Hello all! I will be a first time Wyandotte owner on the 31st, and am embarking on a project. I will be trying to 'start from scratch' with hatchery quality GLWs, and increase health, type, and color until they are as close to standard as possible. It will most definitely be a long term thing. This project, however, has posed me with a question. I've always heard the saying build the barn before you paint it, but where does vigor fit in here? This is the first time I've done this, and I'd like to start off in the correct mindset. Let me give you my plan: I'm starting with five pullets and a cockerel. I'll hatch out everything I can for the first mating year and let them all grow. It may be a hundred birds. Anything with excessive health problems will be culled. Any with extreme deviations from standard will be culled. I then hope to have about ten hens and two cocks from that first generation. Twelve out of a hundred may seem low, but from what I've read extreme culling is the only way to make good progress. ( Only birds with health issues will actually be culled. Those with disqualifications will either be saved for the pot or put with my laying flock. I'm not wasteful.) From there, I'll hatch out as much as I can from the F1s, and while still focusing on health and vigor, start making more culls based on type. I figured I would go on this way until vigor is no longer an issue and type is good. Then I'd start on color.
Where do you guys place vigor according to importance? If you have a hen with great type and color, but poor vigor, what do you do?
Also, does anyone know common problems hatchery stock have? I haven't ordered from a hatchery before, but I know there is no quality as far as standard goes. Do they commonly have health problems? I see a lot of folks treating for split leg and cross beak and such.
Basically what I'm asking is if I'm going astray here or if I'm way off base. I haven't decided what type of breeding system I'll use, but considering my parent generation only has one cockerel, that won't be an issue for a year or two.
I'll warn you... you can plan and plan and plan, and the birds usually have different ideas of how it all works. LOL
yes, hatching lots and culling hard is always a good idea when striving for the standard.
here's a couple general tips that I never thought of when I first started breeding...
if you haven't already, build your coops ASAP. and build for twice as many birds as you 'think' you'll have.
keep an extra rooster. you never know when you'll lose one, whether to accident disease or predators...
unless you REALLY like a challenge, save yourself years of time effort and money and just start with the best stock you can find and improve upon that line.
in my case, show quality silver grey or red Dorkings don't exist in the us. if there are, I haven't heard about them. so the only readily available sg and reds ARE from hatcheries. There are a few breeders that are selling slightly better stock, but again I wouldn't consider them SQ yet. so in your case, with gold laced 'dottes, you're a few steps ahead of me on that aspect, since SQ stock IS available to work with.
also, don't forget that they're slow growing so in order to determine type, you'll have to keep a number of them for at least 3 months, sometimes more. their full type won't develop probably until closer to 4-5 months IMO. and yes, you 'build the barn' first, but I would personally cull hard also for poor lacing. sometimes the hatcheries produce birds that don't have complete lacing, which means the genetics for the color aren't completely there. so once the lacing is complete, with a nice narrow edge all the way around, THEN you can worry about the type and not worry about losing the color WHILE you work on type. the laced varieties are the only ones i'd say that about typically... since there are 3 different mutations that HAVE to be homozygous for lacing to show properly. otherwise you may have a gorgeous Wyandotte that has incomplete lacing or none at all, which would defeat the purpose of breeding glw up to standard, since you'd then have to incorporate someone that does have the correct lacing pattern but not the type maybe.
