White Cornish: Building a Quality, Sustainable Flock for Meat and More.....

[Sandy_01]

So a while back I acquired these.

About a week later they started laying eggs for me. Every egg they lay goes to the incubator. So now I have some of these.

Seems like I am getting 3 different types of chicks. Some hatch white, others hatch with some swirled color and then some hatch white with a reddish chipmunk strip on the back. Seems like the swirled ones are growing in feathers with some color to them???

 

[bigz1983]

So a while back I acquired these.
View attachment 1967002

About a week later they started laying eggs for me. Every egg they lay goes to the incubator. So now I have some of these.
View attachment 1967011

Seems like I am getting 3 different types of chicks. Some hatch white, others hatch with some swirled color and then some hatch white with a reddish chipmunk strip on the back. Seems like the swirled ones are growing in feathers with some color to them???

The parent stock look like purebred white cornish.
That's strange your getting chicks with different color patterns.
What breed and color is the father?

 

[Sandy_01]

large fowl white Cornish.

 

[Sandy_01]

The parent stock look like purebred white cornish.
That's strange your getting chicks with different color patterns.
What breed and color is the father?

White Cornish. I will try to get some pics of them up tomorrow.

 

[Folly's place]

Dominant white, showing underlying color patterns. Interesting!
Or, because you started incubating eggs only a week after getting these birds, at least some were fertilized by another male at the previous farm.
Mary

 

[Sandy_01]

Dominant white, showing underlying color patterns. Interesting!
Or, because you started incubating eggs only a week after getting these birds, at least some were fertilized by another male at the previous farm.
Mary

Well, now you have me thinking. How long would one have to wait to be sure the eggs are fertilized by the chosen male? Two weeks? one month? I think they are done laying for the year so I will have to continue this project in the spring when they start up again.

 

[Folly's place]

I wait two weeks, and once that wasn't quite long enough...
Mary

 

[Ridgerunner]

How long would one have to wait to be sure the eggs are fertilized by the chosen male?

I'll answer in two parts. It takes an egg about 25 hours to go through the hen's internal egg making factory. It can only be fertilized in the first few minutes of that journey. That means if a mating takes place on a Monday, Monday's egg will not be fertile. Tuesday's egg might or might not be, depending on timing. Wednesday's egg should be.

After the rooster hops off, the hen stands up, fluffs up, and shakes. This shake gets the sperm in a special container near where the egg starts its journey. Exactly how long that sperm remains viable is uncertain. I've seen it given somewhere between 9 days and three weeks. For the sperm to stay viable for two weeks is pretty common. There have been some cases where it is more than three weeks, but that's stretching it. So if you use two weeks you're taking a chance, three weeks and you are pretty sure.

I've also heard from a poultry science professional that the sperm works on a "last in - first out" basis. The last rooster to mate with the hen will be the father. He was pretty adamant about that. I look at that as everything else with living animals, you don't get guarantees. It may work in the vast majority of cases but you can always get an exception. That may be why Mary's two weeks usually works.

From what I've read and heard, two weeks is pretty common, used by a lot of people. How sure do you want to be?

 

[Fairview01]

@Sandy_01

Welcome to the surprises of the world of LFW Cornish. Lol.

Many LFW breeders have used different varieties and even different breeds to build up pump up the framework of the LFWs. This 'surprise' can be supressed in a heterozygous recessive state for many, Many, MANY generation andc and then out of the blue it will show up leaving you scratching your head in bewilderment. Here is a pic of one of my surprises. Most likely from a WLR Cornish. I hatched 400 cornish this year and had this one bizarre fella show up. I regret culling it. Out of curiosity if i ever get another one i will let it grow out.

When it comes to white there is the recessive white, dominate white and the expression of the silver gene. I don't know how to tell which is which by looking at them. What i know is that when the silver gene is present it is expressed as black ticking here and there in the feathering. When a LFW has the silver gene they are 'stay white' cornish. They will not pull brass in direct sunlight. Cornish pull brass because they posses the gold gene. If thats the case they will pull brass in shade, in complete darkness and during the months of artic darkness. The silver gene is very desirable.

If you look very closely at his back and right wing youll see traces of the black ticking.

Chick down may or may not be an indicator of feather color characteristics. I am studying this but have only ome year of data. They come out as silver white, yellow, wild and mixtures of any of those.

Hens can hold viable sperm for as long as a month. They can also eject the sperm if after being covered by a rooster they comsider him inferior. Usually a week is normal.

Send me a pm with the breeder name. We all pretty much know each other.

 

[Sandy_01]

I'll answer in two parts. It takes an egg about 25 hours to go through the hen's internal egg making factory. It can only be fertilized in the first few minutes of that journey. That means if a mating takes place on a Monday, Monday's egg will not be fertile. Tuesday's egg might or might not be, depending on timing. Wednesday's egg should be.

After the rooster hops off, the hen stands up, fluffs up, and shakes. This shake gets the sperm in a special container near where the egg starts its journey. Exactly how long that sperm remains viable is uncertain. I've seen it given somewhere between 9 days and three weeks. For the sperm to stay viable for two weeks is pretty common. There have been some cases where it is more than three weeks, but that's stretching it. So if you use two weeks you're taking a chance, three weeks and you are pretty sure.

I've also heard from a poultry science professional that the sperm works on a "last in - first out" basis. The last rooster to mate with the hen will be the father. He was pretty adamant about that. I look at that as everything else with living animals, you don't get guarantees. It may work in the vast majority of cases but you can always get an exception. That may be why Mary's two weeks usually works.

From what I've read and heard, two weeks is pretty common, used by a lot of people. How sure do you want to be?

Now that is an answer that I can really sink my teeth into. Thank you so much.