Shippings eggs for hatching

[RIR0BCM]

Hello ...
I am looking for dark black copper marans eggs for hatching ...
I am outside of the US ...
Does anyone ship fertile eggs internationally ?

 

[Fishkeeper]

I think you need a lot of permits and inspection and such to do that. What country are you in? That affects what you'll need to get eggs shipped to you from out of the country, and if you can even do it. There may also be a breeder in the country you could buy from.

 

[ChickenCanoe]

I don't raise Marans but it would help to know what country you are in.

 

[RIR0BCM]

I am from israel ...i bought pullets from all of the breeders and bloodlines in israel but none of them layed brown eggs all of them layed eggs less than 4 on the color chart ....

 

[Fishkeeper]

If you have a lot of space and time, you could always take those hens and try to breed them back into a darker-laying line. If not, you'll want to look up the laws around importing hatching eggs into your country. That sort of thing is generally restricted to help prevent the spread of disease.

 

[RIR0BCM]

If you have a lot of space and time, you could always take those hens and try to breed them back into a darker-laying line

How ? Is there a specific method to do that ?

 

[Fishkeeper]

Have a lot of hens and look at the eggs. Pick out the hens that lay the darkest eggs, and breed only those. Keep doing that until they lay as dark an egg as you want. That's how selective breeding works, and is how marans were developed in the first place. I confess I'm not sure how to pick out which rooster has the genes for dark eggs, since roos don't lay eggs. I also know you'll need plenty of space and multiple generations of chickens, and will have to remove a lot of light-egg-layers from your breeding stock, which could mean getting rid of them or eating them. It's not the easiest thing in the world, but it's definitely doable.

 

[ChickenCanoe]

Have a lot of hens and look at the eggs. Pick out the hens that lay the darkest eggs, and breed only those. Keep doing that until they lay as dark an egg as you want. That's how selective breeding works, and is how marans were developed in the first place. I confess I'm not sure how to pick out which rooster has the genes for dark eggs, since roos don't lay eggs. I also know you'll need plenty of space and multiple generations of chickens, and will have to remove a lot of light-egg-layers from your breeding stock, which could mean getting rid of them or eating them. It's not the easiest thing in the world, but it's definitely doable.

X2
For roosters, I only keep those from the darkest eggs. He should pass that on to his daughters.

There is another member on here from Israel. He said importation was quite restrictive. He also has a friend with Black Penedesenca chickens that lay nice dark eggs.
His screen name is @Akrnaf2.
However, I doubt crossing Marans and Penedesencas will achieve the desired results.
I once crossed a dark egg Welsummer with a dark egg Penedesenca and the result was disappointing. A normal brown egg.

 

[Fishkeeper]

I'm pretty sure the genes for dark eggs are the same in all chickens, and I wouldn't take a single cross result as an indication that the whole cross is bad. You can occasionally get chickens that lay lighter eggs out of a good line of nice dark eggs, so that could have happened.

 

[ChickenCanoe]

You make a good point and I'm not going to dispute that. I'm also not a genetics expert but I think with some breeds there is more than one pigment contributing to the dark egg. That leads me to believe there may be more than one gene involved. And also possible that they are in a different locus which could mean different breeds could cancel each other out.
The best Penedesenca eggs are an intense reddish maroon. To me they look different than the darkest Marans eggs.

But I'm certainly with you on your advice of only hatching from the darkest eggs for generations on end.
Egg color in even the best lines of Marans can be lost in short order without carefully tending to that detail.
I once bought 3 varieties of eggs from a farm in Indiana the claimed their birds were Bev Davis and Jean Wade lines. The eggs were no darker than an Orpington egg.