Marans Thread - breed discussion & pictures are welcome!

[desertmarcy]

Where's all the regulars on this thread? Anybody to answer my eye color question?

Question for you all: looking at my held back group of 17 black copper pullets: about 1/3 are in lay and the rest will not be too far behind. I am seeing very few with bay eye color. A lot of dark brown eyes. The male and all the hens I used for breeding had nice bright bay-orange eyes. Can someone explain eye color genetics to me? How is it I'm not getting all bay eyes? I am assuming brown is dominant? What will happen if I breed a dark-eyed pullet to a bay-eyed cockerel or vice versa? Will that give me all brown-eyed? Thanks.

 

[Lotsapaints]

Hi all, it's been weeks since I posted. We were out of town for almost 3 weeks---got back a week ago and I still have so much to do to feel half way caught up. Pink, I had to look at my own post to remember what the heck I posted before that you are asking about! Now I remember---the blue copper cockerels. #2 is actually my favorite except his eyes are dark. I like his tail better than #1. I'll get some more pics when I have time.

I have been evaluating my Marans after I got back, taking notes, weighing the birds--trying to figure out which ones I want to pair up to do some test matings. Thinking I'll hatch a few this fall to put me farther along in the project. By spring I should have a better idea of where I'm heading. Question for you all: looking at my held back group of 17 black copper pullets: about 1/3 are in lay and the rest will not be too far behind. I am seeing very few with bay eye color. A lot of dark brown eyes. The male and all the hens I used for breeding had nice bright bay-orange eyes. Can someone explain eye color genetics to me? How is it I'm not getting all bay eyes? I am assuming brown is dominant? What will happen if I breed a dark-eyed pullet to a bay-eyed cockerel or vice versa? Will that give me all brown-eyed? Thanks.

I do not know much about eye color genetics if you crossed bay eyes to bay eyes and have brown eyed ones maybe recessive? I can tell you more later as my project Birchens have some brown eyed ones I kept next year I'll see what happens....I test to New Hampshire for the yellow leg thing they have bay eyes and I know they don't carry a brown eye gene so I'll let you know I'll test hatch a few next month...

 

[heath_elisha]

I am just loving how soft the feathers are on my little ones..... they feel like silk.

 

[pinkchick]

Hi All!

WOW! Super slow thread lately......it never takes very little time to catch up on this thread, but today it was fast like lightening fast. Geesh! Where's everybody at? Hope everyone is doing great!

Elisha~ They sure are growning up fast aren't they? I also love how silky they feel. I was just thinking the same thing last night as I finally caught all the little Birchens up and took them away from their mother, she has raised them for 3 months, I think that has been long enough. Little stinkers everyone of them, but they sure are soft.

Marcy~ Eye color is something that is not as explored as other things genetics related. Many things eye color on chickens and bird cannot be explained. I hope others that know about eye color genetics comes by and shares their wisdom with us.
I read that some darkness can be caused by melanizers and some darkness can be caused by an illness called Leukosis, (hope I spelled it correctly).
Question.....Are any of your hens over melanized? Show very little copper?
I have bred a dark eyed female to a male with correct eye color and have received good results in offspring eye color, with only a small percentage having a dark eye. I once tested a dark eyed male over a female with correct eyes and got a larger percentage of dark eyed offspring.
I usually cull dark eyed birds from the flock, but if they have something too good to toss out, I will test them to see what I get.
I currently and still have one dark eyed female that I use because she is a nice representation of a Marans in all other aspects. I have been breeding her for 4 years and she is my only original pure Davis bird that I have left. She will not be leaving any time soon.....she makes some very nice babies, she is the mother to my Lil' Bill. I have now been crossing her back to Lil' Bill for what now..almost a year and a half or slightly longer and have raised several of their offspring and they have had the correct eye color that they get from Lil" Bill.

 

[pinkchick]

Vicki~
Found a couple more photos of my young Black Copper male. Crossing my fingers for copper....even just one copper feather and I would be happy.
He's a little beefcake. I really like him....he just gets sweeter and friendlier everyday, hope he stays that way.

 

[medawinks]

I am a total newbie. I do have a beautiful BCM however, purchased from a reputable breeder as a 2 month old pullet. She laid her first egg yesterday. Wowza was she ever noisy about it!! She is generally very quiet and sweet. Her egg is beautiful to us though!!! Kids were so excited!!!

I have a couple of questions I am hoping you pros can fill me in on....

Will she always be that noisy when she lays an egg?? My neighbors won't like that at all :-(

And... Will the color on her egg even up or will it stay speckled? I like it both ways, just wondering

Thanks in advance!!!

 

[desertmarcy]

Marcy~ Eye color is something that is not as explored as other things genetics related. Many things eye color on chickens and bird cannot be explained. I hope others that know about eye color genetics comes by and shares their wisdom with us.
I read that some darkness can be caused by melanizers and some darkness can be caused by an illness called Leukosis, (hope I spelled it correctly).
Question.....Are any of your hens over melanized? Show very little copper?
I have bred a dark eyed female to a male with correct eye color and have received good results in offspring eye color, with only a small percentage having a dark eye. I once tested a dark eyed male over a female with correct eyes and got a larger percentage of dark eyed offspring.

I usually cull dark eyed birds from the flock, but if they have something too good to toss out, I will test them to see what I get.
I currently and still have one dark eyed female that I use because she is a nice representation of a Marans in all other aspects. I have been breeding her for 4 years and she is my only original pure Davis bird that I have left. She will not be leaving any time soon.....she makes some very nice babies, she is the mother to my Lil' Bill. I have now been crossing her back to Lil' Bill for what now..almost a year and a half or slightly longer and have raised several of their offspring and they have had the correct eye color that they get from Lil" Bill.

Hi PInk, well as we have discussed so much, one must pick their battles with these Marans, and my first battle was to get the color back in the pullets. My founding stock were overmelanized, only one hen with a very slight amount of copper, so all the ones I kept have fair to good amounts of copper hackle feathers. All the cockerels I kept have good eye color, so I guess I will just do some testing matings and see what happens. It takes so much time to know since their eye color changes late in development. I still have 4 of the Black Copper cockerels. I butchered the founding male and the last 3 of the founding hens on Thursday. These youngsters look better than the father and the mothers and those older hens were on their third round of being broody this summer---so sick of that and with the cost of feed being so high, I can't afford freeloaders.

It's been pretty hot here the last 4 or 5 days: 95-95 degrees, no relief from the sun, ugh. Hard to get anything done outside. I've got to move some sand into my condo pens--the sand pile is quite a ways away from the pen, so one wheelbarrow at a time. Then I will move a few black copper and blue copper pullets into individual pens to see which ones are laying the darker eggs. That will be my next deciding factor on which pullets out of the 17 to keep! I'm thinking based on earlier discussions from Vicki and others that I'd be best off at this stage to mate the best blue copper pullets to a black copper cockerel instead of a blue copper cockerel. I still have all 3 blue copper cockerels--sorry haven't taken new pics yet--but the younger two still have dark eyes. The older one has good eye color but I'm not as keen on his tail. With so many pullets to work with, I could do one blue to blue mating just to see what happens. Feed cost and space to raise them are my biggest concerns.

 

[BroosterSpringsteen]

Is this Splash Maran roo rumpless? I can't feel a tail bone. Is this common?

 

[gilavina]

Vicki~
Found a couple more photos of my young Black Copper male. Crossing my fingers for copper....even just one copper feather and I would be happy.
He's a little beefcake. I really like him....he just gets sweeter and friendlier everyday, hope he stays that way.

Hey Lady.... I've been going out of mind with work, trying to prep and cull for winter and the poultry show. I'm so tired I can't keep track of days lately, let alone keep up here. I'm hoping now that our last meeting before the show is done and I can get catalogs out, that I'll be able to get it a bit of a break. I hope.

You know what's funny? When I looked at these photos I was wondering who took some pics of one of my pullets. He looks soooo much like some of my pullets its not even funny. Hope he gives you some copper lady!

 

[15littlem]

Is this Splash Maran roo rumpless? I can't feel a tail bone. Is this common?

I have never seen a rumpless Marans before. I do know that it can be a lethal gene, so he is definitely not a breeder.(although I might be mistaken, it might only be when rumpless birds are bred over and over when they become lethal) He does look neat though.