The Aloha Chicken Project

[alohachickens]

I'm anxious to see these crosses myself.

I bet they are going to be great farm chickens regardless of color!

I'm so excited, it's been 3 years of waiting!

Will we see spotty red and white chickens in this first hatch?!?

Genetics stuff is SO fun!!!

 

[wornoutmomto3]

This little cockerel didn't look like much just after hatch. Now that he has feathered out, what do you think?

 

[HEChicken]

I'm excited too!!! Its a good thing I didn't know it would take three years to get to this point when I started or I never would have started at all

I candled last night (day 8) and can see movement in ALL Aloha eggs. At this point of course they are just a black blob surrounded by spider veins but nevertheless it was fun to watch the little black blob moving around in every single egg.

 

[Peoria Eggs]

I don't have a web site (yet) just an old outdated one. BYC is the best contact for me, right now.

I have plenty of hatching eggs right now, $5 per dozen.

I will keep you in mind. If the wife approves the plan then i should be ready for some in a couple months.

 

[Fire Ant Farm]

Sorry - I've been offline for a few days.

@alohachickens - I love your description of your ideas - it would be a lot of work, but as you said, I'll have "everything" here.

The complication I have is that part of the CL breeding I do here will have to include breeding for Marek's resistance, as of three girls, I've lost one, one has it, and I'm not sure about the third. The third is strongest, prettiest, and lays the most saturated eggs. I only got two boys from her out of the 13 I hatched earlier, so I'm collecting her eggs now for another go - in case she gets ill. All babies will have antibodies form their Mommies, so perhaps this will go better.

Since there are more chicks on hand already, I pulled the plug on the BLRW and Lavender Ameraucanas in the chick order, so only German New Hampshires, Blue Copper Marans, and a couple Olive Eggers are coming (making up the minimum of 20 chicks). I'm frantically building mobile tractor coops right now to be able to put Tank and the Speckled Ladies together, and to move the current chicks out. I'll need to build yet more for growouts for the new chicks as well, and there's another big permanent coop in the works. I may never be finished!!!!!

- Ant Farm

 

[alohachickens]

This little cockerel didn't look like much just after hatch. Now that he has feathered out, what do you think?

I'd say that this guy will almost entirely lose his white spotting. But - he is a carrier of Mottling! So it comes down to size and other positive traits.

With his nice, bright light color, and yellow legs, he could be a very helpful cross to Speckled Sussex hens, if you found hens with an excess of spots. The first generation chicks would look like Speckled Sussex - as the pink legs and dark mahogany color take over.

The Mahogany color is very difficult to breed out, but eventually, you might be able to "pull" this boy's light buff color out again. (As icky as it sounds, for example breeding him to Speckled Sussex hens and then crossing the daughters back to the father, you could get Mille chicks within one year, most likely!) And the recessive yellow legs would start to show again. It would be a matter at that point to pick out the lightest and most spotty chicks. (And then of course cross those to something totally unrelated to diversify bloodlines.)

So he could for sure be helpful, it all depends on what else you had? He'd be good on very spotty Speckled Sussex hens.

For crossing with New Hampshire Reds, I'd prefer to start with a "super spotty" Aloha rooster instead - or even a nicely marked Speckled Sussex roo if someone is starting without Aloha stock.

 

[alohachickens]

Sorry - I've been offline for a few days.

@alohachickens - I love your description of your ideas - it would be a lot of work, but as you said, I'll have "everything" here.

The complication I have is that part of the CL breeding I do here will have to include breeding for Marek's resistance, as of three girls, I've lost one, one has it, and I'm not sure about the third. The third is strongest, prettiest, and lays the most saturated eggs. I only got two boys from her out of the 13 I hatched earlier, so I'm collecting her eggs now for another go - in case she gets ill. All babies will have antibodies form their Mommies, so perhaps this will go better.

Since there are more chicks on hand already, I pulled the plug on the BLRW and Lavender Ameraucanas in the chick order, so only German New Hampshires, Blue Copper Marans, and a couple Olive Eggers are coming (making up the minimum of 20 chicks). I'm frantically building mobile tractor coops right now to be able to put Tank and the Speckled Ladies together, and to move the current chicks out. I'll need to build yet more for growouts for the new chicks as well, and there's another big permanent coop in the works. I may never be finished!!!!!

- Ant Farm

Oh no, Marek's, what a pain! Good luck fighting, that's a tough one.

I love hearing that you're getting the Blue Copper Marans and Olive Eggers because that could make it easier to ID some of your hens in mixed pens, so easier management. The NHR's are going to lay a light brown egg, and the Aloha NN's are going to lay a cream colored egg. The Speckled Sussex eggs may look a touch darker than the Alohas but will probably be very close in color. And of course Cream Legbars lay light blue. Makes it easier to keep things straight if you have one roo running with a group of hens and want to hatch specific chicks.

 

[Fire Ant Farm]

Quote:
Interestingly, I have a hatchery NHR in my NN coop right now - she lays a small dark terra cotta egg similar to what I've seen posted for some of the "dark brown" layers. (Maybe because she's a pullet). Several of the other NNs lay darker terra cotta colored eggs as well (again as pullets), and only two or three lay lighter colored eggs. I think I'll just need to nail it down to the specific birds...

But I agree - the plan I have in my head is to TRY to minimize the number of separate housing groups, and mix birds with different eggs to better tell them apart. I'm not sure I'll easily be able to keep multiple boys together at all (definitely not in a few of the groups), so I may try to have little "families" for each...

- Ant Farm

 

[alohachickens]

I'm not sure I'll easily be able to keep multiple boys together at all (definitely not in a few of the groups), so I may try to have little "families" for each...

- Ant Farm

If you raise the boys together, it can go really well. I've had brothers co-habitating in coops, and as long as they know who is #1 and who is #2 it's generally OK.

I've had 7 (yes, seven) roos in the main barn, and all has been well for about six months. Then, the "top dog" from last year was challenged by the one year old younger guy, and now old man has a bum leg. I separated him and he's currently wandering the yard. I hope he recovers over time! He follows me around while I feed and water all the others, limping and hopping behind me, LOL.

But, the only reason that he's hurt is that he absolutely REFUSED to back down. That's unusual. Most have a quick squabble and get it out of the way, and it's settled. Most boys know that if they go at it too hard then they could end up hurt badly - like this guy - and now he's not fast enough to dart in for a "quickie on the side" which is what the passive roosters do. The dominant roo breaks it up soon as he sees the underlings try and hop on a girl, but sometimes #1 can't run fast enough to knock the smaller guy off the hen, and genetic diversity ensues. Ha ha!

I actually like to keep extra roos around now, because I found it keeps the #1 guy on his toes. When I had just one rooster, for one season, he got lazy. Even though technically he could have covered all the hens, he just picked his few favorites and skipped the rest. So many "blank" eggs that hatching season!!! I don't make that mistake any longer! LOL.

 

[alohachickens]

Also - I don't know if it is typical - but two of my friends kept ALL the Aloha roos and had no issues.

My friend Jessica, she had like 10, and I was like, um, you don't have to keep ALL the boys - ha ha - but she lets them free range and likes having them around.

Everything is OK there, to this day. They are all about 2 years old now.