Norwegian Jaerhon

[1muttsfan]

I woke up to two Norwegian Eggs this morning e  They have been free ranging during the day, and with all the snow we've had in the last couple of days, I had a feeling they may be hidden in the snow. This morning I woke up to two medium white eggs in their coop. What a nice suprise

C

Yay! Congratulations.

I have chicks ordered from sandhill, while this is the first time I have ordered jaers, other birds I have ordered from them in the past were hearty and healthy.

 

[aurissavannahs]

discover egg How exciting those first eggs are.

I am excited because that means that Ruddy is probably fertile too. Now I have to bring my incubator from the barn loft to the house and get it setup for a fertility hatch. Sadly not this weekend as it is raining a flood and I don't want to get the bator soaking wet. If I can't move it by tomorrow I will have to wait until next weekend as it is always after dark when I get home from work.

I know you will be setting eggs soon so looking forward to chick pictures.

 

[Roosterfry]

Wow! i have been gone awhile! the new system doesn't work for my blackberry curv... anyways! all my jaers are doing well. i found my first egg yesterday it was a decent medium size off white egg, i thought that was a pretty good size for a first egg! i found it when i was hooking up a light in my coop for early egg production. I'll be loading the incubator here in a week or so. I already have several orders for chicks whoop whoop! everyone I've talked to about them seem interested in them. other than being a lil small for a meat bird they are in my opinion an all around good hardy breed!

 

[discoveregg]

Hi Roosterfry

Congrats on your first egg! With your lighting enabled, you should be getting lots of eggs in no time. Haven't installed lighting yet in my Jaers coop, but still getting eggs - mine are meium too, but not worried, I'm sure they will increase in size as production continues. Remember how big the eggs were that we hatched them from...

1muttsfan: Looking forward to seeing more Flames posted on this thread. Have always heard good things about Sandhill, and have been pouring over their catalogue. Would love to order some Flames as well, but I'm up to my eyeballs in a variety of chicks right now so I will have to live vicariously through you and others...lol

Connie

 

[Roosterfry]

thank you!

 

[iahills]

Hi--fascinating to read this thread and learn about this breed. I'm very curious about the genetics...does anyone know the main color genes involved?
Obviously the Barring gene...is the white from the Silver gene? And the chick down color--I've read about Punnett working with the wildtype "chipmunk" down color (e+) and the barring gene to produce auto-sexing chickens. It seems clear to me from pics that this is not the chick down color on Jaers. Anyone know what the chick down color is for the dark Jaer variety? Is it e^b? Also, any theories about what causes the Flame Jaerhon coloration?

 

[iahills]

okay, did some investigation and have a couple of theories to propose:

Proposal 1: The Norwegian Jaerhon carries the ig (cream gene). This is described as an autosomal recessive gene, but I think the better term might be incomplete dominance. This gene, and not sex linked Silver, is the main cause of the white color in the breed.

Check out this site on the cream legbar:
http://www.cream-legbar.co.uk/gallery.html

The photos show examples of cream legbars carrying one copy of the cream gene versus two. Might this be part of the puzzle of the dark versus light varieties in NJ?

Proposal 2: the Flame Jaerhons are simply missing the cream gene altogether. Which should happen from time to time if the NJ breed is heterozygous for the ig gene.

 

[1muttsfan]

Hi Iahills, and welcome to BYC

 

[Roosterfry]

I'm very excited! i hatched my first jaerhon chicks for the season, and my hens are laying up a storm! still very people friendly. sometimes i just pick up a hen and hold her for a couple seconds just to see how she acts. very calm birds. My first hatch was 3 chicks! and there is a very clear distinction between the pullets and cockerals, i have two pullets and one new cockeral. but more chicks are on the way! I'm getting about 60 eggs a week from my ten jaer hens, very firm yolks haven't seen not a one blood spot yet. seems to have good interior and exterior egg quality.

 

[1muttsfan]

Yay that is great!