What would a Buff Orpington and Black Australorp cross look like??

[pburthold]

hi all
im in texas. and i would be interested in australorp barred rock mix!
some chicks would be great. or.. started pullets/hens.
we have one and she is awesome! and she gets along well with dominiques/ domineckers/dominickers( ur choice of pronunciation).
any info anyone?

 

[aveca]

Both barred rock and coopers black orpington are the base breeds of australorps . or foundation breeds.. The coopers black orp is crossed into australorps often in australia to acheive a certian look but the australorp needs to keep a tighter feather according to the standard so occasionally clean legged black langshan and black show leghorn are added back in , leghorn is also one of the foundation breeds of the australorps and the probably get thier green feathers and occasional spur on the femal from the sumatras that were added at one time..So adding buff orp if it is black is never a bad thing...there is a fantastic book called "the australorp" written by one of the formost breeders in the world , many time australian champion breeder, a good read and careful interesting building of this wonderful breed of bird.

This is considered a Giant australorp by some to me its a coopers black orp or plain old black orp

I will be breeding her back into the son od this hen and some new stock Im getting to tighten up the feathers ..Should be an interesting project and underway next year.

a few of us are trying to catch up to the australians with this breed but we have a LONG ways to go

 

[mandiceb]

Well, I have a black Australorp Rooster with 3 Black Ladies and 8 buff orpington hens. One of the buffs just hatched out 3 chicks today. We'll see if we get anymore. But I guess I'll have some pictures soon!

 

[Farmerboy16]

I have a Black Australorp/ Buff Orpington hen, and she does not look like any of the pictures above. She has buff color, with black lacing. Alot of people have commented how pretty she is, and wonder what breed she is. Maybe I will take a picture of her tomorrow and post it here.

 

[aveca]

it seems like there are a lot of sub species of blk orps and australorps. the english blk orps are big meaty birds the american version is a bit different big also .i said above cooper blk orp, i meant cook blk orp..hatchery breeders put very little effort into type and worried a little more about good back yard laying hens..good australorp hens are rare as hens teeth and breeders arnt quick to give them up..breeders concentrated more on correct type working toward the standard of perfection... you would be safe to add back a little blk orp into australorps..old time breeders chose blk orps that were smaller and pretty much cast offs from blk orp breeders so as not to make australorps too big thou a little size doesnt hurt..this is a good example thou he has his faults of american breeder version australorp rooster, smaller neater tail, elegant neck but not too bulky. he is out of an old US line early improt that somone kept going..Im pretty sure somewhere down the line somone added blk orp back in. to get that neater tail. in some of the old books by breeders we have been dowloading for free to kindle (you can get kindle free for pc too) give worlds of advise and some of it is very interesting.as well as ray connor 17 time world champion australorp breeders book..he said one of his tactics is he always looks at his rooster and looks for his weakness, then he uses hens that will compliment his flw or help to fix it.

I cant recomend highly enough to buy from a breeder..you will have fewer faults to work with..the only downside to buying from a breeder is you buy chicks , you will get a high number of boys sometimes where hatchery can send you exactly what you want in nmber of females ..here is a good blk orp cockeral American version..very big , heavy to pick up..had to make him a cage as he was way too big for a standard cage..but you can see where the 2 breeds compliment each other..if you work both breeds choose some of the smaller orps that are more correct into the australorps ..you will be making some winners.Like I said, ray connor had huge success by looking over his cockerals and choosing females to fix any flaws he had. at one time we added a little decent barred rock but a problem arose out of it but maybe that was just a frek...as the hens all molted out, the head feathers would hace some barring..it was hard to get rid of..so somone told me look for sports or blk barreds that breeders were looking to get rid of..i never followed throu with that ..but maybe thats the answer ..not sure

 

[stumpbroke]

Just had 9 hatch from a Black Australorp rooster and Buff Orpington hen 3 days ago. 7 are black with rust on the head and 2 are rust. No white markings on any of the 9.

 

[Henk69]

When you cross 2 purebreeds the outcome would be uniform. All the genes are pure so all the offspring get the same ones.

 

[klwr333]

I'm reading this thread with great interest. Just this evening we hatched our second dark-colored chick. It is so new that it hasn't even "fluffed up" yet, so all I can say is that it is big and strong, and that it is dark. All our others are pure Buff Orpingtons. Our Buff rooster, Brewster B. Fluffybritches (I love that name, and try to inject it into conversations as much as possible!), is the papa of all our babies, and our nine Buff hens are in prime laying form and, really, were the only ones I expected to become mamas. (The chicks think that we are their mamas, of course, which I suppose they will for a few weeks until they figure out they're chickens.)

We have three elderly hens, though, and apparently at least one of them is nowhere near as menopausal as I thought they all were! Two of them are Barred Rocks, and one of them is a Black Australorp. Judging by the threads I've read and the photos I've seen, I have been tending to think that our first dark chick was the offspring of Brewster and one of the Barred Rocks. Now I am not so sure.

From what I understood, a Buff Orpington X Barred Rock cross would result in two types: hens would be a sort of rusty black (or blacky-rust, I suppose) with varying degrees of orangish areas on their bodies and rusty spots on many of their otherwise black feathers; roosters would be barred.

First of all, is this so? Do I have that correct?

Secondly, some of the Black Australorp/Buff Orpington crosses y'all posted photos of on here look very much like our older dark chick. I had been of the opinion that our first dark chick (what we call the "chicklets" now, since they're about six weeks old and not really chicks, not really chickens) was 1) female, and 2) the daughter of one of our Barred Rocks.

Since seeing the photos y'all have posted, though, I begin to doubt myself. I will describe her as thoroughly as I can, but tomorrow I will try to post some pics: She is a bit smaller than the her pure Buff half-brothers and sisters, but not tiny. I would say that her feathers are primarily black, but she almost looks like she was standing too near while someone was using rusty-orange colored spray paint. She is by far the most intelligent-seeming of the whole lot of the chicklets, but that doesn't seem to be much to brag about. She is cautious, but not flighty, and she is very people-oriented. Her legs are gray . . . sometimes I think they're very dark, sometimes I think they're only medium.

Do any of those characteristics seem like they might lean toward an Australorp hen's offspring from a Buff rooster instead of a Barred Rock's offspring from a Buff rooster? I am very curious about this, and I am so looking forward to seeing if this newly hatched chick grows into the same type of chicklet! Since I couldn't see any spots on its head, and the down around its beak and eyes seemed to have more of a reddish tint than a silvery tint, I am hoping that it is a girl, but . . . it's really too early for me to even be sure about the reddish vs. silvery. It is probably just wishful thinking that I'm projecting onto the poor little thing! Since its eventual destiny will be the freezer instead of a nice life with the rest of the girls if it does turn out to be a roo . . . it probably wouldn't mind my projecting feminine vibes toward it!

Thank you for all the wonderful posts, not only in this thread, but all over the site. I am mostly just lurking, reading things about trying to sex Buffs and that sort of thing, but you are all so friendly with your help and information! I so appreciate it!

Oh! I forgot to add that the egg the dark one hatched this evening was, of course, a "brown" egg, but it was toward the pink-beige end of the brown egg spectrum. Since I have NO clue which eggs are laid by which hens, though, I can't tell anything from that egg color myself. If it is some well-known fact that Barred Rocks or that Black Australorps tend toward the pinky-beige egg-laying habit, I am not aware of it and would be happy to be educated further!

--Kristi

 

[klwr333]

Here are pictures of the first dark chick we hatched and the second. The first one had very little down on its back and neck that wasn't black. The recent one, though, has a barely noticeable touch of silvery down on the back of its neck. The first chick's "mask" wasn't as prominent as the second one's, and the down around the "mask" was an orange-yellow color. The recent chick's "mask" is quite noticeable, as around the mask and under its beak on its throat is a rich sunshine-yellow color. These are only "phone-pics", and they are not very good (obviously), but I'm wondering whether it is a difference in gender causing the difference in appearance, or perhaps a difference in mother that is causing the difference in appearance, and if so, which one might be out of the Black Australorp hen, and which out of one of the Barred Rocks.

First chick:

Second chick:

I'm betting on a gender difference, and this newer one being a roo. They just seem too similar to be out of a different breed of hen entirely.

 

[nicalandia]

Quote:
Oh my God.. my little boy looks like his clone...