Lavender-Based Leghorn Breeding & Improvement Discussion

[Miami Leghorn]

I’ll have 3 8’x12’ chicken tractors for quarantine and grow outs.

Nice...

 

[ChicKat]

She hasn’t laid since I added 2 rescue hens from a live poultry market.

Very cool perch~ I think I'm going to try to copy that. I even have a branch/limb already picked out for the job.

Sometimes I think about that old wives tale of feeding pepper to chickens to increase laying. The theory is that although they cannot taste pepper, the capsicum increases thirst and since eggs are something like 80% water, their water intake increase results in more eggs.

Here is a study aimed more toward yolk color I think:
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC4093037/

 

[ChicKat]

borrowing these images From The Moonshiner's Leghorn's thread.:

The reasons I'm going down this route are:
1. Good examples of Leghorn Types
2. Time to start evaluating my 4 juvie boys.

The cool things about top image is that it's a real-life bird. The back line from the bottom of the comb's blade to the tip of the tail is a smooth curve. He doesn't have an overtly large comb. One nice looking bird!

the illustrations were found by Miami Leghorn, and they also show nice birds, along with pictures of females. Yay for the working girls.

Should Leghorn type discussion be in a lavender breeding thread, or am I going too far afield?

Lavender is so definite that the chicken is either obviously lavender - or doesn't show lavender,or maybe a stray feather as one cockerel had in my project when he only had one lav gene (must have been a strong gene right?).

Early on we had concerns about lavender fading to white-ish in continued generations and the problems lavender breeders had -- one was ragged feathers and feather damage and one was black stubs, mostly in the wings of males. So those sets of problems would be a way to improve lav if they were encountered.

So, the other avenues of improvement include: type, health, productivity, temperament, size -- all the normal chicken things of every day life.
Since I've got stable lav, I'm looking at combs and tail angles to improve type in my birds. Those would be the breeders I select from my juvies.

He was kind enough to jump up on his look-out stick so I could shoot a better side-on angle. With a critical eye I think his back could be longer (we were always breeding for longer backs in our cattle) -- and his comb could be better. He's good IMO -- and that may be attributable to the sources that I got my Isabels from. His ancestors are good stock.
Here are females:

Black and White has less distraction so it's easier to see the true shape. This hen has the fan-tail like the white leghorn in the illustration.

Even though a different angle, this chicken has the more tapered pointed tail like the other females in the above illustration.

fan tail

tapered tail

Comb. biggest critique the points are too narrow and a bit irregular.

 

[Jac Jac]

Here's my spring hatch. Everyone easily autosexed...lost one baby female on about day 2-3 of life. (think it may be something I did wrongly in connection with not-quite absorbed egg yolk, I think it hatched a day or more later than the others). Could have just been a weak chick and I'm blaming myself.

Now have remaining 6 females and 4 males.
View attachment 2134733View attachment 2134740
View attachment 2134737
The first hatch I got only 2 females and the second hatch was 5 females and 4 males. This is pretty much capacity for me right now. -- And as they grow, I will really be crowding them. Fortunately the two females from the first hatch (3-weeks older than the second hatch) integrated with complete nonchalance with their younger sisters. I keep boys and girls apart as juvies, because I've heard that the boys hog the feed.

Remember a few years back when we were concerned about a couple things with our lavs? One of them was the color fading to whitish in subsequent generations. I knew the genetics at project's end when I dispersed all my birds (2018)...so I guess this is the first generation that is definitely the results -- but the parent birds of these little ones came from lavenders I'm pretty sure and the only thing that was needed was an added barring gene in males to guarantee autosexing. So these chickens are 3rd generation lav x lav and I don't see any color fading. I remember wanting to get there in the most direct route possible.

OH -- and -- I'm going to write an eBook on the project. That was made possible by the marvelous and intrepid Kiki. To make it possible she went through the thread from making Lavender-patterned Isabel Duckwings (Barred) - Lavender Brown and extracted all the instructive posts and the remaining pictures. -- (some pictures get lost when BYC upgrades - so some of the illustrations were gone). What a lot of work. I admire Kiki SOOOO much - and have a huge debt of gratitude.

It's intended to be sort of a 'cook book' of how my project was conducted for anyone else who wants to go the route of making autosexing lavender creles.

Hi there. I'm looking forward to cooking with your eBook, once it's completed. I have a few lavender Orps. Their color has faded tremendously. Thanks for your input and congrats on the eBook. I'm already sure it's a winner.

 

[Jac Jac]

Very cool perch~ I think I'm going to try to copy that. I even have a branch/limb already picked out for the job.

Sometimes I think about that old wives tale of feeding pepper to chickens to increase laying. The theory is that although they cannot taste pepper, the capsicum increases thirst and since eggs are something like 80% water, their water intake increase results in more eggs.

Here is a study aimed more toward yolk color I think:
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC4093037/

The article was read with great enthusiasm and interest. Thanks for incorporating it in your thread; it leads me to consider creating a flock of pale egg laying hens. Thanks again. Will keep you apprised of my results.

 

[Jac Jac]

borrowing these images From The Moonshiner's Leghorn's thread.:
View attachment 2147121



View attachment 2147133

The reasons I'm going down this route are:
1. Good examples of Leghorn Types
2. Time to start evaluating my 4 juvie boys.

The cool things about top image is that it's a real-life bird. The back line from the bottom of the comb's blade to the tip of the tail is a smooth curve. He doesn't have an overtly large comb. One nice looking bird!

the illustrations were found by Miami Leghorn, and they also show nice birds, along with pictures of females. Yay for the working girls.

Should Leghorn type discussion be in a lavender breeding thread, or am I going too far afield?

Lavender is so definite that the chicken is either obviously lavender - or doesn't show lavender,or maybe a stray feather as one cockerel had in my project when he only had one lav gene (must have been a strong gene right?).

Early on we had concerns about lavender fading to white-ish in continued generations and the problems lavender breeders had -- one was ragged feathers and feather damage and one was black stubs, mostly in the wings of males. So those sets of problems would be a way to improve lav if they were encountered.

So, the other avenues of improvement include: type, health, productivity, temperament, size -- all the normal chicken things of every day life.
Since I've got stable lav, I'm looking at combs and tail angles to improve type in my birds. Those would be the breeders I select from my juvies.
View attachment 2147336
He was kind enough to jump up on his look-out stick so I could shoot a better side-on angle. With a critical eye I think his back could be longer (we were always breeding for longer backs in our cattle) -- and his comb could be better. He's good IMO -- and that may be attributable to the sources that I got my Isabels from. His ancestors are good stock.
Here are females:
View attachment 2147348
Black and White has less distraction so it's easier to see the true shape. This hen has the fan-tail like the white leghorn in the illustration.
View attachment 2147360
Even though a different angle, this chicken has the more tapered pointed tail like the other females in the above illustration.
View attachment 2147363
fan tail
View attachment 2147364
tapered tail
View attachment 2147372
Comb. biggest critique the points are too narrow and a bit irregular.

Pointed comb aside, he's still a handsome gentleman.

 

[ChicKat]

Jac Jac, Thanks for the kind words. Encouragement is always welcome!

looking forward to cooking with your eBook, once it's completed. I have a few lavender Orps. Their color has faded tremendously. Thanks for your input and congrats on the eBook. I'm already sure it's a winner.

You're really kind.

Could you iterate about how many generations the lav Orps have been lav? Orps were definitely one of the first, if not the very first breeds to get lavender from what I recall. In the case of these birds, lav can be 'refreshed' or darkened I'm thinking with infusion of an out cross to a Cream Legbar, or to a brown Leghorn then offspring from that pairing bred back to lavender. . There are Crele Orps I know, and they have the Legbar plumage pattern on their bodies. Orps were the first Lavender Creles that I had seen on the internet. I'm guessing yours are solid lavender, right?

it leads me to consider creating a flock of pale egg laying hens

I'll be an enabler and say 'go-for-it.'

Will keep you apprised of my results.

Yes, please do -- and you can also post some current or past pictures and point out the fading to help us see what happens. It's fascinating to see chicken pictures.

 

[Tbird84]

Well, up until a few weeks ago 2 of my Isabella hens were broody. Had been all spring. Finally pulled every egg out there and kicked them out. One occasionally still walks around clucking. With their help, approximately 35 ducklings and 20+ chicks hatched this year. Now they are finishing up molting and putting condition back on. It has hit 100F here already so breeder pen building has hit a stand still. I will try to do some coop juggling to see if I can get my two pens of Isabellas going. We are WAAYYY behind here.

 

[ChicKat]

It's always remarkable when a breed that is supposed to be non-broody hatches babies. So many things about chickens leave me in awe. Congrats on your successful hatches.

We are WAAYYY behind here.

Seems like par-for-the-course in 'these times'. So much of every-day life has come to a standstill IMO.

 

[HaikuHeritageFarm]

It's been an ok year over here, though the heat and humidity has held up our building plans as well. I've grown out a small flock of legbars and a flock of light brown leghorns from Bud Blankenship. I also have a gorgeous dark brown male from him. Rounding out the grow outs, I have three pullets and two cockerels from my original Isabella pair.

After much deliberation, I've culled my legbar cockerels for various faults and started hunting an opal legbar boyfriend for the 8 remaining girls. I think I've found him, and honestly... he's pretty gorgeous. Enough so that I will be breeding him to my Isabella leghorns and brown leghorns as well. He does not appear to have the feather quality issues I'm battling in my isabella leghorns, though that may just be from the low percentage of gold in the "Opals" (cream+lavender). The real test will be if his lavender grandchildren carry feather faults when bred to the browns, I think.

SO, this young man will have big shoes to fill.

He will have three groups of offspring for three different goals:

1) Lavender split Legbars for a purebred Lavender Legbar pen
2) Barred Lavender Leghorn crosses to breed back to Leghorns for Isabella and Barred Isabella Leghorns
3) Barred Brown Leghorn crosses (splits) to breed back to Leghorns for Crele Leghorns