The Moonshiner's Leghorns

[ozmarans]

I was thinking about this today. It is easy to go out and buy stock from a show-quality line of birds, and work on them from that stock. There is no challenge to it because the work has already been done. It is easier and quicker that way, and if I wanted birds to exhibit now, that is what I would certainly do. But putting the work in on a line, working to correct flaws over generations, and turning it into something special is an achievement. It is frustrating at times, but it is gratifying to watch a line slowly improve over generations.

the lady I got my stock from in 2018 killed all her stock because they had many deseases and what , she when out there and bought new stock ,
but now she see my marans witch they come out of her stock just reworked ans selectted ,she just can t beleive it , she call it the evolution of her line by some one else work and knoledge . I proved the point .
I m not here to show chooks I m her to breed chooks that can be shown .
Ozmarans

 

[ozmarans]

Thank you! I look forward to working with Leghorns. I hope you can share your breeding knowledge here on this thread. The genetics for color is the same regardless of breed. We would very much enjoy talking chickens with you!

And agreed, @The Moonshiner 's work with Leghorns and all of the varieties he has created is very inspiring. He has done well with them for sure.

I will be part of this group ,like you said genetic is a same .
I have a great respect for @The Moonshiner because good breeder when I see one I know how much work and dedication goes into it , Blessing
Ozmarans

 

[KF0002]

the lady I got my stock from in 2018 killed all her stock because they had many deseases and what , she when out there and bought new stock ,
but now she see my marans witch they come out of her stock just reworked ans selectted ,she just can t beleive it , she call it the evolution of her line by some one else work and knoledge . I proved the point .
I m not here to show chooks I m her to breed chooks that can be shown .
Ozmarans

It's pretty amazing that you improved the original line that much, and with careful selection, the line became more disease-resistant and robust. I bet she wanted to buy some birds from you then! lol
My father-in-law, an old retired Gamefowl breeder, told me that no two breeders will breed a line the same. You can give two people each a group of birds from the same line, and in 10 years they may look very different from each other, and different from the original line. Because each breeder will likely select breeders for qualities different from the other and may have different methods for breeding the line (close inbreeding vs line breeding). One line may become poorer in vigor, while the other maintains vigor because of careful selection and not too much close inbreeding. You proved that theory very much true.

 

[ozmarans]

It's pretty amazing that you improved the original line that much, and with careful selection, the line became more disease-resistant and robust. I bet she wanted to buy some birds from you then! lol
My father-in-law, an old retired Gamefowl breeder, told me that no two breeders will breed a line the same. You can give two people each a group of birds from the same line, and in 10 years they may look very different from each other, and different from the original line. Because each breeder will likely select breeders for qualities different from the other and may have different methods for breeding the line (close inbreeding vs line breeding). One line may become poorer in vigor, while the other maintains vigor because of careful selection and not too much close inbreeding. You proved that theory very much true.

agree with your Father-in-low ,100%
I tell you some thing most peoples out there are not breeding they chooks ,what they are doing in multiplying them like what @chickengr said { one rooster plus one hen = chicks ) doesn t matter what are they traits ,
breeding is totaly different aproch we need to know what we are trying to achieve from the mating of any peiring we put together . selective breeding it call .
Ozmarans

 

[The Moonshiner]

If I cross the little Silver Ginger looking stag to the Brown Leghorn hen, their leg color would be sex-linked and any pullets produced would be green legged like the Game and the cockerel chicks will be yellow legged like the Leghorn hen. I could use an F1 yellow legged Golden Duckwing male next year to mate to a Brown Leghorn hen and get Golden Duckwing males and SDW females, breeding away from the Db gene and green legged gene, toward Leghorn.

In another direction, I could mate two F1s together and reinforce the Db and silver genes, and cull any green legged offspring from the mating. I should get some male and female yellow legged offspring from that cross.

With that cross I can expand to 2, 3, or even 4 projects....
Ya that's how my brain works too.
Everything spiderwebs to more things.

 

[Amer]

Okay I may give it a go then. The biggest issue would be that the SDW Gamefowl line we have is willow legged. So breeding out the green leg gene could be challenging and could return to haunt me if I am not careful. The two breeds are similar in a lot of ways, similar in type, comb, feather type, body type, personality, etc. Games and Leghorns have different ideal toplines. The back of a Game slopes downward to the tail, and the tail and back have an abrupt angle. The ideal topline of a Leghorn is a gentle curve from the middle of the back upward to the tail. The gentle curve is caused by extra cushion feathers at the saddle. (I'm learning @Amer !)

This is the Game I would use over the Brown Leghorn hen. He is just a stag still and hasn’t developed his full cock feathers yet, so his tail will be nicer after he molts. They always look nicer after their first full mature molt. He is Silver Ginger with autosomal red (I think that is what @Amer said he was) and these birds are sports that cropped up in the SDW line. But if I use him I can take the project in two different directions: SDW and Silver Ginger. The genotype on these is likely e+/eWh Db/Db S/S. But some may be full Wheaten based, and some are full Duckwing based.

View attachment 4111618

The good news with id+ is, it's sex-linked, so further down the line, if you want to eliminate it, all you have to do is only carry forward the yellow legged pullets into the next generation thus eliminating any chance of id+. So once you get yellow legged silver pullets you can just use those in your Leghorn project.

 

[KF0002]

View attachment 4111795
With that cross I can expand to 2, 3, or even 4 projects....
Ya that's how my brain works too.
Everything spiderwebs to more things.

And this is why you have such a following! That diagram I found could be dangerous.

I can see development in half of the Legbar x Leghorn eggs today so I may give him another few more days with the hen, then put the Silver Ginger rooster with her on my next days off from work. All I need is a couple of birds from that cross to carry on the barring gene. The chicks will be easy to tell apart at hatch. The Legbar's offspring will be barred, and the Silver Ginger's offspring will be silver and non-barred, so no need to clean her out and wait.

 

[KF0002]

The good news with id+ is, it's sex-linked, so further down the line, if you want to eliminate it, all you have to do is only carry forward the yellow legged pullets into the next generation thus eliminating any chance of id+. So once you get yellow legged silver pullets you can just use those in your Leghorn project.

Yes, that is the beauty of the sex-linked leg color genes. As long as you use the yellow legged females you can trust the green leg genes are not being carried forward, because only males can be split for leg color genes. It's a project I may turn lights on in pens for in the winter, so I can get two generations a year. lol

 

[KF0002]

agree with your Father-in-low ,100%
I tell you some thing most peoples out there are not breeding they chooks ,what they are doing in multiplying them like what @chickengr said { one rooster plus one hen = chicks ) doesn t matter what are they traits ,
breeding is totaly different aproch we need to know what we are trying to achieve from the mating of any peiring we put together . selective breeding it call .
Ozmarans

I agree with @chickengr and have always called them chicken "propagators," not breeders. The chicken propagators and peddlers in my area are so bad that it is impossible to get a decent price for birds. The buyers are just as bad because they don't care what conditions the birds came from, no regard for health, they just want cheap birds. So when you ask $30 for a hen, people scoff at that price and say, "I can go down to Jim Bob's and get one for $10." And we just say, "have a safe trip to Jim Bobs getting your $10 hen!"

 

[KF0002]

Smart little things