Marans Thread - breed discussion & pictures are welcome!

[BarnGoddess01]

Will start off with not real big posts as my internet lately has been dropping off.

For the people that can not or will not cull this will be a waste of time reading this for you. Will start with acquiring fowl or using existing fowl. We are talking about inbreeding or close line breeding as either will work in this breeding program. You can not start with fowl with DQ's or major faults.

If you are buying fowl to start with at least buy from someone that is at least linebreeding. If you use the scatter bred fowl to start you will just end up taking longer to get the uniformity we are looking for.

To start off single mate every female you are going to start with and band all fowl with wing and leg bands as you never know when they will lose a band.

The first year chicks you will breed the young male and female back together. Cull any off spring with a DQ or major fault. You will breed the very best brother and sister back together on right on down the line year after year.

There is more so you can ask questions and make comments as we go.

Don, you know I love you - well, maybe you don't know that but you should!!!

I am NOT afraid to cull BUT if I culled for absolutely every fault I'd have NO birds at all - even buying from reputable breeders. Perhaps if I had space for several hundred birds I might start getting close to a trio of decent stuff?

I was at a big Canadian show in September. Winning trio of Buff Orpingtons sold for $1,300. Unheard of at a Canadian show but this was someone new to chickens and the birds were from a "reputable" long-term breeder of Orpingtons - a breed MUCH more established than Marans. The buyer wanted to start off right. He took that same trio to another show in November and was DQ'd for a sprig on one of those hens.

 

[kowgurl62]

Hi math, sorry,haven't been online for a while, no, the guy i was talking about was on the right, about halfway down past the sale birds

 

[culler]

If we use the scatter bred way of setting up our breeding pens we will never have uniformity of type or anything uniform.

I will just deal with Inbreeding at present . With inbreeding contrary to what most say you can keep breeding your fowl for many generations if you are willing to cull real heavy.

If you run into a problem where you need to bring in some new blood, try and get the new fowl from someone that has fowl bred similiar to what you have in your pens, either that or carry more than one breeding line if you have the facilitys. I would keep at least tow lines going at the same time and this way you would never have to go outside of your yard. When you introduce this new blood into your line use both the young male and female over your old line. After about five year you will have bred the new blood back out and can go back to brother and sister matings.

Some of the oldtimer I new always had a five year plan line going to be able to ad the blood back to the original line. There will be a time when new blood will be needed, I know of some that have bred brother and sister for at least 25 years and never had to ad new blood.

There are a lot of questions to be asked here so now would be a good time.

 

[culler]

Don, you know I love you - well, maybe you don't know that but you should!!!

I am NOT afraid to cull BUT if I culled for absolutely every fault I'd have NO birds at all - even buying from reputable breeders. Perhaps if I had space for several hundred birds I might start getting close to a trio of decent stuff?

I was at a big Canadian show in September. Winning trio of Buff Orpingtons sold for $1,300. Unheard of at a Canadian show but this was someone new to chickens and the birds were from a "reputable" long-term breeder of Orpingtons - a breed MUCH more established than Marans. The buyer wanted to start off right. He took that same trio to another show in November and was DQ'd for a sprig on one of those hens.

Hi Barb, No I do not want to say cull for all the faults, only the major faults that will reproduce themselves. I will not breed a chicken normally with a DQ but have done that out of necessity with another breed, Just one time .

I am sure we run run into eack other eventually at a show and can give some info that I can't post on here.

 

[culler]

Don? Sister to Brother?

You have specifically told me in the past to NEVER breed sister to brother, UNLESS necessary for reasons such as loss of stock and so on.

Unconfuse me please?

Kim, the only main difference with brother and sister if someone is ready to do the culling is you can get to a point much quicker. Most new breeders will not be successful with the brother- sister because they will not follow the guidelines. There are very few on here that are ready to do what has to be done unless it is someone with an animal background.

I believe from the Comb problem you have had that you are ready to take a big jump in your breeding program.

 

[culler]

I use the line breeding method, and agree with everything you've said so far, just wonder what your view on spiral line breeding is? Do you ever use the spiral method when line breeding?

Vicki, Yes I have almost entirely used the spiral linebreeding method. The only draw back is mostly that you really should have several breeding pens going. That is mainly the reason I always kept so many adult fowl here. I always had several spares for any combination I wanted to make. I do not believe you can really get the uniformity that we can with the brother-sister, this might be something to look into with the price of everything now days.

 

[Debbi]

Well, for sure, inbreeding will get you in two directions really quickly. It will bring out the best qualities quicker, and it will also bring out all the faults a whole bunch quicker too! That should make the culling process faster.

 

[Cadeau]

Vicki - the only other boy I have is the Bryant roo!

Don - for someone starting out with a variety of birds, this year being my F1, is it still possible to make adequate progress, as long as I line breed thereafter?

Does this then suggest we should cull down to our best two pairs and start from there?

 

[Cadeau]

So - what is spiral breeding?

 

[gilavina]

Vicki, Yes I have almost entirely used the spiral linebreeding method. The only draw back is mostly that you really should have several breeding pens going. That is mainly the reason I always kept so many adult fowl here. I always had several spares for any combination I wanted to make. I do not believe you can really get the uniformity that we can with the brother-sister, this might be something to look into with the price of everything now days.

I've done both the spiral and single line type breeding and agree that with single or brother-sister it requires less space and less numbers of birds. In my BCMs and birchens I'm running several pens from different breeders and keeping them isolated within their own line, but this way I will have stock on hand for when I do need to bring in fresh blood to a line when necessary. Either way, I'm gonna be culling down further to just my top tier and should help to move things along quicker I think. The birchens are gonna take a bit longer no matter, since they need the most work out of all the colors I have here