Quote: Lol, as long as they lay eggs, who cares if they can't fly? Not me.
More seriously though in my experience there is nobody, no matter how seemingly ignorant or uneducated, who can't teach me something. Everyone's got pieces of the puzzle, not the whole picture. So due respect even if the person seems quite noob or random in their posts.
Quote: Lol, I won't forget, you're one of the few Aussies who seems to move beyond the Aussie threads within the same sorts of topics I check out, and I do believe our circumstances in Australia are somewhat specific to our geographical differences, so I always pay a bit of extra attention to stuff Aussies say as it may directly affect my flock too.
Quote: Your youth isn't an issue. I'm younger than most people guess. What info you have to share, whether fact or opinion, is all valuable regardless of your age and whether or not people agree with it. There's a lot of different schools of thought in rearing chickens and your personal experiences will not be identical to everyone else's so there's a valuable point of difference in itself. Aussie chicken issues are slightly different than many USA ones for example, as diseases adapt to their environments, so your experiences are potentially more important for fellow Aussie members than some other countries. Even if your threads are mainly ignored, someone, sooner or later, will search for these issues and come up here seeking answers and you may help them with whatever you posted.
You're already doing well with this thread. I thought your other thread, regarding the waste of those quarantined rare breed chickens, was a good thread. Good on you for trying anyway. What a pity nothing useful eventuated of it. We keep and breed some mammals in permanent quarantine, why the heck not birds?! Some of those birds were irreplaceable, the importers were right, Australia badly needs new blood. Wasting them because they carry a disease already within our shores and stock is just... OK, I'm running out of nice ways to refer to this. lol.
I do believe Aussies need to look into developing more of our own breeds though, as trying to preserve purebreds indefinitely with such limited stock is a guaranteed way to degrade it further. Our birds are adapting to our environment, so I expect we will have some noticeably unique strains or breeds emerging sometime in future, as has been the case with other countries. This is a totally uncool opinion though as some Aussie breeders subscribe to the idea that anyone who is not maintaining an already existing pure breed is merely "making more chickens". Lol, that's how most breeds began.
Quote: Yeah.... Infinitely variable, lol. Or almost so. Mix away, it'll be very educational.
I've crossed bantams and LF's back and forth, often letting them choose their mates to see what results, and the results have been quite variable. Some offspring will likely be bantams, who may produce LF's in turn, some offspring will likely be LF's, who may produce bantams in turn, and some will be inbetweenies. I've had such mixes come out, even LF fowl with bantam feet, which is obviously not the best mix.
I've had fowl that look like miniature standard LF's and fowl that look like oversized bantams. When I say 'LF' or 'bantam' I am generalizing them into two groups though, with 'bantam' meaning it has fluffy feet with short legs, a boofy hairdo, coral crest, etc and 'LF' meaning normal head feathering, no leg feathering, etc. But of course not all banties and LF fit within those generalizations, just most of mine. But you get the idea.
I prefer bantam crossed with LF for meat and eggs. Mine have excelled in both areas, compared to the closer to purebred LF and bantam stock I bred them from, but what a mongrel mix they are! Bantams contributed darker, juicier, better flavored and fine textured flesh, and the LF contributed higher laying capacity, and the results ended up being a very productive dual purpose LF bird with bantam features. Maybe one day I can refine it into a breed but I'm pretty wary of developing anything purebred with such limited bloodlines, and after moving house so much, I've lost some of my best breeders, so I anticipate a bit of a long climb back to the standard I had them at.
Best wishes.
