Looking for my best rooster

lukkyseven

Songster
Sep 13, 2018
132
146
123
Maryland
A quick back story. I fell in love with the history of Speckled Sussex as a dual purpose breed for the homesteader. A good laying breed that's hardy, good at foraging and friendly to boot. I always like to keep a rooster and do a sustainable flock. Well these girls go broody as well so I can keep the age of the flock down. Well this means you always end up with some extra roosters and this breed gets big enough to eat them when they're still young.

What I found is that the standards are just not there and finding a breeder of them was not easy or I was just looking in the wrong places. So I went with about 30 chickens. My main goal is egg production (body type and size), table fare (again size quickly), friendliness (basically I wont tolerate a mean rooster) and in conjunction with that the SOP. This last one I would like to prioritize more, but without good stock it's going to be hard

This is why I'm here. These are what I believe are my 4 best roosters. I don't know that there are two that are good enough, but if possible I'd like to keep 2. Ultimately if the genetics are just so terrible then I will just use one and potentially look for better stock down the road.

I forgot to save my general walking around photos, so I will try to get them when it stops raining. Pictures to follow in the comments
 
All roosters are around 3 1/2 to 4 months old.

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This guy (rooster 1) has my favorite color out of all of them. It's much darker than most of the others and the speckling is not as predominant which I think is good because most of my hens are very white dominant. The comb appears to be good, but head shape (this will be a recurring theme) appears to be a weak point.
 

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Rooster 2 is not as deep in color as rooster 1, but the speckling is also where I'd like it to be. The pure white feathers in the wings makes him a cull in my opinion for showing, but he's probably my 2nd largest roo which would make him great for production.
 
I suppose first question is are you looking for the best ones APA show wise or that would fit your purposes?

I'd love to shoot for APA show, but as you'll see I don't think I have the birds for it. I recognize that I need to work on breeding that if at all possible with what I have. I think sadly as far as APA goes, I need to luck into some good stock and introduce it into mine. As far as I can tell, the APA standards for this bird would ultimately make them ideal for what I want
 
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As you can start to see. The color gets lighter and away from the standard even further. The white starts to really come through as well. The wing feathers aren't completely white, but there's still a lot of it. Head shape again looks to be poor (unless I'm just way off). Only positive for this guy is he's very friendly.
 
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Twisted comb, but maybe slightly better overall head shape? Color is too bright and possibly too much white in the wings. Apparently my email didn't send me all of the photos of rooster #5, but I don't think he's the strongest contender anyway
 

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