Russian Orloffs

[ashandvine]

Having looked at Julio's chick I feel better about my suspected cross. The cock that sired this chick (I hope) was very red and had little spangling so its my hope that is the reason for this very red/yellow down. On a very sour note this last year has been terrible for us and our Orloffs. We have lost about half of what we had, including two chicks this week. Its been different reasons each time but still smarts. Three out of five chicks going

and I have a broody! I put her on some eggs of other breeds since we lost the cock here and I know her eggs were going to be crosses or duds. Nice to see the brooding in at least one female here.

 

[desertmarcy]

Here are photos of the first Orloff I hatched this year. She was hatched January 14. She is out of my two best original hens (from Rare Feathers Farm) mated back to a son. She is way ahead of any of my other Orloffs because I had those 2 hens in with my "green" eggers: Orloff/Ameraucana crosses from last year, but it turned out one of those was laying an Orloff-colored egg (light tan) so my plan to keep them together was not going to work. It took me forever to figure out which of the 8 green layers was not laying green, then I figured I'd more the Orloffs out to another pen, where they promptly quit laying for a while. So there was about a 1-1/2 month gap between her and when I started hatching chicks again. I am really pleased with her color but I think she is small. But then again, she is only 4 months old and I keep comparing her to the big Black Copper Marans in the pen she was raised with. AND, she is already doing the spread wing thing that they do when ready to accept a male!

 

[Mr MKK FARMS]

Here are photos of the first Orloff I hatched this year. She was hatched January 14. She is out of my two best original hens (from Rare Feathers Farm) mated back to a son. She is way ahead of any of my other Orloffs because I had those 2 hens in with my "green" eggers: Orloff/Ameraucana crosses from last year, but it turned out one of those was laying an Orloff-colored egg (light tan) so my plan to keep them together was not going to work. It took me forever to figure out which of the 8 green layers was not laying green, then I figured I'd more the Orloffs out to another pen, where they promptly quit laying for a while. So there was about a 1-1/2 month gap between her and when I started hatching chicks again. I am really pleased with her color but I think she is small. But then again, she is only 4 months old and I keep comparing her to the big Black Copper Marans in the pen she was raised with. AND, she is already doing the spread wing thing that they do when ready to accept a male!

Nice looking Bird!

 

[NCSprout]

Nice spangling. Great job!

Hopefully she will mature to the size and type you are trying for.

 

[ashandvine]

Yes, nice even spangling on her body. Legs, feet and muffs all look good. What do you think she weighs?

 

[NCSprout]

Okay Orloff fans, I have believed we have needed an organization for the breed for awhile. The club started by Mr. Flannery seems to have fizzled, so i figured why not give it a go. Since I couldn't get editing access to the original Russian Orloff Pres. Society site, or the url, we have to more or less start from scratch. I have begun constructing the site on weebly and if it works out I can register the site. It can be found at usorloffs.weebly.com. Please check it out and give me feedback. If any of you have anything to contribute please let me know. Thanks and take care.
Ivy

 

[desertmarcy]

Okay Orloff fans, I have believed we have needed an organization for the breed for awhile. The club started by Mr. Flannery seems to have fizzled, so i figured why not give it a go. Since I couldn't get editing access to the original Russian Orloff Pres. Society site, or the url, we have to more or less start from scratch. I have begun constructing the site on weebly and if it works out I can register the site. It can be found at usorloffs.weebly.com. Please check it out and give me feedback. If any of you have anything to contribute please let me know. Thanks and take care.
Ivy

Wow, you are so right we need a club! I hope we can reach a consensus on breed standard, that is the biggest thing. It is a little frustrating to me to be breeding without that, I feel a little in the dark

Will check out the site. There is another guy here in Tucson, he is a poultry judge, who is also breeding them and is an Orloff fan. I will call him and see what he is up to and maybe he can also help.

 

[NCSprout]

I've got copies of the German standard, working on the Russian (I had a copy but can't find it at the moment) And need to copy the bantam standard. Ultimately, whatever we use has to mesh with the bantam standard since they are already accepted as bantams. I have a lot of contact info for people, but there is no real organization to anything. Hopefully, this will change.

 

[desertmarcy]

I've got copies of the German standard, working on the Russian (I had a copy but can't find it at the moment) And need to copy the bantam standard. Ultimately, whatever we use has to mesh with the bantam standard since they are already accepted as bantams. I have a lot of contact info for people, but there is no real organization to anything. Hopefully, this will change.

OK, I just got off the phone with Gene Helton. He lives near me and bought a couple of my Orloffs last year and has some from another line, but is getting frustrated because eggs are not hatching well, so now he has a batch under a broody. Well he sounded like maybe he would get rid of these birds because he wasn't getting anything out of them, so I offered to stick some of his eggs in my incubator for him (I think he has an incubator problem but I don't, so we will see!). I didn't want him to get out of Orloffs!

So I told him about the proposal to start a club and work to get the large fowl Orloffs in the SOP. This is his take on it (mind you he is a poultry judge and has been in poultry for many, many years). He said whoever starts the club needs to stick with it and not try to run the whole show. He said a lot of people just give up after a couple of years or they try to single hand decisions. Like Bob Blosl is always saying, how many will still be doing this in 10 years? The other point is, a lot of the birds we have today don't look anything like or match the old standards. So you might decide the Russian standard, or the German standard, is what we want, but if the birds here today are no where near that Standard, it would be a mighty task if not impossible to make them match it. The easiest thing would be to just use the Bantam standard that is already in place and accepted and apply it to the large fowl. What was the Orloff standard in 1910 (that was the last year they were in the SOP as I recall but I could be wrong)?

Yes there needs to be some organization and someone (Looks like you have nominated yourself

) needs to take the reins and go with it. There are other breed clubs that have been really active---the Ameraucana, the Marans---and pushed and got their breeds and color varieties in the SOP and Marans especially still working at it to get more colors accepted. So in my view, there needs to be a big group of people who are showing and want to get this done. As the breed gets more exposure, more people will realize what a wonderful breed they are. I am trying to do my part down here in S. Arizona. I take at least 2 to every show I enter even though I know they can't win anything. I want people to see them and know what they are. I don't have a lot of time to do much more than that right now.

 

[kahlua]

How does it work with showing LF orloffs, since they are not a recognized breed? Do they still give out awards/placings?

I just showed two of my chickens (not Orloffs) over the weekend, it was my first time. I would love to show my Orloffs in the future - but right now my girls are not in show condition.Maybe over the summer I'll take the rooster out so the girls can grow their feathers back and be ready to show in October.