Marans Thread for Posting Pics of Your Eggs, Chicks and Chickens

[havi]

Quote:
Now that ain't right, ya'll gotta be nice to me too. Hmm..dress funny? You should have seen me earlier when I was wearing my long sleeve Eskimo Joe's shirt with my Dr. Seuss pj bottoms and mud boots. Now that WAS a funny sight!

 

[ninjapoodles]

Quote:
Now that ain't right, ya'll gotta be nice to me too. Hmm..dress funny? You should have seen me earlier when I was wearing my long sleeve Eskimo Joe's shirt with my Dr. Seuss pj bottoms and mud boots. Now that WAS a funny sight!

Have you been rifling through my closet? Quit copying my style!

ETA: As to your earlier question, it was probably just too broad for a succint answer. Will you be dead-set on older chicks, or can you consider day-olds or hatching eggs? That would certainly broaden your choices.

I will say that, if your primary concern is egg color, you could do a lot worse than getting live chicks from Jesse Bryant. These birds have numerous challenges as far as breed type goes, but I have not seen any darker eggs out there.

If you can go with hatching eggs, there are tons of folks on this thread who will be happy to help you out, for very little cost, especially relative to the prices being commanded most places right now. Lots of us are in our first year of breeding Marans and very willing to share as we learn.

 

[havi]

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Haha I guess so. I love PJs! I wish I could wear them everwhere. Today just gives me an excuse to wear them all day long though. Its cold and rainy and Ive been cleaning house all day. And to think I was a 'city girl' a couple of years ago. I wouldnt step out of the house without my makeup on and nice matching clothes. Now I wait up, pull my hair back and pull on my mud boots and go out and feed the chickens. Hubbys learned to live with it.



ETA: Oops.


Im not dead set on older chicks, its just that at this time that was what I was looking for. But I think I am going to wait until next spring to buy some. Im not looking to breed my birds or for showing them. I just want the darkest egg color possible. I dont care if the bird is colored wrong or has the wrong feathering. As long as they are healthy I dont mind. As of right now I dont have a bator, but hopefully I will get one later on in the year. Right now Ive been going by whenever one of my hens goes broody. But Ive noticed with BCM eggs lots of people are on waiting lists. And waiting on a hen to go broody doesnt fit well with waiting list.

 

[Knight Hawk Ranch]

The blues I have are about 7 weeks old in the photo.

I am not exactly sure. I just know they are a little bit bigger than the buffs in the pen with them and I hatched those out on March 6.

 

[ninjapoodles]

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Too bad you're so far away--I've got a couple hens I'd let you have, maybe three. One has weird coloring, and the others have black eyes. And I'm about to put a couple roosters in the freezer!

Later this summer, though, if I still have my culled hens, I'll put them with my Ameraucana rooster and hope for Olive Eggers.

 

[lostsoulhelpmejebus]

Since I am a newbie, please be gentle, o.k.? What is the difference in the coloring of Blue Copper chicks and just Blue chicks? I hatched out some BBS Marans and I have 2 that look very much like the posted pixs of the Blue Copper, mine have clean legs though. Any one care to enlighten me, please?

 

[Krys109uk]

Copper blues & copper blacks are supposed to have copper in the hackles & have one or two different colour genes. In reality sometimes the copper blues/blacks/splashes are a bit lacking in hackle colour ........the why starts to get a bit more complicated here so suffice to say because of genes. It is not a particularly big deal & can be solved by selective breeding. The same with leg feathering. In Northern France Marans are the general farmyard birds, rather as the light Sussex in Britain & Rhodie or Rocks in US. The emphasis is put on eggs & carcass & very many of these birds are sparse in leg feather.
When marans were introduced into Britain, in the 1930s I think, the chap who brought them over liked the dark cuckoo colour & didn't like the leg feathering so he bred the leg feathering out & like this they were admitted into the British Poultry Standards. (Well imagine feather legged bird scratching around in the rain & mud.....wellies needed maybe?

)

Now we have French type & British type, both in US plus various breeders trying to take advantage of the dark egg & outcrossing to improve production (& losing egg colour). These & probably other factors will have contributed to the variety of different Marans in US.

Some of my Marans have sparse leg feathering......it is just something which needs to be factored in when choosing ones breeders.
It takes years to get birds the way one wants them.

 

[shmooborp]

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OMG ! u have one of those too ?! ...


i just finnished a hatch of bev eggs ! blue and black copper

look great to me !

 

[lickskillet]

Just cause.... I wanted to update some pics of my almost 2mth old BC Marans.

The pics of the roo are of the one and only roo to hatch. The hen pics are all of the same hen as the other three girls are more skittish.

Sorry for the wetness, It's been raining here ALL day! Yuck!

 

[1mommahen]

I just had my first BCM hatch and one more is pipped!

Can you tell sex at hatch on a BCM??? It has a yellow belly and yellow tipped wings!