The Legbar Thread!

[ChicKat]

I'd like to post some pictures of my start into crested cream legbars. Last year I bought some eggs locally and out of 6 hatched 1 rooster and one hen. Both made it to the 4 month mark and then died a day apart for unknown reasons.

I got eggs off e-bay this summer, one from marry-4-berry and the other set from warnerranch1. I hatched a total of 15: 9 roosters and 6 pullets. Here are some pictures. Several of the hens have huge crests so far. The roosters are all varied but 2 have small crests and straight combs so far so I am excited to grow them out and see how the color in.

One of the pullets has a very orange red neck, the others I am hoping are more cream. Comments appreciated.

Thanks, Reed


The bottom pullet looks more cream and the other more gold?

smaller crest, color?


gold vs cream?

This pullet I really like, and you have a lot of cockerels to select from -- I think you are on your way! Congratulations on your flock.

ETA - you take nice photos too.

 

[jfishdr]

Thanks. I'm hoping to get a decent flock going. I used my iPhone 6 plus for the pictures. I took 200 to get about 20 decent ones.

 

[ochochicas]

Beautiful birds, and congrats on hatching out so many chicks. It seems to me the legbars are difficult to hatch. Maybe the second batch of eggs you got came from a better line.

 

[Junibutt]

Ok, so I had my broody hatch me a pullet egg from my Legbar Hope. She had only been laying for 2 weeks or so when I set her egg and they egg only weight 1.6 oz, so I did not expect it to hatch.

Well to top it off, I dropped it on Day 20 once and then the broody through it out of the nest again a few minutes later.

To my surprise it did hatch but towards the end of day 22. It did take it 24 hrs from pipping to coming out but I decided not to help.

To cut the story short, it is a whopping 30g (1.1 oz) compared to my CL X Red Star Hybrid at 56 g (2 oz) and my other Legbar chicks I have previously hatched at 45 g on average.

Here are some pics. The chick is very different from the mother and father as new-borns in terms of down color. Obviously a boy with the head-spot however I was surprised by the sharpness of his stripes as well as the contrast. I have not seen similar chicks and wondering if signifies anything? Anyone else has had similar looking chicks and have they taken pictures of them when they grow up?


Here are few pics of Toad:











Following are pics of mom and dad for comparison.
Mom is left and dad is right in the first picture. (in between is a Wyandotte)

Don't have any others of the dad so rest of the pics belong to mom (Hope)

 

[Regin]

Ok, so I had my broody hatch me a pullet egg from my Legbar Hope. She had only been laying for 2 weeks or so when I set her egg and they egg only weight 1.6 oz, so I did not expect it to hatch.

Well to top it off, I dropped it on Day 20 once and then the broody through it out of the nest again a few minutes later.

To my surprise it did hatch but towards the end of day 22. It did take it 24 hrs from pipping to coming out but I decided not to help.

To cut the story short, it is a whopping 30g (1.1 oz) compared to my CL X Red Star Hybrid at 56 g (2 oz) and my other Legbar chicks I have previously hatched at 45 g on average.

Here are some pics. The chick is very different from the mother and father as new-borns in terms of down color. Obviously a boy with the head-spot however I was surprised by the sharpness of his stripes as well as the contrast. I have not seen similar chicks and wondering if signifies anything? Anyone else has had similar looking chicks and have they taken pictures of them when they grow up?


Here are few pics of Toad:











Following are pics of mom and dad for comparison.
Mom is left and dad is right in the first picture. (in between is a Wyandotte)

Don't have any others of the dad so rest of the pics belong to mom (Hope)

I would say Pullet.

 

[Junibutt]

I would say Pullet.

Hi @Regin even with that big of a headspot, you think its a pullet? Anyone else want to take a shot?

 

[KPenley]

Hi @Regin
 even with that big of a headspot, you think its a pullet? Anyone else want to take a shot?

Are you asking about the chick in pics 2-5 (cockerel) or last two (pullet)?

 

[madamwlf]

Hi guys!! Who has Rees Legbars? I have someone questions. Well, really one. Are they small? My flock of Rees Legbars are around 7 months old and small!!!! This is my rooster and that is a blue cooper marans hen standing behind him. He is small. Aren't they suppose to be bigger?

 

[KPenley]

All I have is a pullet madamwlf, but it does seem like size is an issue this first year. I'll see what I can do to put some meat on their bones in the next generation with Mannapro, lots of whole grains, and frequent worming the first few months.

 

[ChicKat]

Junibutt
Mine sometimes look like that one...and sometimes mine have totally diffused back stripes -- for me the headspot is the constant.

Ha - was going to try to find that color plate from Punnett's day -- where he shows all the chick down colors....and went out to move every chicken (I didn't realize I had so many) to different pens -- (well actually 10-not moved-- the 5-brooder babies going outdoors tomorrow)

The whole time I thought the computer was looking for that picture it was looping. Do you remember it? Some of the chick down was dark - some was light. I just realized that I have had all the colors FROM the SAME parents --

Okay found it here on BYC.....

I have had the dark male like the center shot and I have had light light male - like the upper right EXCEPT instead of golden looking chick the chick was gray -- and it was from the same two parents - with some time distance between. AS I recall Punnett's writing at the time of the plate - he didn't know of an explanation for the variation in chick down - and didn't have a theory about it either.
Just realized too - that this set of babies in the brooder came from the very light downed chick as the father

Okay -- not my lightest chicks but the two boys piled up sleeping on one another are a hatch from 2012 one of them (the one on the right) is the father of these dark-downed boys in the brooder behind the female chick in front.... the mother and the grandmother are the same hen (line-breeding them)---- I guess that could lead to a conclusion that she is the source of melanization ---- she is the darkener. She had another set of chcks that was even darker than this dark set in the brooder.

One of her daughters had a very dark set of chicks...and some of the chicks have been lighter - basically the same parents... All the daughter's chicks were killed and eaten by raccoons along with her, and I think that the father was the same father of these current brooder chicks....

Bottom line -- there is a really wide variation of color in chick down in a very narrow genetic pool -- it isn't like this pair of Legbars will always have super dark downed chicks from what I have experienced.... Just about all the boys had more diffused dorsal stripes....but I wonder what that will lead to in the future---maybe your females from that little guy if you breed him - will have even MORE precise markings.