Naked Neck/Turken Thread

[jwells84]

by any chance will a hen hide her chicks somewhere other than the nest she was sitting in? just noticed my broody hen out an about and went to check her nest i found one cold egg and a 2 broken shells,lots of ants im afriad something got her eggs. they were due to hatch this week.

 

[draye]

@Sierra987

Check out this thread:
https://www.backyardchickens.com/t/874920/arkansas-blue-egg-layers/480#post_15284172

They claim these are the sane thing that is available at Whiting.

 

[DesertChic]

That has been my constant problem for a couple decades lol... so many ideas, can't do them all. Been fun and learned a lot though.

I have a similar project going on with Freedom Ranger bred with naked neck and scaleless. The FR roosters ended up being too massive to breed the large fowl hens.. they could only breed some of the larger FR hens naturally. I ended up making the initial cross by NN/scaleless carrier roosters over the FR hens. Currently have a cross cockerel with the FR hens, hope to get some chicks ASAP because it's clear the FR don't have much heat tolerance.. and it is going to hit 110+ next month...

Are your LR cockerels turning out massive(the FR roos were not that much different from a buff colored cornish x)? Might need to do AI to get fertile eggs out of the standard/LF hens. Maybe combine genetics into the same line? Naked neck LR type birds laying colored and speckled eggs? Cross LR onto the NN and production green eggers, then cross them together?

Love to see pictures of the production green eggers. I have single comb colored egger NN descended from an egg trade many years ago. Hopefully one cockerel used in crosses with the FR was a carrier for this trait.. keeping some of his daughters to POL...

I am so glad you discussed your experience with Freedom Rangers. I was just looking at this breed as a possible cross with my NNs and wondered if it would work given the rapid growth rates. You answered every question running through my mind! Thanks! I think I'll monitor your project as long as you provide updates and stick with my original plans for now.

Okay....so what am I thinking now?

 

[jwells84]

by any chance will a hen hide her chicks somewhere other than the nest she was sitting in? just noticed my broody hen out an about and went to check her nest i found one cold egg and a 2 broken shells,lots of ants im afriad something got her eggs. they were due to hatch this week.

i hunted andhunted. she went back to her nest. i found her just nearly so far back i couldnt reach she had 5 eggs under her still. i think im going to gather them an her and find somewhere safer bc more than likely if something cracked the eggs and took whole eggs itll be back for more. ill candle them to make sure theyre still viable to

 

[k5crew]

Jwells84 - Hope the eggs are still viable! Keep us posted.

 

[jwells84]

I got the hen and eggs moved. Ended up finding 6 eggs. She had started with 12. I only saw movement in one but she had just gotten off the nest an the eggs were cool. Got everyone in a safe place dog house inside an enclosed dog kennel. Eggs should be due to hatch end of the week. So we'll see. I didn't find any sign of fight just other eggs missing an only shells of two. Hen seems unharmed

 

[DesertChic]

I got the hen and eggs moved. Ended up finding 6 eggs. She had started with 12. I only saw movement in one but she had just gotten off the nest an the eggs were cool. Got everyone in a safe place dog house inside an enclosed dog kennel. Eggs should be due to hatch end of the week. So we'll see. I didn't find any sign of fight just other eggs missing an only shells of two. Hen seems unharmed

I'm glad you have at least a little good news in all of this. I'll keep my fingers crossed that the remaining eggs hatch into beautiful, healthy chicks.

 

[jwells84]

Thanks I hope so too.well let y'all know if anyone hatches

 

[Sierra987]

I'd say there might be hope.. those are nice sized however in those pictures they have very reasonable proportions.. if it were me, I would go about setting the eggs asap just in case.

I would think this cross would give a fantastic meatier NN with good proportions and looks.

The freedom ranger cockerels were far bulkier and wider.. don't have pictures when they were young and all cockerels have been long culled however I do have one freedom crossed with black ranger cockerel right now, will try to take a picture of him.

Very intrigued by the coloration of the first cockerel!

Me too - what do you think it is? There seemed to be quite a genetic variety in the LR chicks. Most were buff of some sort but there were several solid white ones too. I have one pullet that is quite short legged and dumpy - very odd but I don't remember anything odd about her when she was younger. The combs on some of the pullets are odd. Most have yellow legs but a few are white and this rooster almost had willow legs when he was young although they're kind of yellow now. Most of the roosters and a couple of pullets were decently large when they were butchered at about 8 weeks with carcass weights of 3.5 - 4lbs which is what I like. But there were a couple roosters that were smaller - hen sized instead of rooster sized.
Here are a few more pics. If this is too off topic for this thread and bothers anyone, just let me know and I can move it to private message.

 

[Sierra987]

@Sierra987

Check out this thread:
https://www.backyardchickens.com/t/874920/arkansas-blue-egg-layers/480#post_15284172

They claim these are the sane thing that is available at Whiting.

Thanks draye. I actually found that thread and the original one and had posted on it about the Whiting hens that I have and also posted a pic of the hen in my avatar. She's similar to the Arkansas Blues except that she has a beard. Trudy is probably my favorite hen - very personable and likes to be hand fed cherry tomatoes so she can eat them delicately instead of scarfing them down like the other hens do! LOL! And even though she's my littlest LF hen she is the best young rooster trainer - you should have seen those big LR roos run when she chased them!