Jungle Fowl Thread!!!!!!!!!!!

[Toni-Marie]

My pure Cemoni sure are interesting..I made my fibro phoenix from them..I keep pure Cemoni also though...TM

 

[CochinBrahmaLover]

Speaking of RJF, here's a photo of a wild RJF in Vietnam. the picture was taken literally in the middle of nowhere, miles and miles away from civilization, so I can make sure this is the pure one. Sorry for the crappy photo though, this was the closest I could get, they're just very, very flighty! -____-





Here's a photo of a wild RJF hen


This is where I fould them:




We can even spot green peafowl there: notice the tail of the male one in the thick bushes



in general, I notice RJF in Southern Vietnam always have white earlobes, small body, and bright red colour on the back.

Thats very cool! A friend of mine was in Vietnam and he said that he was by this HUGE river and had a flock of RJF trapped against it so he grabbed his shotgun and by the time he was out of the truck all he saw was those birds flying across this like mile wide river (not exactly sure how large it was XD)
And my dad's friend from highschool had a RJF hen, and it was his first pair, and they flew striaght up out of the pen and he never saw them again.

Anyone have any pics of black cemoni? There was some cemoni cross pics but anyone have any black cemoni's?

 

[chicken farmer]

If you turn RJF loose will they turn wild??I live in Ohio

 

[Worried Mama]

I just purchased 3 pullets and 1 bantam red jungle fowl cockeral at a fund raising auction at my daughters school. We had no idea what we were getting, we got them because no one was bidding on them and I am set up for poultry. I currently have chickens and turkeys. They are beautiful birds. I let my chickens free range. But if I am understanding what I have read so far about jungle fowl on this thread you can not do that with them, because they will fly away? How do you keep your jungle fowl?

 

[Ntsees]

I just purchased 3 pullets and 1 bantam red jungle fowl cockeral at a fund raising auction at my daughters school. We had no idea what we were getting, we got them because no one was bidding on them and I am set up for poultry. I currently have chickens and turkeys. They are beautiful birds. I let my chickens free range. But if I am understanding what I have read so far about jungle fowl on this thread you can not do that with them, because they will fly away? How do you keep your jungle fowl?

Feel free to free range your birds. I'm sure you don't have to worry about your birds flying away once they've become accustomed to their new home. The birds discussed on this thread are the true wild birds and they are the ones that will fly away.

 

[childressj]

It can be difficult to find unhybridized Red Jungle Fowl (the wild ancester of all domesticated chickens) and if you do they are likely to be small and suffer from diseases as a result of inbreeding and be very afraid of humans. You will be far happier with game fowl having almost identical physical characteristics if appearance is what you are looking for. There are gold duck wing, straight combed, green or blue legged games that are indistinguishable from the Red Jungle Fowl in photos although they are actually very different animals. It is like comparing a wolf and a wolf-like dog; same species, same phenotype and very different behavior due to thousands of years of domestication. The down side to keeping game fowl is their gameness. The cocks are pubnacious and must be kept seperate after sexual maturity. Even the hens can be difficult; there are hens which cannot be kept together even with a gamecock. A gamecock will normally keep fighting among hens to a minimum. I suggest keeping one roo and hens which have been raised together.

I am currently looking for such gamefowl myself but finding it difficult to find someone who is breeding them to "breed true". The people who specialize in these birds most often breed them for the pit. They cross unrelated birds for the pit and it can be difficult to find someone these days who


breed a line to "breed true". It is difficult to impossible for an expert to tell whether the fowl in this photo are Red Jungle Fowl or American game fowl.

 

[Ntsees]

...It is difficult to impossible for an expert to tell whether the fowl in this photo are Red Jungle Fowl or American game fowl.

My opinion: the male has all the characteristics of a pure specimen (body-wise, color, and feathering) and he's either pure or has a high degree of purity. The hen is just a chicken.

 

[childressj]

Oh we have an expert! With an opinion! That one is a wild animal and one is a domesticated one! How likely is that?
Please this time point out a detailed reason for your answer. For example a game fowl does or does not have whatever characteristic. There is at least one minor appearance difference that has been identified by experts but do you know what it is and can you see it in the photo? Otherwise how may we determine you are an expert?

Here is a known gamecocks for your convience for comparison to the original photo. Courtesy of Redfox Farms

 

[Ntsees]

In your first post, I can only make an observational guess but the reason why the domesticated hen is placed with the male (if he's pure) is so that her presence (being less afraid of people) will calm him down "a bit" so he won't hurt himself banging himself on the walls trying to escape (i.e. male sees that there's not much to fear and a little reassurance since his hen isn't afraid; completely different story if you have a fearful hen).

Multiple pictures of the same bird would be nice to get other angles but I'll do with what I have with the pic. To answer your above post, that male is a game rooster because of the following:

1) the legs are colored green and not slate blue as in a wild specimen.
2) the outter lesser sickles (not the main sickles), tail coverts, or what ever it is you want to call them, should number only 5 on each side, with 4 being clearly visible and the small 5th feather hidden behind the inner tail coverts (sometimes seen). Also, about these outter tail coverts, they should be short and not long and pointy as in the game rooster pic. Here's a pic I found here on BYC:


But going back to the green legs, having slate blue feet should not be an automatic qualification for a pure specimen. There are some with slate blue feet that are hybrids (google Kong's red jungle fowl - his birds are all hybrids and yet have the slate blue feet). Another thing, pictures cannot capture a birds behavior - which is important. Pure specimens do not behave like game cocks and roosters. They move and behave more like a pheasant. As for the body and tail carriage of the game rooster, wild specimens can have that carriage too so I'm not going to say anything about it. You have to look at all these things collectively (the number of eggs laid - 7 or less, full eclipse flumage, feathering, bird behavior, color, etc.). These are just some of the things I know so far.

I'm sure you've seen this video on youtube:

Lastly, I'm not an expert that knows it all, but someone who is searching for the truth about distinguishing the wild specimens phenotypically. I'm willing to be wrong only so I will know a little more of the truth.

***Updated text (5/30/13): replace the above text "google Kong's red jungle fowl - his birds are all hybrids and yet have the blue feet" with "google Kong's red jungle fowl - all of his previous birds were hybrids, but yet have the blue feet"***

 

[Ntsees]

(didn't realize deleting the pic from my file would remove it here; here's the pic that's supposed to go in the above post)