Seriousbill- your Delawares are awesome!!! pics added

[seriousbill]

Krista, when the shoulder/neck markings start to come in, you should be able to tell fairly well. Also, you should see some comb development on the little males in another week or two. But, Cyn is right. Any males that are sired by my Beta roo will likely be late bloomers.

 

[McSpin]

Quote:
They are potentially all able to be feather sexed. It depends on whether a hatchery wants to do it. It's not difficult. Keep one line without the gene for short feathers. The chicks from this line are sold as straight run. This line can contain fewer birds, since only the roos are needed. The roos from this line are mated to the hens from line 2. Line 2 contains the x-linked gene for short feathers. The result are all able to be sexed. Once these lines are established, they can be easily kept going.

From what I read, vent sexers are becoming difficult to find and the cost to pay them is greater. Feather sexing can be done with little training and faster - less cost to the hatchery. I think it boils down to which is most advantageous to the hatchery. I don't know the answer, but I see no reason they can't easily do it.

If you only had three cockerels, then, statistically, the likelihood of a coincidence is quite reasonable. You'd need a larger selection of males than just three individuals in order to claim a pattern.

No, it's not 3 cockerels, it's 30 birds that were feather sexed reliably. What are the odds that all 30 birds matched correct feather sexing? Very, very small.

I've seen plenty of hatchery Delawares over the years; granted, some strains have been outcrossed some, but I've never seen nor heard of any strain that could be feather sexed.

That experience certainly counts for a lot. I have also read that it is only recently that vent sexing has become a dying profession. Maybe this is reason enough for hatchery to encourage more and more strains that are able to be feather sexed.​

 

[seriousbill]

Quote:
They are potentially all able to be feather sexed. It depends on whether a hatchery wants to do it. It's not difficult. Keep one line without the gene for short feathers. The chicks from this line are sold as straight run. This line can contain fewer birds, since only the roos are needed. The roos from this line are mated to the hens from line 2. Line 2 contains the x-linked gene for short feathers. The result are all able to be sexed. Once these lines are established, they can be easily kept going.

From what I read, vent sexers are becoming difficult to find and the cost to pay them is greater. Feather sexing can be done with little training and faster - less cost to the hatchery. I think it boils down to which is most advantageous to the hatchery. I don't know the answer, but I see no reason they can't easily do it.

If you only had three cockerels, then, statistically, the likelihood of a coincidence is quite reasonable. You'd need a larger selection of males than just three individuals in order to claim a pattern.

No, it's not 3 cockerels, it's 30 birds that were feather sexed reliably. What are the odds that all 30 birds matched correct feather sexing? Very, very small.

I've seen plenty of hatchery Delawares over the years; granted, some strains have been outcrossed some, but I've never seen nor heard of any strain that could be feather sexed.

That experience certainly counts for a lot. I have also read that it is only recently that vent sexing has become a dying profession. Maybe this is reason enough for hatchery to encourage more and more strains that are able to be feather sexed.​

Yes, I realize that they are potentially able to be feather sexed, because the K gene could theoretically function in Delawares as it does elsewhere, but what I'd question is that they have in fact done this:

Most strains (breeds) of chickens do not have these feather sexing characteristics and feathering of both sexes appear identical. http://msucares.com/poultry/management/poultry_sexing.html

I also realize that you mentioned 30 total birds. But let's say that fast-feathering is typical of the breed, which it is:

Though its economic dominance was short lived, the Delaware still makes an excellent dual-purpose bird. It has well-developed egg and meat qualities, and a calm and friendly disposition. The breed is noted for rapid growth and fast feathering of the chicks. http://www.albc-usa.org/cpl/delaware.html

So, if you can expect that the majority of birds you order will have this trait, then it's not surprising that your females were all fast feathered since that's what you'd expect. What would be unusual is that you had any slow-feathering birds at all. You did, and all three were male. Could this be a coincidence? Yes. I'm not saying it absolutely is, only that it could be, based on my knowledge of the breed.​

 

[speckledhen]

I agree with Janet. Delawares are not bred to be feather-sexed, though they probably could be. One time correctly sexing them by this method is probably coincidental, but the small sampling of 30 birds really isn't enough of a sampling to emphatically say that Delawares can be feather-sexed as a rule. Glad it worked for you that one time. The great thing is that Delawares usually dont keep you guessing very long anyway. And after raising a certain breed for years, you tend to get a sixth sense of who the boys and girls are, outside of the secondary sex characteristics,

 

[walkswithdog]

Well I've spent half the day staring at the five males I did get from Cyn.

I have one five pointed, blade combed male - he's also the largest AND the most poorly marked. He's also the hardest biter.

I have two with too many points, one has a small wave to the comb the others is straight, both have good coloring. ONE of them is that pullet surprise that Cyn had. He's also one of the nicer birds.

And I have two with small side sprigs, with good color, one is the BEST colored bird in the lot.

While they're really gregarious, they're ALL trying to remove my freckles which I'd like to keep. Boy are they active.

My pullets are from two sources, four from a local flock, and five from a hatchery. All are friendly.

If you had to sort through, those five divergent males, which do you pick? The one with the best comb was a favorite until I got to know him and his coloring is poor, more blotchy than barred in his tail and little barring on the neck.

I'm leaning toward the two with no sprigs and good color. I can work on better combs later.

Mostly my females suffer in color too little rather than blotchy or broken. Some have better yellow legs than others. I'm supposed to sort toward better yellow legs, right?

I don't have time for pics lol, company coming. Soon though.

 

[McSpin]

Quote:
The way you word this, it sounds as if this is fact. If so, how will you know if a hatchery decides to produce delawares that can be feather sexed? Is this public knowledge? I suppose the best way is to call every breeder and ask, then trust the answer. I'm not sure how one can be certain this hasn't been done.

One time correctly sexing them by this method is probably coincidental, but the small sampling of 30 birds really isn't enough of a sampling to emphatically say that Delawares can be feather-sexed as a rule.

I'm definitely not emphatically saying anything, except it seems a possibility that a hatchery developed such a line, but you seem to have ruled that out. In any instance, I've learned that at least most delawares are not able to be feather sexed. However, I haven't been convinced that positively no one has done it up to now.

The great thing is that Delawares usually dont keep you guessing very long anyway.

I surmised that would probably be the case. My other single, large-combed breeds have all been pretty easy to sex by around 3-4 weeks of age.​

 

[speckledhen]

Quote:
I know that Delawares are mouthy little things! They explore with their beaks more than any other breed I've had. Honestly, I think to really pick the best one, you should grow them out a few more weeks. I'd skip the one with the sprigs. One extra point on the comb to me is a lesser problem than the sprigs. The thing about this breed is that the color evolves to a certain degree and one you think may not be so great at first, may come into his own later on. Keep the most yellow legged ones, certainly, in your girls. Boy, it's hard to get all these traits perfected at the same time, isn't it?

 

[walkswithdog]

Quote:
I know that Delawares are mouthy little things! They explore with their beaks more than any other breed I've had. Honestly, I think to really pick the best one, you should grow them out a few more weeks. I'd skip the one with the sprigs. One extra point on the comb to me is a lesser problem than the sprigs. The thing about this breed is that the color evolves to a certain degree and one you think may not be so great at first, may come into his own later on. Keep the most yellow legged ones, certainly, in your girls. Boy, it's hard to get all these traits perfected at the same time, isn't it?

I'm going to keep em growing, except for the sprig brothers. The sprig brothers can move on. Which will leave me the three boys and we'll see.

Honestly I had no idea freckles were detachable - owie.

With beaks like that they should be voracious foragers look out mice and lizards.

I threw everything over five weeks into the main coop today. They're all in the brooder level. The Rocks are a tad overwhelmed but it works, there are so many they don't know who to pick on.

Next couple of days I'm going to sort cockeral sizzles, my BAmutts and sprigs and the two barred EE cockerals (one black, one blue) from you back into a separate pen. Most of them are spoken for.

The Barred EE girls are dolls, and so is Ponder's sister

Lots to do and more on the way... busy busy.

 

[speckledhen]

Quote:
The way you word this, it sounds as if this is fact. If so, how will you know if a hatchery decides to produce delawares that can be feather sexed? Is this public knowledge? I suppose the best way is to call every breeder and ask, then trust the answer. I'm not sure how one can be certain this hasn't been done.

One time correctly sexing them by this method is probably coincidental, but the small sampling of 30 birds really isn't enough of a sampling to emphatically say that Delawares can be feather-sexed as a rule.

I'm definitely not emphatically saying anything, except it seems a possibility that a hatchery developed such a line, but you seem to have ruled that out. In any instance, I've learned that at least most delawares are not able to be feather sexed. However, I haven't been convinced that positively no one has done it up to now.

The great thing is that Delawares usually dont keep you guessing very long anyway.

I surmised that would probably be the case. My other single, large-combed breeds have all been pretty easy to sex by around 3-4 weeks of age.​

I have no idea if a hatchery has developed a feather sexing method for Delawares. Seems they wouldnt take the time or make the effort unless the bird is extremely common and there was a percentage in it for them. Why don't you just call and ask how they sex their line of Delawares? Now, I know that some hatcheries have crossed in Columbian Rock and "diluted" their Dels so could be their CRs are feather sexed and that trait carried on, but I really don't know. I have only Barred Rocks and they are not feather sexed.
I do not have any hatchery Delawares myself. I did have four and hated them, so they were culled (sold).​

 

[seriousbill]

Quote:
Yes, and if you do, let us know one way or the other. This is interesting. An interesting possibility...