The Wyandotte Thread

[Germaine_11.20]

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That is what I have also heard, thank you for verifying that. Can you explain to me about breeding with the single comb birds. Do you use the hens or the roos or both? How often do you breed them?

If using a single comb and breeding them do you then cull their offspring with single combs and use only the rosecomb chicks for awhile?

 

[Mrs. Turbo]

If you do decide to use single comb in your flock of Wyandottes only use the single comb hens. We only use a single comb hen if she is an outstanding example of the breed....type, color and lacing. We currently only have 1 single comb hen in our flock. You also have to watch the hen to see how many single comb chicks she is producing. If both the hen and rooster have a recessive single comb gene you will produce a ton of single comb chicks so you might have to find another rooster.

Another alternative to increase fertility and improve the Wyandotte color you are working with, after doing some research of course, is to cross another color Wyandotte into your breeding pen. This is where you get into the complicated F1s and F2s.......but these birds would be kept separate from your main breeding pens until you come up with the final 5th or 6th generation bird.

 

[WyandotteTX]

The biggest problem I had with Wyandottes and infertility was inbreeding and/or line breeding too much. I solved the problem as someone else mentioned by crossing out to other varieties of Wyandottes. The one variety I NEVER had any fertility problems with was my White Laced Red, they layed great and hatched great always.
My Silver Pencilled after a time were having fertilty problems but I dont attribute that to a rose comb because I was still getting single comb birds from mine. They just werent as thrifty in general so I made several crosses into other varities to increase vigor and fertility. For the most part it worked very well over a span of several years. Crossed with very good Partridge to improve type and pencilling. The F1 cockerels were very good in type and the coloring was similar to a Golden Duckwing with the red in their hackle and saddle feathers and a dark red bar across their wings. By using those F1 cockerels with my existing SP hens and pullets I raised some greatly improved birds in terms of markings and type. A side note, the F1 cockerel will produce either Partridge or SP when bred to either of those females, no sex link or off colored birds. So they are a very valuable tool in working with those breeds, in my experience and opinion anyway.
The other cross I made was a complete accident with a standard SP male and bantam SP females. They were in the same pen after I had broken up my breeding groups for the season, the females started laying again alot so I decided to hatch out a batch of them for fun. Well I got full blood SP but they were about half way between bantam and standard. Some of the pullets I hatched out were bantam size, maybe just a hair larger but with exceptional markings. I then moved those pullets into my breeding program for my bantams and raised some great birds out of them. They laid great and fertility was never a problem with them. On the flip side, I did hatch out some larger of the bantam/standard cross that I used with my standard SP because they had the sharply defined markings that the bantams have. By crossing them with my standards I was able to improve the markings of those birds. Surprisingly I didnt lose much when it came to size on the standard birds. Raised one cock bird that I wish I had taken a picture of because he was in my mind the absolutely most perfect SP male bird in terms of type and color.
Sorry for the Wyandotte ramblings today, was on my mind so thought I would share.

 

[cedar post]

Wyandotte TX all your posts on here are like a learning tool for me so feel free to gab away. Thanks Mike

 

[chickenjones]

Does anyone have any pics of wyandotte crosses? (GL crossed with SL, etc) Just curious as I have both. Thanks!

 

[call ducks]

after doing some reading , i guess the BLRW's organly got imported to the US , by canada i *think* they were imported to canada then in to the US, now with that said 99.% of BLRW's in canada are from merrey MCmerry hatchery

(sorry about the spelling) altho we do have one breeder wich has exxelent BLRW's and i may be getting some eggs ,from her

 

[WyandotteTX]

Chickenjones, I am sorry but I left something off yesterday. The GL and SL cross is a sex link cross like I said but what I failed to mention is that whatever the Males color is, is what the pullets will look like. Therefore, if you have a GL roo and SL hens, you will get the F1 cross cockerels and you will get nice GL pullets. If you had a SL roo and GL females, it would be the opposite with SL females but the males would in general look the same as the other cross. This ability to cross is like this is available for many of the Wyandotte varieties. Whether you are talking about the SL/GL cross, or Silver Pencilled/Partridge cross and even the Columbian/Buff Columbian cross.
In all of these crosses, the F1 cockerels will always be a mixture of the two varieties but depending on their type, etc they can be a valuable breeding tool.
The SP/Partridge cross F1s will look similar to Golden Duckwing, the SL/GL F1s will look like a base SL with gold/red in the hackles, saddles and wings, the Col/BCol cross F1s will look like Columbian but be very smutting in their white color with red/gold in the hackles and saddles.

 

[Katy]

Had to share a couple of pictures of the SLW chicks I've hatched out over the last couple of days. There's a couple of orps and marans in there too.

 

[CelticMoon1]

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They are SO CUTE! I can't wait till the snow's gone (or at least more gone than now) so I can get started on my own hatching this year

 

[Shelly_WNC]

Katy - your babies are so precious!!! ... thank you for sharing the pics. I can't seem to get enough of looking at every ones pics. And I love seeing how they develop from these fuzzy butts to hens and roos. The development is so amazing.