who would you breed?

[ashleyxyz]

Between my friends and I we have a pretty massive mixed flock of americaunas, auricana's, RIR, delaware, patridge rock, barred rock, dominique's, serama, brahma, yokohoma, EE, polish, and silkies. Oh but the silkies, we have frizzled curly white, white,sultan, buff, black, red, lavender & splash.
For roosters we have frizzle curly white, brahma,polish, serama, americauna, buff silkie, black silkie and possible splash/lavender/red silkies as well.
We have an incubator and broody hens, really interested in hatching these silkies chics, I've seen some interesting colors (porcelain etc) just wondering how to achieve that?
Also, if this was your flock, who would you breed? Why?

 

[1muttsfan]

When you consider breeding, you should consider your goals first. Are you breeding just to produce more layers for your flock, or do you want to sell chicks/birds/hatching eggs? Do you want to produce purebreds? Do you have the facilities to separate the birds you want to breed? If you are breeding for a certain color in a breed, do you have the correct genetics in your breeding flock? What are you going to do with excess birds, usually cockerels that you do not need for breeding or eating? Because you are very likely to have an excess of rooster.

 

[ashleyxyz]

I plan on breeding for eggs and getting different colors, I have several areas to separate for breeding only. So, if the black silkie (purebred) fertilized the buff silkie (purebred) should I expect half buff and half black chics or a black and buff chic?

 

[1muttsfan]

Unfortunately the genetics are more complicated than that. You might try googling the Chicken Calculator, while you can be limited by not nescessarily knowing what the genetics of your bird are it can be very helpful in telling you what to expect if you do know your birds.

 

[ashleyxyz]

Oh okay thank you! I'll look into this