chick with a leg band, or if it looks enough different from the others you could just remember which one it is.

Since the egg is smaller, the chick may be smaller as well. If you have a scale that is sensitive enough, you could weigh each egg around lockdown time, and make a note of that egg's weight and the next-smallest one. If the weights are far enough apart, you've got a good chance of identifying the smallest chick if you weigh each one when you take them out of the incubator. If the eggs are too close in size, the chicks will probably weigh about the same as each other, and you would not be able to tell that way.

If you look into the incubator and see it hatching, take note of what color it is. That at least rules out the chicks of other colors. (I'm expecting about half the chicks to be black, with the others being red or yellow.)

I thought she was too young to be laying but there is a small brown egg in the set that doesn't match any of the others in color.

You could have eaten that egg instead of setting it. Then you wouldn't have this question.

I have a JG x RIR cockerel, 17 weeks old. Hens are still in their first year but probably 8 months old.

Are the hens Rhode Island Reds?

he also has a half sister in the group... also JG x RIR. She took entirely after the JG side, while the cockerel has more of the RIR traits, including early maturity. She is entirely black, black eyes, slow maturity. She looks like a pure JG.

Unfortunately, chicks from that male with a Rhode Island Red hen, and chicks from him with his half-sister, have all the same possibilities for coloring, comb type, foot color, and all other traits I can think of. So there is no way to be sure of which chick came from which egg, if you don't figure it out around hatching time.

Color possibilities include:
Black, with or without leakage
Leakage could be red/gold or it could be silver. It is likely to appear in the shoulders of males (like the current mixed male), and in the breasts of females.
Black-tailed Red (like Rhode Island Reds)
Columbian (black tail and hackles, mostly white on the rest of the body.)

 

[LaurenRitz]

If the egg does develop, you could put it into a mesh bag or plastic basket to hatch, so you can identify which chick comes out of that egg.

Good idea.

Are the hens Rhode Island Reds?

Yes, all the other adult hens are RIR.

Columbian (black tail and hackles, mostly white on the rest of the body.)

Interesting that white should be one of the options. I assume that would be the yellow chicks?

 

[NatJ]

Interesting that white should be one of the options. I assume that would be the yellow chicks?

Yes.

I am guessing that the Jersey Giants are genetically silver rather than gold (that is common in black chicken breeds.) Since they are black all over, no-one can actually tell by looking, whether they have silver or gold. But it can show up in later generations, when there are chicks that are not black all over.