The Wyandotte Thread

[syble]

Quote:
I would like to get rid of one of them, i have quite a few roosters and they are hard on the hens. By spring i want to be down to 1 male and 2-3 hens. but i never rush the hens, there is always a market for beautiful laying hens and they don't get rough with each other.

I have handled and critiqued those poor males soo much as they've grown trying to evaluate them, to the point where i'm a bit lost.

bird 1 is the most developed, he is very wide and very round. he has a nice full breast as well. I really dislike how low his wings sit, they look too low to me now so i can only imagine they will be far to low as he matures. There isn't much i like about his head... his wattles are a bit long, and wrinkly and if i remember right he doesn't have a point to his comb which is lumpy also.

bird 2 is least mature out of the lot, and has 0 tail so i think that throws off his look totally :S his comb is better then #1 but has a few random bumps so not as nice as #3. He's just not as massive or round as the others, but i wonder if that wont come on more as he ages?

bird #3 is i think the winner so far? has a symmetrical comb (very mild depression at front but not as bad as the shadow makes it look). Nicely proportioned wattles that are perfectly round and rather flat. Body wise he seams proportionate wise on par with #1 but not quite as big... he carries his wings better (to me at least). I think I also like that he almost has a shorter back in relation to his body then #1 does. He looks like he might finish off more round over all then #1, which looks longer with a bit more slope to me.

Am i in the ball park? and thanks for all the help, a fresh eye can give a lot of insight!
Thanks
Sib

While Jerry and I disagree on this one, he has a point about waiting and seeing. If you want the best, biggest birds, you have to wait. I don't and won't do that. I want mine to mature faster and, imho, waiting is allowing slow growth as a favorable selection criteria. I'll take the faster growing, faster maturing birds anytime and make chicken and noodles out of the slow pokes. If you end up selecting #2 and using him next year, guess what kind of offspring you will get. I hate slow. Therefore, I eat slow. Next year I can raise and eat more fast growers, cull sooner and know sooner what I have if I use fast growth/maturation as a selection criteria.

But I did sell him a young Partridge cockerel last year that matured pretty slow and it turned out really nice, see pics on his website. So in the end, maybe Jerry does always win...

Although i try not to rush them too much, I don't have separate pens for the pullets and cockerels... they have gotten hormonal recently and that point is when i try and thin them out a bit. Like you I do tend to favor the ones that grow faster when i can. I don't want to set myself back in a quest for speed but if i have comparable birds i have no quams about picking the faster grower. Also truth be told i am a student money is always tight, so I'm trying not to keep anything any longer then i have to (I have made cuts to all my birds, but I am least familiar with SLW). Thanks for all the pointers and bare with me lol. I'm kind of glad i didn't post the pullets up first lol. Am I anywhere on target with my critiques of the boys?
Thanks
Sib

 

[Hwlchickmama]

 

[gilavina]

I haven't been on here in a while...life's been crazy! I am in the process of planning and culling down for winter and am trying to decide on some girls I have. Part of deciding who stays and goes is if I can source a silver penciled male. I've been told Duane Urch has silver pencileds....anyone have experience with the quality of large fowl wyandottes he has? I haven't heard a whole lot.

 

[HallFamilyFarm]

Quote:
Duane is an APA/ABA judge and a Grand Master Exhibitor of various breeds, including turkeys. His info and 2012 price list is posted at https://www.backyardchickens.com/forum/viewtopic.php?id=437644

Not sure how good his Silver Pencilled Wyandottes are, but would be lots better than any hatchery bird.

 

[gilavina]

Quote:
Duane is an APA/ABA judge and a Grand Master Exhibitor of various breeds, including turkeys. His info and 2012 price list is posted at https://www.backyardchickens.com/forum/viewtopic.php?id=437644

Not sure how good his Silver Pencilled Wyandottes are, but would be lots better than any hatchery bird.

I sure hope they are decent...finding Silver Pencileds is like pulling teeth. Ironically its the color I've wanted to raise for a long, long time. Just never had the space before to have them. I've thought about ordering some to go ahead and see what I get...just hoping someone might have first hand experience with that color from him.

 

[rtroxel]

Quote:
As to SP Wyandottes, Duane has the about the best you'll find. They have pretty good color and type. Small, but what colored Wyandotte isn't?

 

[rtroxel]

Although i try not to rush them too much, I don't have separate pens for the pullets and cockerels... they have gotten hormonal recently and that point is when i try and thin them out a bit. Like you I do tend to favor the ones that grow faster when i can. I don't want to set myself back in a quest for speed but if i have comparable birds i have no quams about picking the faster grower. Also truth be told i am a student money is always tight, so I'm trying not to keep anything any longer then i have to (I have made cuts to all my birds, but I am least familiar with SLW). Thanks for all the pointers and bare with me lol. I'm kind of glad i didn't post the pullets up first lol. Am I anywhere on target with my critiques of the boys?
Thanks
Sib

If you can keep two, I think I agree with you and would cull the smaller one. Of course then they will pick a little more on each other, but that's how it goes. If you can keep only one, well, you have a little bit of tough choice.​

 

[gilavina]

Quote:
As to SP Wyandottes, Duane has the about the best you'll find. They have pretty good color and type. Small, but what colored Wyandotte isn't?

good deal. Thanks for the feed back. How's the leg color since you've seen them?

 

[rtroxel]

I'm sure it isn't as yellow as you'd like, but it's workable. You are talking about the rarest of the SOP varieties, so anything decent you find will be about as good as there is and any improvements you make will be helpful to the variety as a whole.

As a teacher, I look at kids getting poor grades. It's not too hard to get a poor grade up, but it's really hard to go all the way up to an A. It is much, much easier to take an excellent grade and lower it. The best SP Wyandottes are at a D compared with the best Wyandotte in the country. Most people would just probably give them all Fs and flush the toilet, but someone stupid (me) has to love them anyway. A person should be able to make pretty quick improvement to them, but taking that last step is always tough.

 

[SChunn]

I have a question for all the experienced wyandotte breeders out there. I have both silver and gold laced girls. I've noticed that one of my GLW has double and triple laced feathers on her tail feathers. The rest of her body is normally laced. They just finished molting and I didn't notice this pattern before. She's the only one and she just happens to be my darkest pullet. Her gold is more brown than the others and the black lacing is wider. All of my GLW came fro the same pen and I did see the breeding flock. None of the adults had this pattern. It's very pretty, but I know it's not right. Any ideas what might have caused this? I can try to get pictures but I'm having trouble with uploading pics lately.