My Liege Fighters at 20 weeks

[Digby57]

I have 10 that are 4 weeks old right now and another 13 that are about 4 days old. When I was at the stage you are now with the original batch from Greenfire I had no idea either. I don’t want to get your hopes up, but I bet that’s a cockerel. If I lose you can have a rooster of mine for free but I’m not shipping. Let me know at 8 weeks, you’ll know by then!

 

[sasg]

I have 10 that are 4 weeks old right now and another 13 that are about 4 days old. When I was at the stage you are now with the original batch from Greenfire I had no idea either. I don’t want to get your hopes up, but I bet that’s a cockerel. If I lose you can have a rooster of mine for free but I’m not shipping. Let me know at 8 weeks, you’ll know by then!

Where are you located? You actually breed them too? Have a website? It was so hard to find any info on them besides the GreenFire site. I had a gift certificate for them from Christmas so decided to use it to get atleasr one chick I would never have gotten on my own. Then I got some 55 Flowery & Rees Cream Legbars with him too from them.

 

[Digby57]

I live in north-central Florida. I am breeding from that first batch to start a clan breeding system, but I don't have a website or anything. I'm really just doing it to make sure I keep this flock going long term. They're not great layers (at all) but they are good in the free-range department as far as predator resistance goes. That's why I chose them.

I see now that you are also in Florida. I would sell some locally if I get a surplus of good chickens, but I don't really want to sell culls. Better that they are just culled in my mind. I'm planning to stew what doesn't make the cut for the ongoing breeding program, and just keep the hens for laying even if they're not good enough to breed. I'll send you a PM if I think I have some good extras. I won't know for a few months. I am setting another batch of approx 30 eggs Monday and then a fourth and final batch on June 3rd. That's all I'm doing for this year (4 batches total) until I can see how I did on my first match-ups. Then I'm going to spiral these offspring next spring and hopefully I have 9 good layers, 3 for each of the 3 roosters I select. That should allow me to keep that same flock size going forward every year as long as there is no single large disaster.

And besides, I'm still betting you have a cockerel there. I fooled myself at about 6 weeks trying to go by their combs. The hackle feather I see in all 3 of your pictures and the general body shape of those first two pics makes me think you've got a cockerel. Even though he is crouched down in those pics I can imagine what he would look like if he stood up and stretched and he sure looks like a male to me. I guess its possible you have a colorful hen, but none of mine have been like that - they are all either splash or solid gray (blue) or pretty much solid black.

If I'm wrong you can have a rooster of mine - seriously. I'm going to have a ton of extras.

 

[Digby57]

Oh, and I hear what you're saying about breed info. I looked high and low. I did find a few things after some serious digging. This is probably the single best piece of information I found online: http://www.aviculture-europe.nl/nummers/12E06A12.pdf

Also this, which you"ll see the link to in that PDF above, but you have to use google translator: https://luiksevechter.weebly.com/index.html

 

[varidgerunner]

You can see the oriental game influence in these birds.

 

[Digby57]

My understanding is that you also see it in their demenour, but I’ve never even seen a Malay in person. They have a good attitude in my experience. I separated them at about 7 months and had 5 roosters and 6 hens all together with no problems at that point. But I wouldn’t dare put the roosters back together now. Even on the few weeks off from breeding between switching up roosters the hens bump chests and get sqwauky for 15 minutes when I reintroduce all the hens together. But it’s pretty tame really.

 

[varidgerunner]

It's the brow.

Malay is one of those weird things. It's a place more than a breed. Dutch sailors brought Malays to Europe. Undoubtedly some large strain of Asil, like those found in Southern India. But the name stuck. Doubtful that they have remained all that pure down through the ages, the hatchery Malay seem to have a little something missing.

My Thai fowl get along for longer and the hens get along better than my Paki Asils. Seems the bigger the bird the slower they turn. I can leave thai brothers together for close to a year, but don't separate them for one day or trouble is on.

Good luck with your birds. There is a good bit of information on another site about them. Might not be correct etiquette to post it here, if you would like a link I could PM it to you.

 

[LyndaP]

I also have Greenfire Farms Leige Fighters I love them. My rooster "Thor" is about 30 inches tall and such a sweet guy. I also have 2 hens. They both became broody so I let them hatch some out...9 so far and 3 to go. A Happy Spring!

 

[LyndaP]

My splash hen and rooster were both yellow as chicks. The remainder were black or dark gray and the blacks all became red partridge. The grays turned out gray birchen or lemon hackled birchen with a lot of green in the black.

I'm using diggm's picture from another thread to show you what I mean.

The chick I had that looked like the one on the left (above) turned out to be the one in my post above that I said was largest at 10 weeks. This one (below). I would make a small wager that the gray chick above turns out to be a cockerel. The yellow one I wouldn't make a guess. All the chicks I had that had any kind of marking above their eye all turned out to be male. Its a total guess, but I would bet a carton of eggs (not hatching eggs).

The yellow chick on the right will turn out splash if its like mine.

Oh man, I just hatched out a dozen chicks from my LF and they all have markings above the eyes...hope I don't have 12 roos! ha

 

[Digby57]

A couple of my hens (one in particular) is broody lately also, but I’ve got a breeding plan so it’s been fun reaching under her to nab her eggs, lol. If you have any pics of Thor and his flock I’d love to see them. I got mine 8/1/17, when did you receive yours?