The Welsummer Thread!!!!

[bamachicks8]

after 8 long months Lela's first eggs.... Finally.

congrats

 

[faykokoWV]

after 8 long months Lela's first eggs.... Finally.

they're beautiful - congrats

 

[OneCrazyCowgirl]

I'm kinda worried about my wellie. He walks sideways sometimes and his body is at a tilt. He also walks really funky.

 

[bamachicks8]

I'm kinda worried about my wellie. He walks sideways sometimes and his body is at a tilt. He also walks really funky.

is this a new occurrence? how old is he? I hope he gets better soon!

 

[hereorthere]

ideally you would identify which hens are laying the color of egg you want to breed (some like spots, some like solid) and use those hens for breeding your next generation of birds. But, you also would want to assess that hen for other features of the SOP. It would be nice to breed strictly for egg color, but you have to breed for overall quality as well. Ideally, you'll end up with birds that have both a dark egg and meet the SOP. (standard of perfection)

Their laying cycle would be over a period of several months. The first pics I posted (darker ones) are in the fall, the second set around January, the lightest ones from early spring. They usually molt and starts all over again. Mine pretty much or almost stop laying when they molt, lose a ton of feathers and look pretty scraggly to be honest. I was looking for a pic of a hen that molted recently. Sorry I must have deleted it.

You would want to select the darkest eggs to incubate, but you would need to know what that hen is capable of producing at their darkest point as well as what they look like at their lightest point. Something that I always think about with my Marans that Bev Davis says. If she doesn't at least produce a #4 on the Marans eggs color scale even at the lightest point, then it's really not one you would want to incubate for future dark egg producers. I myself remove those hens I know consistently produce lighter colored eggs. I keep them in a separate coop. They are what I call my "eating egg" flock. It really all depends on what you are breeding towards. Are you just wanting darker eggs? Do you want to sell hatching eggs? Do you intend to show the birds or sell them as eggs or birds to people who might want to show them? If you are just looking for darker eggs then I would suggest to see what your hens darkest eggs will be like then decide if you want darker or if her eggs are are ok.
I apply the same method with my Welsummers. I mostly breed for egg color while trying to adhere as closely to the SOP as I can. But I do really pay close attention to those who consistently produce a darker egg year round. My roosters all came from very dark eggs so I feel ok with them. Then I take those darker eggs produced to incubate and work on my next generation of layers. It takes a lot of time and patience to get it all right. Now am I going to say that every egg of mine hatched will be a dark egg producer? No, I won't claim that, but odds are pretty good that they will be because of my selective breeding. You have to cull and document and keep track of who is doing what. It's a lot of work especially if you have a large flock. If you have just a couple birds it can be difficult to get that "dark egg" result you are looking for because you can't really cull and selective breed.
Fact is some hens just don't produce that dark color like we hope they will. In that case it might be best to look elsewhere. I've had hatchery welsummers before. Some of them were just fine, produced a nice dark egg. But overall most of them are no where near what my flock is today. I bit the bullet and bought from a private breeder and ended up with some really nice birds. Like I said though, it all depends on what you want to do with them in the end.

faykokoWV and bwalden - thanks for your replies! Yes, the logistics of breeding to SOP and darker eggs is where I'd like to attain to one day; for the moment, I enjoy them and their eggs.

 

[buckabucka]

after 8 long months Lela's first eggs....

Finally.

Congratulations on the eggs. Where did you get the chicken cut-outs? Are they painted steel? I'm a metal sculptor, so these things always catch my attention!

 

[Anniebee]

I notice here that you mention that 'Leia' has laid her first eggs at 8 months of age. Congrats for that.


I am fairly new to chicken raising, and have one very large Welsummer hen, who - while making a lot of pre-laying noise, lays nothing. She is about 29 weeks old now. The two other chickens I purchased at the same time ( Barnevelder and RIR ) give me 12 to 14 eggs a week between them. The RIR never fails to produce 1 very large egg per day. Have had eggs now for about 6 weeks. We have just gone through an horrendous long long summer ( Victoria, Australia ) and all my chickens molted for many weeks during that time. Once the molt had finished they laid - except for my Welsummer. She also stopped molting a little after the other two.


I am guessing now, from your comments it is common for Welsummers to take a long time to begin to lay ? Would that be right ? She is also extremely aggressive to my little bantam Australian bred Araucana and I think would kill her if they were all together. The Araucana is in a separate free range run, but can see the other chickens and they are company for her ( albeit safe company ). The two laying hens do not put up with the Welsummers' shenanigans, and occasionally pluck out one of her feathers to remind her to behave herself. Other than that, the 3 big hens get along very well.



While here - and PLEASE DO NOT LAUGH - - - is there any such thing as a hermaphrodite chicken ? I probably should post this on the Araucana thread, but will ask just the same, as it might apply to chickens in general. She is a she I have been assured, from the way her feathers lay flat and rounded near her beautiful hen type upright tail which has no sharp showy extra long feathers as in a roo, whatsoever ( we don't have the rumpless Araucana's here ), and she makes some extremely strange noises - have never heard a chicken with such a wide vocabulary. Occasionally she sounds like she is trying to crow, but for the most part just purrs, and makes little gutteral sounds in her throat, some proper clucking sounds - and she moans a little. It is all very strange, hence my question. She adores being cuddled and sitting on my head or arm when she can. She is 4 weeks younger than the other 3 and has also not yet laid - she finished molting a long time back. It is coming in Autumn here now, so I expect they all might molt a bit again and then back off the laying somewhat in winter.


Apologies - I have asked 2 distinctly different questions here, but I hope someone can shed some light on them for me.

Thanking you in anticipation

Cheers ..... Anniebee

 

[FlashPointFarm]

I notice here that you mention that 'Leia' has laid her first eggs at 8 months of age. I am fairly new to chicken raising, and have one very large Welsummer hen, who - while making a lot of pre-laying noises, lays nothing. She is about 29 weeks old now. The two other chickens I purchased at the same time ( Barnevelder and RIR ) give me 12 to 14 eggs a week between them. The RIR never fails to produce 1 very large egg per day. We have just gone through an horrendous long long summer ( Victoria, Australia ) and all my chickens molted for many weeks during that time. Once the molt had finished they laid - except for my Welsummer. She has also stopped molting.


I am guessing now, from your comments it is common for Welsummers to take a long time to begin to lay ? Would that be right ? She is also extremely aggressive to my little bantam Australian bred Araucana and I think would kill her if they were all together. The Araucana is in a separate free range run, but can see the other chickens and they are company for her ( albeit safe company now ). The other two do not put up with her shenanigans, and occasionally pluck out one of her feathers to remind her to behave herself.



While here - and PLEASE DO NOT LAUGH, but is there any such thing as a hermaphrodite chicken ? I probably should post this on the Araucana thread, but will ask just the same, as it might apply to chickens in general. She is a she I have been assured, from the way her feathers lay flat and rounded near her beautiful upright tail which has no sharp feathers as in a roo, whatsoever ( we don't have the rumpless Araucana's here ), and she makes some extremely strange noises - have never heard a chicken with such a vocabulary. Occasionally she sounds like she is trying to crow, but for the most part just purrs, and makes little gutteral sounds in her throat, occasionally a proper clucking sound - and she moans somewhat. It is all very strange, hence my question. She adores being cuddled and sitting on my head or arm when she can. She is 4 weeks younger than the other 3 and has also not yet laid - she finished molting a long time back. It is coming in Autumn now, so I expect they all might molt a bit again and then back off the laying somewhat in winter.


Apologies - I have asked 3 distinctly different questions here, but I hope someone can shed some light on them for me.

Thanking you in anticipation

Cheers ..... Anniebee

Welsummers tend to be slow to mature. I don't see many of mine start laying before 7 months old. As far as aggressiveness, it depends on what you want to put up with. I wouldn't keep a bully around; in my chicken coops, or otherwise; especially if you are afraid she will kill another bird.

As far as hermaphrodite chickens, I haven yet to see one, but stranger things have happened. I have heard of hens taking the role of roosters, especially if you don't have a rooster, and actually crowing.

 

[Hens and Roos]

I had this same problem too with my first hatch. Set 18, tossed 17 infertile eggs, and the one that developed was shrinked-wrapped....but it was a good learning experience. Not sure how large your setup is Hens and Roos, but I learned to greatly reduced the area where my flock free-ranges, thus it allowed for my roo to accommodate the ladies (and they couldn't really run too far away either.) Maybe did that for about a week and a half, then went to set 7 eggs- 1 infertile, 1 died later in development, and 5 happy little peeps now living in the brooder and playing "Are you my mother?" when I socialize them with the hens!

faykokoWV and bwalden - thanks for your replies! Yes, the logistics of breeding to SOP and darker eggs is where I'd like to attain to one day; for the moment, I enjoy them and their eggs.

Our set up is a coop with runs attached and since we live on a pretty busy road, we don't allow freeranging outside their runs. He is almost 3 years old and has a couple of broken/deformed toes-not sure if he injured them fence fighting or if gentic issue of some sort. He might just be slow and not able to accooodate his 3 ladies. We do have the 1 chick that hatched

so we hope that he develops nicely. We will probably try and hatch some more eggs to see if fertility improves as the weather gets better.

 

[Tailfeathers]

While here - and PLEASE DO NOT LAUGH - - - is there any such thing as a hermaphrodite chicken ?

Cheers ..... Anniebee

Anniebee, I would imagine that freaks of nature happen in all species. Having said that, several years ago I had a true BW Ameraucana that had characteristics of both male and female. The coloration was sort of a blend between a BW male and female. The comb was much larger than a female's but not as large as a male's would be. It got a little bigger than a pullet but not as big as a cockerel. After two years of never laying an egg, I finally sold it but my guess is that may have been a hermaphrodite. Now that you bring it up, I wish I had just butchered it to see if it had any testes.

God Bless,