Minorca thread!

[rodriguezpoultry]

Bottle necking is an old term ,when you work with very small numbers ,and breed from a limited small number of breeders,followed by hatching only a small group of chicks;and you do this for a few years,every bird gets to be very closely related to each other quickly.It is the opposite to a wide gene pool. Outcrossing and inbreeding a both breeder tools,both can be good or bad depending on the case. Outcrossing mixes up and thing like uniformity can disappear,but vigor can sometimes be helped.Inbreeding can bring out hidden genes allowing them to surface.Inbreeding does not always result in problems,for with using strict selection and culling,followed by good numbers of offspring to pick from the stock can remain strong and healthy and only mildly related.Like any tools,you have to know when and why to use them.

dan, it has been a long time since I have had Minorcas. I remember the gene pool being very sparse. Is there any way that someone who knows the lineage of their birds would be able to get into contact with another breeder that has the same line and create more vigor by using that person's birds? Both are from the same lines, so both would have relatively the same type and faults. I realize that may not be possible with the small numbers of Minorcas in the area.

 

[danhonour]

Not sure from your post if you had or still have Minorcas,but if you do some research into where the bloodlines came from,many times they go back to a common breeder.As bloodlines become fewer,it happens more often that the same bloodlines are being passed around .It helps with vigor to a degree,but often many of the same faults and lack of size can be noted. Currently some imported blood would be of help ,for we have lost the male lines with the coarseness,and huge earlobes,most of the US lines are female lines.The big lobes are gone,and getting very small here.Many of todays flocks are not established breeder flocks of a bloodline.By keeping a male line of decent,unbroken (could be done with females instead),you can maintain a bloodline of your own with its blood predominant.If you need new blood mix it through the opposite sex(with the unbroken male line-use a new female) Keep only her daughters and breed back to your males,then with the f2 or f3 (if satisfactory)they can be mixed into gene pool or made a seperate family within your bloodline. This way uniformity and breeding power are maintained and improvements continued(prepotency).Constantly mixing birds from everywhere with out letting(the blood settle) or dominate, can lead to undoing years of progress and go backwards,sometimes it brings out faults long forgotten.

 

[redandalusian]

Not sure from your post if you had or  still have Minorcas,but if you do some research into where the bloodlines came from,many times they go back to a common breeder.As bloodlines become fewer,it happens more often that the same bloodlines are being passed around .It helps with vigor to a degree,but often many of the same faults and lack of size can be noted. Currently some imported blood would be of help ,for we have lost the male lines with the coarseness,and huge earlobes,most of the US lines are female lines.The big lobes are gone,and getting very small here.Many of todays flocks are not established breeder flocks of a bloodline.By keeping a male line of decent,unbroken (could be done with females instead),you can maintain a bloodline of your own with its blood predominant.If you need new blood mix it through the opposite sex(with the unbroken male line-use a new female) Keep only her daughters and breed back to your males,then with the f2 or f3 (if satisfactory)they can be mixed into gene pool or made a seperate family within your bloodline. This way uniformity and breeding power are maintained and improvements continued(prepotency).Constantly mixing birds from everywhere with out letting(the blood settle) or dominate, can lead to undoing years of progress and go backwards,sometimes it brings out faults long forgotten. 

I have seen some pictures of UK Minorcas and they have huge earlobes. It would be interesting to cross one of those to an American Minorca to increase earlobe size.

 

[danhonour]

I agree in Minorcas ,the earlobes are nice in shape and very large in the UK,Germany,and Holland. It is the expense and paperwork after finding a contact source,to import some good stock. Once a flock is established and aclimated here,it could improve earlobe size and boost vigor,then it would be a matter of refining combs or selecting against narrow whip tails.It would be a worthwhile pursuit for someone with patience,time and money.Most important would be the willingness to share stock to help the Minorca flocks left in the US.

 

[ChickensAreSweet]

In general are Minorca males aggressive?

 

[rodriguezpoultry]

Mine never were. More scared of me than I was of them.

 

[ChickensAreSweet]

Mine never were. More scared of me than I was of them.

Thanks for the response! I think I will leave him in the chick order then.

I hope he will be a good roo. I'm getting him some Minorca girls too. I have had one Minorca hen before and loved her.

 

[WyandotteTX]

Thought I would check in with everyone here to say hello and give a bit of an update on my Minorcas. I have one great looking RC Black pullet this year.....she is bigger than her mother and much more vigorous and has the most gorgeous full tail. I also have a very nice SC Black pullet that I will be using this season that is just behind the RC. Hatched two nice cockerels, SC, that I will be using as well. The SC definetely lay a much larger egg than the RC which is something I am not real happy about and will be something I work on in the future.
I feel like I have really nice size in the birds I have though. Dan if you have any suggestions on feeding and nutrition when it comes to helping birds fill out please chime in, I am interested in if there is anything specific that helps them fill out or feather quality etc.
Lastly, just my two cents about the English Minorcas in that I am not really a fan of them. Too large of an earlobe and too small of a body and frame for me, they look bantam-like in stature. Guess I have been ingrained with my own perception too much.

Oh yes, although I already had a digital copy of George Northrups book of Minorcas, Amazon is now printing old texts such as these via license and I just bought a copy and will be here on Wednesday. In my chicken nerd world I was pretty excited about it.
John

I apologize for not having any pics of them either. I have not spent alot of time around them lately, so they were very skittsh around me. The one really nice RC pullet is plum crazy haha and wouldnt sit still for a milli second.

 

[redandalusian]

does anyone know how to help minorca pullets combs flop just a little more.

 

[danhonour]

Feed some meat-dog food,and a warm coop will make combs grow. From a breeding standpoint small combs and upright combs are a good defect for you will raise a high percentage of good combed males from such females.Male breeders. If you want huge lopped combed females use a thin lopped over combed males,pullet breeder males. I personally do not like double mating and try to avoid huge combed hens and lopped combed males You will have a very high percent of males with poor combs.