Marans Thread - breed discussion & pictures are welcome!

[coq au vin]

why do some of you have your names in orange?

 

[geebs]

Where??? It's your monitor... Mine is in green... LOL

 

[kathyinmo]

Quote:
Mine is pink.

 

[coq au vin]

Quote:
lolz!

You have the most beautiful heritage breed chickens...and then those Marans...

 

[coq au vin]

Well its all orange to me. Maybe a medium shade of pumpkin.

 

[geebs]

Coq au vin... You do know I am yankin your chain right? Oh and to answer your question.... I have no idea.

Kathinmo: That is a male.... The legs give it away

 

[kathyinmo]

You all know I don't plan to show or breed to standard .... I just want dark eggs. This boy came from a very dark egg. Maybe I will make a new Marans .... dark egg laying RUMPLESS Marans!

 

[cpartist]

Quote:
Debbi...I hear ya'

I had hatches (2 different sources, one that had combined 2 lines). I can't remember how many chicks I ended up with...maybe 20?
I think some of most of these were from a nice line crossed with one that had a lot of faults. I had no white feathers, but one mossy, one with short toes, one with
side sprigs, one with fused toes, one roo with squirrel tail and too much red breast, and a roo with roach back.

After culling for all this, and egg color, I ended up with one roo with non feathered legs, and one BCM and an unrelated Blue Copper. Both girls have lightly feathered legs and less
than optimal coppering. GREAT egg color. The roo has a nice comb, very nice hackle coppering, and size, but too high of a tail set. When combined, they are are producing some nice offspring, with mostly feathered legs and various degrees of coppering. I've not seen any of the DQ (SOP or Marans) issues pop up. Some pullets need better eye and hackle color, but the 2 roo's are looking
good for color and 45 degree tails. I will be working on better coloring, but by eliminating and understanding which traits are easier to work with, I think I'll eventually have some close to standards which have good egg color.

I'm not hatching hundreds or even dozens of birds to do this...just keeping the best of the best...culling to the standard, and perfecting through compensation breeding.

I think this can be done on a smaller scale, just by closely examining and carefully breeding, even if you only end up with a few that make the "cut" of breeding out DQ's and extreme faults.

I'm working with 1 roo and two hens...I think this can be done, keeping a good eye and a sharp hatchet (actually the cull hens are easy to rehome as layers and the boys are tender and
nice sized meaties).

Just MHO on how this can be done on a smaller scale, and I'll be happy to post pics of the culls and keepers, if anyone is interested.

 

[Debbi]

Oh Lawdy! Geebs is in orange, kathinmo is in red! Different paid status'?? Kathy, are you sure someone in the flock didn't pluck him rumpless??

 

[geebs]

cpartist... HECK YA post the best and the rest... Love ta see em!!!