The Legbar Thread!

[dretd]

I can officially post on here! I had my first Legbar hatch ever today!!! I know I have 2 males and am pretty confident that I have 7 females.






You have no idea how excited I am!!!

I have eggs in the incubator thanks to Steen, so I can imagine-- I sure am excited every time I futs with the 'bator --congratulations to you, what a fantastic hatch and great ratio!

In the third picture in the upper left corner, you have really good examples of females of the 'light type' and the 'dark type' according to Punnett. -- I got from ebay in the UK a plate from a book that someone had removed - from the days of Punnett. He shows 5-chicks (all deceased and stuffed) -- and even back in 1938, had that variation. The title under the photos is Legbar chicks
He shows - dark, light and dark type male chicks and dark and light type female chicks.

This is very interesting. I knew about the dark and light males but somehow missed about the females being different morphs too.

It looks like the two dark females you refer to have a faint head spot whereas the lighter morphs do not. I know that some of you all are tracking the boys, but is anyone looking at the difference in the females? Do they look different as adults? Since Cream is recessive it shouldn't be an incomplete expression of that, so what is going on to explain the difference--the 'red enhanced' that folks talk about? Are the darker chicks more likely to show the chestnut or ginger? As geneticists, I can see why Punnett and Pease were working on these guys.

 

[walady944]

You got a wonderful hatch. Congratulations on the new babies.

In the third picture in the upper left corner, you have really good examples of females of the 'light type' and the 'dark type' according to Punnett. -- I got from ebay in the UK a plate from a book that someone had removed - from the days of Punnett. He shows 5-chicks (all deceased and stuffed) -- and even back in 1938, had that variation. The title under the photos is Legbar chicks
He shows - dark, light and dark type male chicks and dark and light type female chicks.

It would be nice to get the whole article, but that's ancient for things like magazines -- it is called 'Supplement to THE FEATHERED WORLD, September 30th, 1938.'

Hope the chicks and you 'live long and prosper'.

such nice babies;; do you know if the darker or lighter females are the preferred coloration at this age?

 

[redchicken9]

The Hen finally started back with her true blue eggs again.. YEA! little muted d/t flash

Here are my CLB.. they are offspring from the original A and B lines from GFF.. I think they are such lovely birds and LOVE that I can tell at birth what they are.. no vent sexing or feather sexing needed..

For those that have been around for awhile who remembers, how did the leg band colors relate to lines? Wasn't there orange, blue, red, lime green? Did these pre-date A and B lines or post? date?

 

[blackbirds13]

For those that have been around for awhile who remembers, how did the leg band colors relate to lines? Wasn't there orange, blue, red, lime green? Did these pre-date A and B lines or post? date?

I got my first birds in October 2011 and February 2012

My original hens are from line A - golden girl and line B - cream girl

this was the email from Jenny about the lines at that time -:

"The originals you received are from line A. The shipment you just received was 1H-B; 2R-A"
I'm not familiar with the color coded bands that came afterwards

 

[lonnyandrinda]

I believe they switched leg band colors several times through the years, so just knowing someone else's GFF chick had a red band and was line X doesn't mean your red banded one came from that line. If you know when you got your chicks you can contact GFF and see if they still have the records. It does seem like they keep really good records!

On the female chick down- no, it is unknown on the outcome of light females versus dark females. We aren't even 100% sure what the light versus dark male down means. Something we need to start looking at. I don't seem to have as much variation in my female chicks though? I will have to look closer at that in my next hatch.

 

[ChicKat]

x2 for lonnyandrinda's response. We don't know yet the long-term effects. To track them you may want to band them. I had one very light newly hatched chick "blondie" matching the light one in the above photo. Subsequently, I couldn't differentiate, and two of the pullets in that hatch were killed by raccoons.

So another thing that we all need to learn about the breed.

 

[Triplell]

Congratulations!!  Really a nice set of chicks -- and 100% hatching rate is something to crow about.  

 

[ChicKat]

For those that have been around for awhile who remembers, how did the leg band colors relate to lines? Wasn't there orange, blue, red, lime green? Did these pre-date A and B lines or post? date?

The original rooster I got about 1-year ago in Feb. was yellow legband, and the hen was green legband HTH

 

[GaryDean26]

...We aren't even 100% sure what the light versus dark male down means. Something we need to start looking at...

As many of you know, at the beginning of 2012 I started a photo progression of three different down colors in cockerels. Charcoal black color, medium brown, and a blond color. I complete the photo documentation in the fall of 2012 and since I could post a PDF file on the BYC posted in on the Cream Legbar Breeders Yahoo group, the Cream Legbar Breeders Facebook group, and the Cream Legbar Club's club house as well as sent it to about a dozen people on the BYC through personal emails. Many people asked what happened to the blond cockerel. I lost him at about 10 weeks (age?). His plumage was developed enough at that point that I was able to make all the conclusions that I needed for the study, but over the last two months have been trying to track down examples of the mature plumage on blond down type cockerels. I only knew of two other people with the blond down type cockerels. One confirmed that she also lost hers as a Juvenile. The other recently got back with me and told me that his entire cream legbar flock was destroyed by predators. He had three eggs from them which he set after the loss. Two cockerels hatch (one light and one dark). He still has one of the cockerels which he said he faintly remembers was the light down type. He sent me photos of this cockerel which he said is quite different from what he has seen in other legbar flocks in the USA.

I am posting his cockerel here with his permission. I hope this helps.

 

[1muttsfan]

That cockerel appears to have indistinct barring, as well as white feathers in the tail. Overall his color is very light, lighter than what I prefer but maybe more correct - color can be so hard to evaluate in photos, and those appear overall a little overexposed.