The IMPORTED ENGLISH Orpington Thread

[aveca]

That's a tough one. Mostly says Pullet but something about the stance and attitude (yep and feathers) say cockerel. If it were mine I'd be throwing my hands up and waiting for an egg or a crow.

Im going to be different here and say its a girlfreind..the feathers are different, ..but I have seen a couple like this over the years in this thread..little more time will tell..

 

[Renie'sPeeps]

It might be possible... to take your hand and lift the feathers up on the back..... look for quills for the starting of saddle feathers...... I had to that a couple of times.

 

[Renie'sPeeps]

wow they look great! you should do a "test run" breed them with one of you GL roos and see what you get! I love the heads on these gals..nice a big!

I can't..... I only had one and I lost him.

 

[fowlman01]

I like him too,is he blue or black based? I do not know much about them but his fluff looks blue, I have seen some on the UK sites that say blue laced and black laced.

In the photo he looks blue, but photo's are not always correct.

Walt

 

[aveca]

Not to worry...I keep a 100% English line, as well as my SOP crosses for show. If you're going to show in this country, you have to adhere to APA's SOP.

I agree with you redrenier so doing the same as Vickie, keeping a line of pure english..I just like and appreciate these birds.gorgeous well thought out birds .. they kept the type no matter what for the large part... and at the same time Im breeding more toward standard project pen ...and then my SOP birds love love love them!!! they are big and round and fine...

Heres something interesting..the imported whites I have were bred much more to everyones standards, they were german imports to england then bred into some brit whites..this caused a few interesting things to come out, nothing bad, just an off colored feather here or there on a few birds, very minor stuff..they have a shorter feather pleantly of leg showing and beautiful orp type..one of the strange features they have is some of them hatch with blue legs..but by the time they are 5 months old the legs are winter white..Not sure why that happens but its interesting..Pastor romig said to me when looking at the babies, are those legs blue, some are pink, some blue? I said yep, now look in this pen with 4 month olds..beat both of us why this happens..but the end result was there..white legs that look like buff legs..white scales..a few appear to carry the gold gene, corn and grass roaming affects tips of feathers, but all of the females stay stone cold winter white no matter what..so Im guessing the whitest and largest male will be in the breeding pen with the hens next year.. I need some coaching on these.

Im thinking the way they are bred more to everyones standards is why they were national champions in 2 different countrys.., excuse me, 3 different contries.this bird belongs to Sandra.
And she said there were over 7000 birds at this show


this baby had blue legs...Go figure

 

[TheNuttyChick]

Interesting!

 

[aveca]

Interesting!

Boy its interesting to me too...Next year I will take pics of the babies and thier legs, you will see some pink ones and some blue, then again when they are 4-5 months..at that point unless I tag them, you wont know who had what..they all look the same..I have no explanation for it..

 

[TheNuttyChick]

All the more reason not to cull too early, let them grow out some just so you know what you're dealing with. I wonder if it continues to show up in their offspring too?

 

[jdoane]

I have two English Orpington Chicks from a BBS hatch.

Was hoping for a Splash and a Blue but it was more important that we try to get pullets so... Any thoughts of what these ladies will look like when they are grown up?


This is Hedwig. 3 weeks old. We were thinking Splash but her feathers are coming in pretty consistently light blue.



This is Bella (hard to get a still picture of her!) 3 weeks today. We were thinking perhaps a Dark blue or maybe black on top and blue underneath but now I tend to be leaning toward all black?


Another view of Bella about a week ago.

 

[RisingStar]

I would guess Splash and Black. But I am still learning as well.