What kind of chickens are these?

[ArizonaDesertChicks]

Quote:
You could be right - I know I'm in the minority here. My first thought was BSL too. I'm just confused by the fact that 3 of them have much larger combs and wattles than the others at only 6 weeks and that only 1 of them has any brown on its chest. It might help if Njones posts a couple pictures of the other chicks for comparison.

I think that of the OP's 10 black sexlinks, there should be a much greater percentage of chicks that have some brown in their feathers. I have seen a post once where someone had a black australorp with brown feathers on its chest (an anomoly). It was full grown and definitely not a bsl - had an australorp face and body.

All of my BSLs matured at the same rate - at six weeks of age, I still had 7 of them and none of them stood out because of their comb size and none of them had wattles yet. You can see from the photos that they really didn't start getting wattles till they were about 15 weeks old and even if I do have a slow 'line' of BSL, I wouldn't think there would be that much difference.

This pic is of my white leghorns & production red (fast maturing chickens) at 7-8 weeks of age -- no wattles and small combs:

I agree that Njones chick has the coloring of a BSL, but it also looks like a roo. Since the two don't go together, I'm still thinking it is probably not a BSL.

 

[njones]

Hi, Thanks for all the replies. I am posting a couple more photos, maybe this will help. As you can see, only 3 out of the 10 don't seem to have larger combs and wattles.

 

[gel2727]

Interesting, where did you get these? I think you have at least 2 different breeds here. The ones without the reddish combs are probably not black stars. Maybe Australorps? It looks like their combs are black? Could they be sumatras?

http://www.mcmurrayhatchery.com/product/sumatras.html

I'm interested to see what everyone else has to say.

 

[stormylady]

I agree with black sexlink but I think he is a Roo. My girls are 15 weeks old and still don't have there combs in.

 

[njones]

I got these chicks from the people that I bought my coop from. They didn't know what they were either. She had 25 and wanted to get rid of 10, so I took them. Saved me from waiting until I could order some from the feed store. I thought 10 would be enough. Ha....same day I got them I knew I would have to get some more. Ordered 8 more from the feed store, but I know what I am getting there. Seems these birds that I have now are still a mystery.

 

[ArizonaDesertChicks]

Yep - the 7 chicks with red combs are definitely roosters - way too much of a difference between the pullets & roos and 6 weeks is too early for pullets to have wattles, even in fast maturing breeds.

Is there only 1 chick with brown feathering and the rest are all black? They might be black australorps and black australorp mixes - sharing one of the same parents - or all mixes.
http://www.citychicks.com.au/p/469756/australorp-hybrid---point-of-lay.html

 

[njones]

Yes, I only have one that has alot of brown on his chest feathers.
Today I noticed that a couple more have just a few brown feathers, you really have to look to see them. The one with alot of brown chest feathers also has a paler color to his comb and wattles, looks more like a light orange rather than the pink to red that the others have. In the sun they all have a purplish tinge to them. I am disappointed to have so many "roos" as I am getting quite attached to them. I love to watch them. They are so cute.
(Hubby thinks I am nuts.....chickens cute?). I know that I can't keep 7 "roos". They are already play fighting.....cute...too cute