The Moonshiner's Leghorns

[Chookwagn]

Ya I'm thinking sex linked. I much prefer autosexing but would need to protect my investment. If they were autosexing any Tom, Dick or Hairball could buy a few and start selling them.
At least sex linked would slow them down and they'd have to maintain two different flocks to make the cross.

Yeah I agree.

I'm wondering if it's something I look into as well. If I could sell guaranteed female chicks that would be awesome and I could sell them for $15 each

 

[The Moonshiner]

Yeah I agree.

I'm wondering if it's something I look into as well. If I could sell guaranteed female chicks that would be awesome and I could sell them for $15 each

You have brown (gold duckwing) leghorns and silver duckwing or access to both don't you?

 

[Chookwagn]

You have brown (gold duckwing) leghorns and silver duckwing or access to both don't you?

Yes I could muster a couple of SDW hens and a brown rooster.
How easy to tell at hatch?

 

[Chookwagn]

I need to find a good line of SDW Leghorns

 

[KF0002]

I had a neighbor like that. I'm sure he had 50 or more. He'd buy like a huge bag of cat food every so often and just open it and dump it on his shop floor but that must not have been enough because they'd come here to try to eat chickens that free ranged.
My dog at the time took up hunting them for sport so that kept them at bay for a while. Then they found my quail in the barn. I had homemade pens like GQFs where they reach through the front and back to eat and drink. Cats put me out of the quail business in 2 days.
I'm not a cat fan.

Wow, we would be setting live traps and dispatching cats if they were a predator problem here. Our LGDs keep the ferals ran off luckily, but tolerate our two farm cats. The two female cats we have now keep the rodent population way down, so they are helpful. They live outside and come in to our enclosed back porch when they need to. A hungry animal will go to great lengths for a meal, so feral animals can do a lot of damage for sure. That is crazy the cats killed your quail through a pen.

 

[KF0002]

Yes I could muster a couple of SDW hens and a brown rooster.
How easy to tell at hatch?

SDW and GDW (Brown Leghorn) are very easy to distinguish at hatch. GDW are more a brownish red tone in their face and body and have chipmunk stripes, and SDW have grayish down color with chipmunk stripes.

SDW

GDW

SDW and GDW together

I do not own these photos. I found them on the Google, but my experience with the two chick colors are the same as these photos.

 

[KF0002]

I need to find a good line of SDW Leghorns

Is it worth trying to make my own line using a Gray (SDW) Gamecock over a Brown Leghorn hen, then breed a golden duckwing F1 male from the pair to another brown leghorn hen next year, then mate the BC1 birds together to create the F2 SDW Leghorns?

 

[KF0002]

I need to find a good line of SDW Leghorns

It is hard to get decent SDWs here. Some hatcheries have them, but not many I don't think. I am still scarred from ordering chicks last year from MM and a lot of the chicks arriving dead in the box. Then the chicks they sent to replace those lost during shipping also arrived dead.

 

[Chookwagn]

Is it worth trying to make my own line using a Gray (SDW) Gamecock over a Brown Leghorn hen, then breed a golden duckwing F1 male from the pair to another brown leghorn hen next year, then mate the BC1 birds together to create the F2 SDW Leghorns?

You know how you are good at getting eggs posted to you..... i reckon you could find some SDW eggs from someone

 

[Chookwagn]

SDW and GDW (Brown Leghorn) are very easy to distinguish at hatch. GDW are more a brownish red tone in their face and body and have chipmunk stripes, and SDW have grayish down color with chipmunk stripes.

SDW
View attachment 4111516
GDWView attachment 4111517
SDW and GDW together
View attachment 4111518

I do not own these photos. I found them on the Google, but my experience with the two chick colors are the same as these photos.

So when crossed it still should be that easy?