Let's talk Golden Cuckoo Marans!

[morbius18]

My golden cuckoo olive eggers are starting to resemble my Golden Cuckoo marans. I was breeding clean faced ones so they will look like a marans, other than the pea combs. They are almost 8 weeks old.

 

[Chooks man]

they are good looking young bird. nice golden cuckoo colour pattern .

 

[morbius18]

I managed to get a better picture of the F1 rooster I kept. This is the sibling to the ones that rainbowchick got. He'll be 6 months in a week or so.

 

[rainbowchick]

I'm going to check fertility in my girls' eggs when I make breakfast tomorrow! Can't wait till they're clear so I can put your boys with them... My son is so excited, he wants to get going on incubating!!

 

[morbius18]

I'm going to check fertility in my girls' eggs when I make breakfast tomorrow! Can't wait till they're clear so I can put your boys with them... My son is so excited, he wants to get going on incubating!!

One question that I was wondering. When you breed the single barred males, you will end up with black copper looking pullets. Are these true black coppers, or watered down versions? I wonder if they will show mossiness as a result of them being impure.

If you start with the GCM rooster and a black copper hen, you can create Golden cuckoos eventually as well as Black coppers eventually. At least according to the chicken calculator.

 

[cree57i]

One question that I was wondering. When you breed the single barred males, you will end up with black copper looking pullets. Are these true black coppers, or watered down versions? I wonder if they will show mossiness as a result of them being impure.

If you start with the GCM rooster and a black copper hen, you can create Golden cuckoos eventually as well as Black coppers eventually. At least according to the chicken calculator.

I got some eggs that were GCM X BCM. In the hatch, 1 was solid black, 2 looked like pure cuckoo, 4 look golden cuckoo, but the cockerel has too much copper color and the pullets don't have enough gold. The egg color is 5-6 now. I have the hens that were the parent stock of this hatch. They do not have good egg color. I am thinking to breed the rooster back to the hens and the pullets to a new roo who is GCM. I have 2 cockerels and 3 pullets that are 3 months old now from GCM parents. I would love some advice on what direction to take this to get back to a better golden and keep the good egg color. I will post pictures as soon as the mud and rain are less.

 

[morbius18]

I got some eggs that were GCM X BCM. In the hatch, 1 was solid black, 2 looked like pure cuckoo, 4 look golden cuckoo, but the cockerel has too much copper color and the pullets don't have enough gold. The egg color is 5-6 now. I have the hens that were the parent stock of this hatch. They do not have good egg color. I am thinking to breed the rooster back to the hens and the pullets to a new roo who is GCM. I have 2 cockerels and 3 pullets that are 3 months old now from GCM parents. I would love some advice on what direction to take this to get back to a better golden and keep the good egg color. I will post pictures as soon as the mud and rain are less.

They ones that I've been posting are GCM x BCM, with the rooster being the GCM. They all should have been barred if the rooster was double barred. When I breed this guy:

Im going to end up with 25% males single barred (like the pictured rooster), 25% males double barred (correct), 25% golden cuckoo hens and 25% black copper colored hens.

If the black one wasnt a pullet, you probably didnt have pure crosses. Also, the GCM carries the golden gene as well as the BCM, there shouldn't be any plain cuckoos. Mine took a while to mature golden though.

Part of the reason for me to cross the BCM was to improve egg color. Are you saying that your BCM hens have bad color or the GCM hens?

 

[cree57i]

They ones that I've been posting are GCM x BCM, with the rooster being the GCM. They all should have been barred if the rooster was double barred. When I breed this guy:



Im going to end up with 25% males single barred (like the pictured rooster), 25% males double barred (correct), 25% golden cuckoo hens and 25% black copper colored hens.

If the black one wasnt a pullet, you probably didnt have pure crosses. Also, the GCM carries the golden gene as well as the BCM, there shouldn't be any plain cuckoos. Mine took a while to mature golden though.

Part of the reason for me to cross the BCM was to improve egg color. Are you saying that your BCM hens have bad color or the GCM hens?

The GCM hens do not have good egg color, the cross does have good egg color. The black one was a pullet. I got rid of the ones that looked like cuckoo marans cockerels, so I probably acted too quickly there.

 

[morbius18]

The GCM hens do not have good egg color, the cross does have good egg color. The black one was a pullet. I got rid of the ones that looked like cuckoo marans cockerels, so I probably acted too quickly there. 

So the male was a single barred one. I only had a GCM rooster and no hens, so I had to 'make' my own. Mine took quite a while to gold up. Some like 2-3 months.

This was them at 6 weeks:

And now:

 

[rainbowchick]

One question that I was wondering. When you breed the single barred males, you will end up with black copper looking pullets. Are these true black coppers, or watered down versions? I wonder if they will show mossiness as a result of them being impure.

If you start with the GCM rooster and a black copper hen, you can create Golden cuckoos eventually as well as Black coppers eventually. At least according to the chicken calculator.

From what I can tell on the chicken calculator, half of the BCM females will be "pure" BCM and the others will be slightly "off".