Large Fowl Cochin Thread

[Black Cochin Bantams]

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This is so true. Bo is trying to recreate colors that there used to be quality flocks of. I admire him for working on long term goals in standard Cochins.


I looked for well over a year to find the Columbians that I currently have. It was frustrating beyond belief to contact someone who had purchased a good pair of Columbians and find they had discarded/sold at swap/flea market after using them for a project they were working on. It was their money that bought the birds and they paid the bill for the feed but the variety is what really paid the price.

 

[emptynester]

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Anybody?

 

[rtroxel]

Quote:
Anybody?

Well, it depends a lot on the breed and strain, but I'll try to give you a couple guidelines. Certain things can be seen earlier than others. You can tell if a bird is going to be wide backed fairly early. You can also look at their heads and get a pretty good idea fairly early, maybe 2 months or 3? You can weigh your birds. The biggest ones at 8 weeks will still be the biggest ones at 16 weeks (usually). You can use pedigree matings to ensure that your best typed parents are the ones you get the most chicks from. But to really tell how much fluff and feathers a cochin is going to have, I am of the opinion that you need to see it feathered out. Then they will grow and mature and change on you

Even after a year or more...But if you're observant, you should be able to get a pretty good idea about which 20-30% is going to contain the best birds!

 

[chickendales]

Quote:
Anybody?

sence ur new i would start culling for type on the 7 months olds but i wait on the 4 month olds cochin get better with age

 

[chickendales]

what color are they becauce some time color is a factor too if u had nicely lace gold lace that type was not as great i might use him once

 

[dak]

I believe there is hope for the GLCs. Mr. Roebuck has done some interesting crosses to improve type and lacing and should be seeing the results soon. I am still in the midst of my initial crosses, and anticipate it will be at least another 2 generations before I can tell if it was worth it. If I wasn't able to obtain the excellent stock in Blacks from Mr. Garrett and Mr. Roebuck I would not have attempted this "project". DH will need to improve his processing skills over the next couple of years. Perhaps a plucker for Father's Day.

 

[emptynester]

Quote:
Anybody?

Well, it depends a lot on the breed and strain, but I'll try to give you a couple guidelines. Certain things can be seen earlier than others. You can tell if a bird is going to be wide backed fairly early. You can also look at their heads and get a pretty good idea fairly early, maybe 2 months or 3? You can weigh your birds. The biggest ones at 8 weeks will still be the biggest ones at 16 weeks (usually). You can use pedigree matings to ensure that your best typed parents are the ones you get the most chicks from. But to really tell how much fluff and feathers a cochin is going to have, I am of the opinion that you need to see it feathered out. Then they will grow and mature and change on you

Even after a year or more...But if you're observant, you should be able to get a pretty good idea about which 20-30% is going to contain the best birds!

Thank you

Though I live in a beautiful place, there are no Cochin breeders who live close to me, the ones I have actually came from a listing on Craigslist from a lady who does not show chickens but sells them as pets. I didn't expect them to be show quality, but I would like to make the ones I do have better in the future. There are no poultry clubs here, no poultry shows either for that matter. So, those of you who have had/ raised/shown/loved this breed are my best real life resource. I have been reading the standards, but nothing can compare to real life experience, I tend to learn things better when someone 'shows' me. So thank you when you take time to answer what may be a silly question for us new folks.
Right now I have 21 Cochins, of which I need to somehow identify which ones have the best type - some are easy to pull out because of little or no feathering on legs, feet, and flat backs. It's the others I'm not sure about yet, hence the question. Thank you again for taking the time to answer

 

[OwensMom]

Quote:
This is so true. Bo is trying to recreate colors that there used to be quality flocks of. I admire him for working on long term goals in standard Cochins.


I looked for well over a year to find the Columbians that I currently have. It was frustrating beyond belief to contact someone who had purchased a good pair of Columbians and find they had discarded/sold at swap/flea market after using them for a project they were working on. It was their money that bought the birds and they paid the bill for the feed but the variety is what really paid the price.

This is the point that I was trying to make but done much more eloquently!! When the old standard colors and quality are lost, the chances of breeding a novelity color with type is small to none. The old standard colors are our seeds to play with and help insure success. Seems that Bo is now having to reinvent the wheel becauce the ball got droped. Noone is against having new colors. They add variety to the breed but there is a certain responsibility to maintain the original quality.

 

[sjarvis00]

Quote:
This is so true. Bo is trying to recreate colors that there used to be quality flocks of. I admire him for working on long term goals in standard Cochins.


I looked for well over a year to find the Columbians that I currently have. It was frustrating beyond belief to contact someone who had purchased a good pair of Columbians and find they had discarded/sold at swap/flea market after using them for a project they were working on. It was their money that bought the birds and they paid the bill for the feed but the variety is what really paid the price.

This is the point that I was trying to make but done much more eloquently!! When the old standard colors and quality are lost, the chances of breeding a novelity color with type is small to none. The old standard colors are our seeds to play with and help insure success. Seems that Bo is now having to reinvent the wheel becauce the ball got droped. Noone is against having new colors. They add variety to the breed but there is a certain responsibility to maintain the original quality.

It has been a long road for many varieties and some of teh best in my opinion have been lost. The Columbian pattern is one of my all time favorites and we have it in two other breeds at this time. We discussed and began trying to locate the proper breed stock two years ago to get the Large Fowl columbian pattern in Cochin again. needless to say it has been very difficult to get the required breed stock of any kind of quality. Most have been crossed in very recent generations and will make the process even harder. We decided to hold off another year and look for the right recesive white and raise out a few single combed columbian wyandotte cockrells to start the project with. This will allow for the retention of size, fewer type issues just leg feathering quality to fight for the most part. It will still take several generations to get there but I beleive it is worth it.

 

[OwensMom]

Again reinventing the wheel. In the rush to establish a novel color, someone dropped the ball and let an established color fall by the wayside. I say "to bad". As a novice I would love to have a nice Columbian. I love color and diversity but I want quality birds that will reproduce themselves with quality.