Key West aka Gypsy Chickens Thread :)

[flgardengirl]

How sweet. He is really tame. I guess it depends on where they live on Key West whether they get treats and are more tame or live further away from the businesses and eat lizards and bugs and stay wild lol. Mine were really wild but I noticed they sure are crazy for bread...so maybe they did get some hamburger buns or sub sandwich from the tourists haha. Your daughter is beautiful!
I took some new pics yesterday of my 2nd generation cockerals and will get them posted when I am back on my computer later. Yesterday, I noticed that one of the newer KW babies is gonna be a Crele color like her momma. Another hen just hatched a chick this morning and is sitting on more eggs. She isn't letting me anywhere near them yet lol.

 

[Greybear23]

What a cool forum, I am joining so I can keep up, I am interested in the KWs, a friend of mine in Colo. has some that he hatched from eggs his daughter brought him while she was a college in Florida, his are mostly of the Blue colors, I will contact him and see if he can post some pics of his, when I get caught up here I hope to get a start of KWs, I am partial to the blue and the crele color patterns, keep me in mind if you have some of those crele bred eggs to get rid of!!! Lynn in Okla.

 

[Greybear23]

Well my daughter went to Florida this week on vacation, I tried to talk her into going to Key West and grabbing me some eggs and bring home!!! No Luck, she said she wasn't going that far!!! So here I set waiting on some eggs!! Well maybe some day!!! LOL Lynn in Okla.

 

[mener6896]

I have a friend that got one as a day old chick. It looks like it's turning out to be a roo. Since she isn't a chicken person, she asked me if I wanted to add him to my flock...just wondering if this is a good idea or not. I don't presently have a roo. thoughts?

 

[Greybear23]

I have a friend that got one as a day old chick. It looks like it's turning out to be a roo. Since she isn't a chicken person, she asked me if I wanted to add him to my flock...just wondering if this is a good idea or not. I don't presently have a roo. thoughts?

mener you definitely have a rooster there and he is destine to be gorgeous!!! Whether you add him to your group of hens will depend on your goal for your group, do you want pure breed eggs to hatch? Do you just raise them for eggs to eat or just the pleasure of watching and interacting with the birds, Do you mind if a hen steals a nest out and hatches some cross breed chicks? Well I say unless you are breeding for the pure breed eggs to hatch then you should go ahead, I think he will make a beautiful rooster for a flock of hens and as for yard ornaments he will be beautiful when he matures!! If you hand raise him and keep him tame I think you will enjoy him for years, chickens can live 15-20 years but normally around 6-8 years! Enjoy him he is gorgeous and send us some updated pics as he matures!!! hope this helps, Lynn in Okla.

 

[RoostersCrow HensDeliver!]

Last year, my DH and I went on vacation to Florida. We drove through all the keys and stayed the night in Key West. I was so excited to see all the wild chickens running EVERYWHERE! I was sooo tempted to take this roo back with me Of course DH said "Heck NO!" so unfortunately I won't ever see this handsome boy again except in my photos, but I'll share with you all.



I swear he thought he was in a photo shoot. What a ham! And a georgeous ham at that!

 

[Greybear23]

Last year, my DH and I went on vacation to Florida. We drove through all the keys and stayed the night in Key West. I was so excited to see all the wild chickens running EVERYWHERE! I was sooo tempted to take this roo back with me Of course DH said "Heck NO!" so unfortunately I won't ever see this handsome boy again except in my photos, but I'll share with you all.



I swear he thought he was in a photo shoot. What a ham! And a georgeous ham at that!

OMG!!! He is gorgeous!!!

 

[flgardengirl]

Rooster's crow: He is a really handsome boy- what a poser,he does seem to like his picture taken lol!

mener: Did you end up keeping the little roo? He is a cute little guy. I wonder how he looks now?


I did manage to breed the crele male offspring back to his crele mother. The babies are a much darker and correct looking crele color on the males. The one female offspring looks just like the crele mother. The original crele male was more golden crele and his babies are much darker and more like the traditional crele color so maybe I have something to work with now, putting them back to the original crele female. I will try to get some comparison pics up.
We had some major predator problems here this summer. I no longer let them roost in the trees due to a bunch of owls that started hunting. They took out 9 birds in one night! Lucky that these Key Wests are so prolific in hatching so I still have a large flock. The blue key west baby turned out to be female she has been laying for a while now so I will be working am now working on the blue project.

 

[Greybear23]

flgardengirl, I bred and showed OEGB in the Crele color for a few years, by breeding the Cockrels back to their mom you are setting the color pattern, that is good and I would do this a couple more generations and select hard for color and type, if you should start getting birds that are fading out in color on you then you need to find a Black Breasted Red or Partridge color pattern cock to breed over your fading hens and a BBred or Partridge colored hen to breed back under the darkest Cockerels you have and then take the offspring from these crosses back to each other and select for the Crele color again, you will have to do this occationaly to keep you dark Crele color pattern going or it will fade out on you. Lynn
PS, If I had them I would try breeding the Crele Rooster over the BlueRed pullet, you should eventually be able to selectively breed Blue Crele from them! Lynn

 

[flgardengirl]

Here's some pics of the recent 'crele-like' colored males. I have been trying to work on towards Crele in the KW but don't have all that much to work with so it will be a slow process lol. I will have to get one of the father's pic up later. He really hates his pic taken lol. The father of these is much lighter golden colored. I think they are still a little too orangy brassy in the hackles and saddles and could have more defined barring in their hackles/saddles. Open to comments for further improvement.... There are two cockerals colored like this.