Sex Linked Olive Eggers?

[Crazy for Chickens!]

It sounds like Langshans used to, (are supposed to) lay dark brown eggs, but you can't hardly find any that do any ore, even in breeders.

 

[Brahma Chicken5000]

It sounds like Langshans used to, (are supposed to) lay dark brown eggs, but you can't hardly find any that do any ore, even in breeders.

That’s too bad. Show quality Langshans might lay the dark eggs.

 

[Crazy for Chickens!]

I am so glad that Crazy for chickens asked this question. I had NO idea that the sex linking could pass onto a mix breed. Your combination is exactly what I have in my incubator and now I am SO excited to see who pops out. I assumed that the chicks would be just an olive egger but knowing that I can sex them too is just FABULOUS. Does the sexlinking happen automatically with this cross or is it just happenstance?

Do you have eggs that are from a female CL, and a male Maran? Sex linking happens from a barred female crossed to a solid male. I know that much, but I asked them if someone like Black Copper Maran will work as the solid or not, which I do not know.

 

[oregonkat]

Yes, Cream Legbar hen and my big beautiful BCM roo.

 

[The Moonshiner]

Do you have eggs that are from a female CL, and a male Maran? Sex linking happens from a barred female crossed to a solid male. I know that much, but I asked them if someone like Black Copper Maran will work as the solid or not, which I do not know.

Yes black copper will work just as well as black.
You could use blue copper and get blacks and blues. Or splash copper and get all blue chicks.
Or same with solid blues or solid slash.
I would think with coppers that the chicks should get some color like the coppers have.

 

[Crazy for Chickens!]

Yes black copper will work just as well as black.
You could use blue copper and get blacks and blues. Or splash copper and get all blue chicks.
Or same with solid blues or solid slash.
I would think with coppers that the chicks should get some color like the coppers have.

All those will work to produce sex links? What about the Wheaten color?

 

[The Moonshiner]

If bred to a CCL hen they will.
As you know its all about the barring and the males getting the head spot.
CCLs are wild type/ duckwing. Solid black and solid blue chickens are extended black. Black copper and blue copper are birchen. Both are dominate to wild type so their pattern will cover the wild type pattern and the chicks will hatch looking like marans chicks. The head spot will show best on black chicks but can be seen on blue chicks too.
Wheaton is recessive to wild type so Wheaton crossed to CCL will produce the chipmunk pattern of the CCL. You can see the head spot on them but not as well as with black chicks of course.
Wheaton wouldn't be my first choice but would work.

 

[The Moonshiner]

What would be cool is if marans or another dark brown egg layer came in chocolate.
You could breed a chocolate rooster to the CCL hen and have double sex links.
Cockerels would be black with head spot and pullets would be chocolate without head spots.

 

[GaryDean26]

Thanks for sharing! Those chickens are
Pretty. I want to do a rare cross, which is why I chose not to do Marans.but if I can't find the Blacks, then I may use them. I'm curious, which color of Marans did you use? I am not very educated about stuff like this, but does the solid rooster have to be absolutely solid, or could you use so sing like Black Copper Marans? I'm hoping the cross will produce someing a little more colorful than black. If you know of any other breeds that lay really dark eggs, please let me know!

I used Black Copper Marans. The males are black with copper hackles, copper saddle feathers, copper shoulder, and black wing triangle. I had a Black Marans cockerel that got taken by a predator a week and a half ago. I though that he would be better for the cross than a Black Copper because I don't like the leaky rust color that they make on the pullets when crossed. Either a Black Copper or Black male would work for the cross. You also could use a Silver Birchen Marans cockerel. The Birchen looks like a black copper only with off white plumage replacing all the copper areas. So...you don't need a solid black male just a male from a variety that produces black chicks down. If you are going for style points a solid black male might make a more attractive olive egger hen though. Some people like the red colors marbled through the black feather of their crosses. I don't. I think the solid colors (solid copper, solid black, solid white/silver) is more attractive than feathers that have a two colors melted through them.

Egg color can be difficult on olive eggers. Some come out a pale green color, some come out a khaki color, some come out a drab color, etc. I would start with the cockerel that is passing the darkest brown eggs possible. The best Olive egg color I have seen was from Angie Jones's flock in Schertz, Texas (@ fowlsRus). She did NOT have autosexing nor sex-links. But she used Marans and Americana for her foundation breeds. After the first cross she put all the hens laying bluer colored eggs back in with the Marans cockbird and all the ones laying darker eggs back in with the Americana cock for the second generation. She then selected for the colors that she liked best and breed forward to focus on egg color. I wish I had saved the photo from her ebay auction when I had the chance. They were really nice.

 

[GaryDean26]

I am so glad that Crazy for chickens asked this question. I had NO idea that the sex linking could pass onto a mix breed.....Does the sexlinking happen automatically with this cross or is it just happenstance?

Pure bred barred cockerels have two copies of the sex-linked barring. One on the sex-linked chromosome from his father and one on the sex-linked chromosome from his mother (two sex-linked chromosomes = a male chicken). A barred hen will just have one sex-linked barring gene on the sex linked chromosome from her father. The chromosome from her mother will not carry any of the sex-linked genes (one sex-linked and one non-sexlinked chromosome = a female chicken). When you cross a barred hen with a non-barred male 100% of the males will get a barring gene from the mother while none of the females will get the barring gene from the mother. None will get the gene from the none barred father so you end up with barred males and non-barred females. If you have a dark chicken down color the barring gene will express itself in the form of a white dot on the head. So white dot = males, no white dot = female. The males from that cross however will only have one barring gene so they will not be pure bred for the barring gene and will produce both barred and non barred offspring (where as the pure bred cockerel for barring will only produce barred offspring). So it isn't happenstance. It has to be done right for the sex-link to produce sex-able off-spring.