Longterm Crossbreeding Project of Brahma, Polish, Silkie, Ayam Cemani, Araucana and Malay

[Slothinc]

Following your project, it sounds very interesting. So are you hoping to have feathered legs but not feathered feet? I didn’t even realize those were two separate genes.

 

[Skyeknight]

Update time! I have bought a new Silkie pullet that does fit my preferences. She should be large fowl instead of a bantam and she has a beard and more obvious partridge colour.

The pullets have been introduced to the Ayam Cemani rooster at the end of June. Sadly they are afraid of him and the 2 other hens. The Ayam Cemani also has the other 2 hens as clear favorites. The pullets have gotten more bold lately. They do not lay eggs yet. Normally I do not use artificial lights during winter, but I will this time to hopefully get some chicks from them before 2026.

The pullets are almost 6 months old now.

 

[Skyeknight]

So the other Silkie I already had did go broody. And I decided to let her hatch some eggs and do a "fibro" test run.

These 6 chicks were the result. These are all from the Ayam Cemani rooster, 2 of which from the Silkie and the other 4 fibro mutts. The middle one with the lighter beak was the only confirmed rooster chick as of now. The black one on the right was a half Silkie but died after a week, it had 4 toes on all feet. The other half Silkie somehow was ablue chick and has 5 toes on only 1 foot.

Here are some more pictures to enjoy!

In this third picture the half Silkie is all the way on the right, with the rooster chick right next to (presumably) her.

My phone camera quality really sucks. The one is the middle is the half Silkie, she has gold leakage on her chest. I also still weigh her weekly, just like the purebred pullets.

Now the interesting result of the "fibro" test is actually the rooster chick. Sadly he died at 6 weeks old. His mother is the white hen in the previous post, she is splash barred and white shanked. This means that this rooster inherited a single allele for barring and dermal inhibitor. Both of which inhibit fibro. The barring is confirmed by the headspot in the first picture of this post and the slight barring visible in the tail and wing feathers. He is not fibro in contrast to his sisters as he still had light skin, which was visible when he stretched his neck. As he aged his comb and legs really darkened up. I did not expect that to this amount at all! I assume he would have returned to red or mulberry comb colour with age?

 

[Skyeknight]

I'd be interested in seeing the weights you got at various ages.

That is quite a lot of weights to type out and not fun to look at, so might do a graph in the future. In the meantime if people are interested in a specific weight at a specific age, feel free to send a message.

Following your project, it sounds very interesting. So are you hoping to have feathered legs but not feathered feet? I didn’t even realize those were two separate genes.

Thank you! Yeah I am hoping for something like that, but it's more a preference than a breeding goal. I will also have to see how the Brahma and Silkie pullet will do this winter with a probable muddy run.

Amer can explain the genetics behind it way better than I ever could, so I will refer you to this post instead.

 

[Skyeknight]

So winter is slowly coming and I still prefer to get chicks from at least 2 of the 3 pullets. Even though the pullets are more accepted into the run, they are however not truly accepted into the flock of my rooster. The blue and white hen peck the pullets if they get too close and the Ayam Cemani rooster also pecks them. He sometimes dances for them, but mostly leaves them alone. I don't find it a problem if he has favourites, as long as he does actually takes care of the pullets too.

So I am considering the following situations:
1. Put the 2 older hen temporary into a different coop. This way the rest can stay in the current bigger run and coop. Hopefully the Ayam Cemani rooster will accept the pullets then, as only the older Silkie would be left of the adult birds.
2. Put the Ayam Cemani with the 3 pullets into a temporary coop. This way if he wants any social interaction he is forced to be nice to the pullets.
3. Change nothing and just wait.


I don't know if it would be more advantageous to keep the Ayam Cemani rooster into his current territory or in a new evironment with the pullets. What would you do?

 

[NatJ]

So winter is slowly coming and I still prefer to get chicks from at least 2 of the 3 pullets. Even though the pullets are more accepted into the run, they are however not truly accepted into the flock of my rooster. The blue and white hen peck the pullets if they get too close and the Ayam Cemani rooster also pecks them. He sometimes dances for them, but mostly leaves them alone. I don't find it a problem if he has favourites, as long as he does actually takes care of the pullets too.

So I am considering the following situations:
1. Put the 2 older hen temporary into a different coop. This way the rest can stay in the current bigger run and coop. Hopefully the Ayam Cemani rooster will accept the pullets then, as only the older Silkie would be left of the adult birds.
2. Put the Ayam Cemani with the 3 pullets into a temporary coop. This way if he wants any social interaction he is forced to be nice to the pullets.
3. Change nothing and just wait.


I don't know if it would be more advantageous to keep the Ayam Cemani rooster into his current territory or in a new evironment with the pullets. What would you do?

I think any of those ideas has a chance of working, but I don't know which would be most likely to work fastest.

Just to check what might be obvious, have the pullets started laying eggs yet?

 

[Skyeknight]

They have not. I have found 1 shell less eggs a while back on the coop floor, but nothing since. Can't confirm if that was from them or someone else. At most I have 3 eggs on a day, which all belong to my 3 older chickens.

At the moment I think the not laying is due to being in a stressful environment. But don't really know for sure why they haven't started.

 

[NatJ]

They have not. I have found 1 shell less eggs a while back on the coop floor, but nothing since. Can't confirm if that was from them or someone else. At most I have 3 eggs on a day, which all belong to my 3 older chickens.

At the moment I think the not laying is due to being in a stressful environment. But don't really know for sure why they haven't started.

If the pullets are not laying yet, that might be why the rooster is ignoring them.

Stress could be why they are not laying yet, but the season of the year might also be involved. The days are getting shorter, which makes some pullets mature more slowly, so they start laying at a later age. Some other pullets just wait for the lengthening days of spring.

I think you could just keep waiting without changing anything, or you could try separating the older hens to reduce stress for the pullets, or you could provide supplemental light to encourage the pullets to lay sooner, or you could do some combination.

Regarding light, chickens seem sensitive to the actual day length, but also to changes in day length. So they may stop laying in fall when the days are getting shorter, but start in early spring with short days because those spring days have gotten longer than the shorter-yet days of winter.

[Edit: I just checked previous posts, and I see you were already thinking of adding light to help the pullets lay sooner.]