The Aloha Chicken Project

[knjinnm]

Which leg color is dominate, what is the weight of your cockerel?

 

[draye]

Well what if i only used the black birds from them? That might would work, but then there is the leg color issue. I've still got leg color issues with my Calico "Aloha" Naked Necks. It is taking a lot of crosses getting there. Silverudd's blues ar not barred, they are typically Blue/Black/Splash with either gold or silver leakage Here is blue my cockerel:

See my reply in bold below your question.

 

[cgmaster]

Which leg color is dominate, what is the weight of your cockerel?

Im not sure weather they have late or willow legs, if they have slate it would only take a couple generations to get back to yellow. I have not weighed him yet but he is currently heavier than his father and he was hatched the week of christmas

 

[cgmaster]

See my reply in bold below your question.

I just remembered that silverudds blues are said to have leghorn and/or creme legbar in their foundation so yellow skin might be lurking already? They are supposed to be good egg layers as well as good forager/free rangers

 

[draye]

I just remembered that silverudds blues are said to have leghorn and/or creme legbar  in their foundation so yellow skin might be lurking already? They are supposed to be good egg layers as well as good forager/free rangers

I'm not trying to discourage you on your project. If that is what you want to try to do. Just know and realize it will be a long journey.

 

[cgmaster]

I'm not trying to discourage you on your project. If that is what you want to try to do. Just know and realize it will be a long journey.

Trust me I know lol, i love my projects

 

[knjinnm]

So to those working on the project how close are you to the standard goal of leg color, weight and egg production?

 

[alohachickens]

Here are updated photos of chicks that I hatched back in March through May!

This rooster is very, very, very close to standard. He has the upright comb, long tail, great size, and excessive white. (Way more than any Sussex should display.)

Faults: Needs yellow legs. And while he's fairly "meaty" in build, I'd be OK if he was even more broad shouldered.


He will be bred to the hen behind him in the above pic - who DOES have the yellow legs and terrific Mille color. However she has small white specks, more in line with the amount of white that you'd want to see on a Speckled Sussex. The Alohas, I want them to display more white in general.

He will also be bred with this hen, who has great build and yellow legs. I'm keeping her for the body type. She does carry spotting, and if you look at the bottom of her tail, you can see one little white spot on one of the feathers! As a Mottled carrier, half her chicks will show spotting and the other half will be Mottled carriers. I'm hoping that crossed with this boy, I can keep the best and more colorful hens. Or maybe, even, get a rooster with even better body type and yellow legs, thanks to Mom?



So one Fall 2016 breeding pen is going to feature this nice boy with some of my bigger hens who need a color boost!

I also have some nice new roosters that have good white, but not really more white spotting than your average Speckled Sussex. Those boys will be paired with some of these hens:








Still working on getting yellow legs on lots of these hens. That's because I've used the Buff Sussex to improve size. That part is working, but Sussex have the pink / white legs, and yellow legs are recessive, so it will take a while to see the yellow appear again.

What is helping the yellow leg gene, is my influx of Turken. The original Turken hen had yellow legs, and was bred to an Aloha rooster with yellow legs, so odds are good that all of my Turkens have a hidden yellow leg gene, even on the ones that don't display yellow legs. The Naked Necks are not anything to worry about, as it can be bred out quite easily, if I choose. However it seems to help them handle the heat, so it's not a detrimental gene in super hot Arizona!







I also have quite a few nice hens that are "more of the same" - very pretty Alohas that are not really bigger than past Alohas. But they are young, and nice, and will be good fresh layers for the Fall 2016 and Spring 2017 breeding pens.






These smaller ones with excessive white might be paired up with this Naked Neck, because I know that as a Naked Neck he's got a hidden yellow leg gene. This particular guy is part Buff Sussex which is why he shows the pale legs and not a lot of white. But he carries spotting, and you can clearly see he has very good body size as compared with one of the more typical Aloha hens, which are colorful but run a bit small. (Kind of a Leghorn size.)



These two crossed together could possibly give me nice Mille hens with yellow legs and good size. Only half would be Naked Neck, and the chicks with "normal" necks would not carry the gene. This NN gene does not hide so it's pretty easy to breed out, just pick out "normal" feathered neck chicks. However, as mentioned previously, it seems to be if anything beneficial in my area so no need to stress over removing the gene at this point. It's just a harmless variation.

Anyway, you can see the massive size on the above rooster. He towered over the group of chicks he was raised with, and was clearly larger than all the rest even at a week old! He's got serious size genes going on there.

I'm very excited about getting breeder pens set up soon. It's been to hot to hatch for a while but things in the extended forecast are showing a cool down. We had a near record summer, with 30 days at or above 110 degrees since June! That does not count all the 107, 108 and 109 days. It's been extremely rough on all the hens. I've waited on selling the extras until we saw some improvement in the temps. Now that it's getting better, I can start to sell the extra stock and set up breeder pens. It will take a full month for the DNA in the pens to "set" however so I don't predict any new keeper chicks until October, though I may hatch out random Alohas to sell locally before then. (They will be a mishmash of whatever though, as all the hens and roos are running free range to keep cool as possible!)

 

[wornoutmomto3]

I have a young cockerel that I think would be good to continue. He still needs some work, but I was hoping for some critique and sugestions of breeds to cross him with to improve the line. He is the only decent one I have remaining from this years hatch for this project.

 

[draye]

I have a young cockerel that I think would be good to continue. He still needs some work, but I was hoping for some critique and sugestions of breeds to cross him with to improve the line. He is the only decent one I have remaining from this years hatch for this project.

Find you some of the "Red" hatchery Naked Necks aka Turkens. Reason I put the red in quotes is because they are actually bordering on almost a orange color. They are also black tailed, and by the way if you find the black tailed buff they will work also, they will produce mostly red babies ( unless you get lucky and get some that carry the mottling gene). alohachickens has done this with her Alohas and is getting some wonderful results. this way you can produce both Alohas and Mottled "Aloha" Naked Necks.

Oh yeah, I just found out that the bigger ones that you'd probably want and they are red. They are produced by S & G Poultry are going to be offered next year by Dunlap Hatchery. They are the bigger broiler type and the orangey red that you'd want, especially if you want to add size to your flock. I'm thinking about checking them out and maybe ordering a few for my self.