Sexing 2 and a half week olds

[peafowl_Lover]

I think I have 3 girls and 4 boys. I think these are the girls.

 

[peafowl_Lover]

And these are the boys. (I think)

 

[Nabiki]

It's still a bit early to tell for sure. I agree with your boy selection, but I'm seeing some red coming in on 2nd and 3rd pics of your girl selection.

 

[peafowl_Lover]

Oh no! Hopefully I'll have more than 1 girl.

 

[Nabiki]

Oh no! Hopefully I'll have more than 1 girl.

A long time ago I agreed to hatch some eggs for someone from his own birds. He gave me six eggs and five hatched. They were ALL boys. I felt so bad for the guy.

 

[Susan Skylark]

Don’t do it! Do not feather sex before 4 weeks of age, most or all will be girls and then a week later they are all male and your dreams of raising quail will be shattered until that other batch of eggs you ordered (just in case) hatches and then you’ll have them coming out your eyeballs. Those darn baby spots! Italian/fawn males often get chestnut colored feathers on their head which can be helpful early on (except homozygous fee which come in black like a hen), but my first hatch of 5 birds was all female at 3.5 weeks and at 4 weeks I only had one girl. This last hatch I had 3/12 feather sexable plus 3 roux birds (sex linked recessive) out of non roux hens (must be female). Had no idea on the rest, so went out of town for a week and they are all crowing when I get back, easiest bird sexing I’ve ever done but it certainly freaked out my bird sitter (she has only female chickens). I really want to make a ring tone of five adolescent males crowing at once! It is hard to wait but you’ll know in a couple weeks.

 

[peafowl_Lover]

1 and a half weeks to go. I take it they could go either way?

 

[Susan Skylark]

They are pretty downy yet so yeah, they could be anything!

 

[peafowl_Lover]

I went in and told them to be girls!

 

[Susan Skylark]

Then they’ll all be boys just to annoy you. I had a new breeding pen all set up with this batch and my favorite hopeful female was crowing when we got home, but as it turned out the new rooster was a jerk so we swapped them out and I now have a Blau rooster!