Pheonix Thread

[flowerfaeiry]

flowerfairy,

I know you've said in the past that your birds are from the CY Hyde line, and I was wondering if you breed them towards non molting traits or more towards the modern Phoenix standard?

My silvers are basically a male breeding line, with heavy emphasis on tails. I have blue silvers that I really enjoy, they’re coming along slowly. The gold birds are more standard bred, no nm in the line, and I truly don’t give them the attention they deserve. I’m really just learning as I go.

 

[Michael99]

My silvers are basically a male breeding line, with heavy emphasis on tails. I have blue silvers that I really enjoy, they’re coming along slowly. The gold birds are more standard bred, no nm in the line, and I truly don’t give them the attention they deserve. I’m really just learning as I go.

Interesting, I'm just trying to find other people who are breeding birds for nm traits. It seems like they are few and far between unfortunately (or maybe there isn't many or any on BYC, not sure).

And I feel you on that, I'm just hoping I can learn some more

 

[flowerfaeiry]

Interesting, I'm just trying to find other people who are breeding birds for nm traits. It seems like they are few and far between unfortunately (or maybe there isn't many or any on BYC, not sure).

And I feel you on that, I'm just hoping I can learn some more

David Rogers says it best! I’ll attach his writing on feather quality. I see some of what he talks about, the very fine, soft feathers, the whispy eyebrows, ribbon like tail feathers. I see a lot of these traits in my silver birds. I really believe the very soft feathered hens pass the genes for these features.

https://onagadori.wordpress.com/2010/04/01/non-molting-fowl-and-feather-texture-by-david-rogers/

I got some crazy eyebrows going on in these birds lol

 

[Lauravonsmurf]

Actually my long term goal with the Pheonix is to breed for nm too.

We are incubating another single Longtail egg so here’s hoping all goes well this time. I am hoping if we can get a live chick it carries nm and is healthy, but you know how it is with dna dice roll, incubating mail order egg, and all that jazz.

 

[Michael99]

David Rogers says it best! I’ll attach his writing on feather quality. I see some of what he talks about, the very fine, soft feathers, the whispy eyebrows, ribbon like tail feathers. I see a lot of these traits in my silver birds. I really believe the very soft feathered hens pass the genes for these features.

https://onagadori.wordpress.com/2010/04/01/non-molting-fowl-and-feather-texture-by-david-rogers/
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I got some crazy eyebrows going on in these birds lol

I've read that article before (I've looked all over the internet for info haha), but it was definitely insightful.

And I'm loving his eyebrows, I've noticed a lot of the CY Hyde birds have them!

And I have another question about the CY Hyde line - I was reading that some of them have reduced vigor due to the high levels of inbreeding needed to keep the line pure for the past 80 or so years, do you find that to be the case? I've thought in the long-term (if my silver gingers actually carry nm traits) that I could make a line by crossing my silver gingers with the CY Hyde line to breed back to my line for the sake of genetic diversity (only once traits like size, color, etc. were set in the hybrid line first).

Plus, I think it might be interesting to see a hybrid line as much of the nm traits seem to be recessive (according to my research) and only seen heterozygously in most American Phoenix, that if these 2 lines were crossed one could get some homozygous birds that could contain more recessive nm genes than previously seen before (at least in America)!

 

[Michael99]

Actually my long term goal with the Pheonix is to breed for nm too.

We are incubating another single Longtail egg so here’s hoping all goes well this time. I am hoping if we can get a live chick it carries nm and is healthy, but you know how it is with dna dice roll, incubating mail order egg, and all that jazz.

I'm excited to hear that! I feel like most people are turned off because of all the effort it requires

And where are you getting the longtail egg from? Is it the one from ebay that's like $30 per egg?

 

[Lauravonsmurf]

Yes it is eBay and mail order eggs but with the lock down and concerns over some serious diseases here in CA in poultry and people it is what it is right now... the seller is however only one county over. So fingers crossed... we have improved things enough to get a viable chick.

We ordered the start of our Pheonix flock from Cackle... have what appears to be 2 silver, 2 white and either gold or red chick. I am not expecting nm from them or birds that meet SOP... but we shall see, you never know...

 

[Michael99]

I've been kind of curious about those eggs but I thought it may have been a scam (considering how expensive they were, it just seems like they're out to make money and not in the interest of propagating the breed). If you manage to hatch one out, post pics! I think it'd be interesting to see how it matures.

And I used to have some Phoenix from cackle hatchery. About 10 years ago I ordered 15 assorted bantam Phoenix from them and got mostly white and silver duckwing, with one BBR. They were good birds and showed well at the fair, but didn't get tails past about 2 feet (but that's pretty good for a bantam), so they were definitely decent birds!

 

[Lauravonsmurf]

Well the egg is long (I really couldn’t tell which end was which) and tinted, came in pretty good shape, not to dirty, I sprayed with 3% H2O2... It was well packaged like before. I suck at candling... so we will see on day 10 how it looks. I am not messing with the egg till day 10.

If we get a chick I will post and try give updates so everyone can see how it progresses.

”Longtails” what I understand.... roll of the dice what you get.

First they are a mix of breeds so exactly what genetics will be expressed is a big question... will it have pea or single comb or some other comb... they can have a lot of stuff in them when you just think about it... thus skin and leg color will probably vary, ear lobe color too.

In looking at peoples experiments that they have shared in LT breeding, people have added genetic hackle lines, Sumatra, Pheonix, Yokohama, various game fowl, Leghorn, various Jungle Fowl Species and more... so what I expect is wait and see... best would be a chick that matures into a bird like we see in the Japanese Onagadori, if the breeder has that goal. I would be happy with just nm genetics and no major defects all else I can work with or on towards a Pheonix with nm genes.

However the Japanese breed has characteristics different than the German Pheonix... but the German Pheonix might have some Korean roots?

Of interest to me is that in 1904 Japan invaded Korea and shortly there after all of Korea’s Longtail chickens vanish (along with their version of the bonsai tree and many other cultural treasures) but an article here and there seem to indicate... the Chickens went to Japan and then at least some were resold from Japan to the West... I have read the description of the Korean birds and they sound a lot like Pheonix characteristics... leg color, earlobes etc... so interesting to me to try and get some nm genes into my birds...

 

[Michael99]

View attachment 2159519

Well the egg is long (I really couldn’t tell which end was which) and tinted, came in pretty good shape, not to dirty, I sprayed with 3% H2O2... It was well packaged like before. I suck at candling... so we will see on day 10 how it looks. I am not messing with the egg till day 10.

If we get a chick I will post and try give updates so everyone can see how it progresses.

”Longtails” what I understand.... roll of the dice what you get.

First they are a mix of breeds so exactly what genetics will be expressed is a big question... will it have pea or single comb or some other comb... they can have a lot of stuff in them when you just think about it... thus skin and leg color will probably vary, ear lobe color too.

In looking at peoples experiments that they have shared in LT breeding, people have added genetic hackle lines, Sumatra, Pheonix, Yokohama, various game fowl, Leghorn, various Jungle Fowl Species and more... so what I expect is wait and see... best would be a chick that matures into a bird like we see in the Japanese Onagadori, if the breeder has that goal. I would be happy with just nm genetics and no major defects all else I can work with or on towards a Pheonix with nm genes.

However the Japanese breed has characteristics different than the German Pheonix... but the German Pheonix might have some Korean roots?

Of interest to me is that in 1904 Japan invaded Korea and shortly there after all of Korea’s Longtail chickens vanish (along with their version of the bonsai tree and many other cultural treasures) but an article here and there seem to indicate... the Chickens went to Japan and then at least some were resold from Japan to the West... I have read the description of the Korean birds and they sound a lot like Pheonix characteristics... leg color, earlobes etc... so interesting to me to try and get some nm genes into my birds...

I'm excited, keep us posted!

And if the seller is truthful, then the chick should hatch out towards extreme feathering Phoenix, but only time will tell. But quality always varies with longtails, as you pointed out. But I don't think you'd be at risk of getting something too varied, Toni-Marie Astin was really the only one who made longtailed Phoenix in different colors, with different comb, skin, and leg color types, so you should be good on that front.

I would pay attention to leg coloring though, all of David's birds (at least from what I can tell from the research I've done) have yellow legs if they are white, and willow/green legs if they are any other color. If you get one with blue legs (as most Phoenix have) chances are they are crossed with standard Phoenix or were never from the Roger's line to begin with. But I have my fingers crossed!