Wrath's Marans

[Kung_pao]

I’m not new to chickens but I am to Marans so I do have a few questions.
When you’re breeding for dark eggs are there any suggestions to maintain or improve egg color?
Do you think the male or female contributes more to egg color?
Do two dark egg layer always equal dark eggs?
Ok I think that’s enough questions for now.

 

[wrathsfarm]

View attachment 4265938

Lovely color !!

 

[wrathsfarm]

I’m not new to chickens but I am to Marans so I do have a few questions.
When you’re breeding for dark eggs are there any suggestions to maintain or improve egg color?

Select your darkest eggs and test mate your roo, track your pullets first 20-30 eggs and keep selecting darkest eggs and backcross to your known dark egg roo.

Do you think the male or female contributes more to egg color?

Male

Do two dark egg layer always equal dark eggs?

Not necessarily 100%

Ok I think that’s enough questions for now.

 

[BlueTheBrahma]

Select your darkest eggs and test mate your roo, track your pullets first 20-30 eggs and keep selecting darkest eggs and backcross to your known dark egg roo.

Male

Not necessarily 100%

@wrathsfarm I feel like I recall asking @Chooks man about which parent contributes egg colour more and he seemed to think that the male being more important is a myth, and they only get credit because they sire more offspring. I could be misremembering but I remember correcting my own notion because I’d always read that the sire contributed egg colour more, but he said it was roughly equal.

 

[Tstraub]

I don’t have enough real experience with egg color genetics to offer any specific advice on that but I’ll just add some general breeding thoughts

Hatch as many chicks as you are able to humanely house and can afford to feed.

Always keep overall health of the birds as top priority when selecting your breeders.

Resist the urge to only breed your youngest birds. Your older birds got old because they have what it takes to stay healthy. If you only breed the young ones then years down the road you discover most of your birds have some serious health issues like heart, liver, disease or get egg bound by the time they are 2-3 years old you’ll be in a bad situation with no easy way to recover the line.

Feed quality feed

 

[BlueTheBrahma]

I don’t have enough real experience with egg color genetics to offer any specific advice on that but I’ll just add some general breeding thoughts

Hatch as many chicks as you are able to humanely house and can afford to feed.

Always keep overall health of the birds as top priority when selecting your breeders.

Resist the urge to only breed your youngest birds. Your older birds got old because they have what it takes to stay healthy. If you only breed the young ones then years down the road you discover most of your birds have some serious health issues like heart, liver, disease or get egg bound by the time they are 2-3 years old you’ll be in a bad situation with no easy way to recover the line.

Feed quality feed

The breeding age point is a really good one I always forget to mention to people. I second this.

 

[Kung_pao]

Thank you guys, this is information you can’t get anywhere else. I appreciate it so much

 

[Kung_pao]

I have another batch of chicks from November. Lots of them have some white feathers, is that ok on chicks? She said her birds were from the Stallings Farm line. The eggs were not large, I’m hoping they were just young birds. Nothing I dislike more than a big bird that lays medium to small eggs. This current batch are nice big eggs. I’ll have to band these two lines so I can tell the difference.

 

[wrathsfarm]

@wrathsfarm I feel like I recall asking @Chooks man about which parent contributes egg colour more and he seemed to think that the male being more important is a myth, and they only get credit because they sire more offspring. I could be misremembering but I remember correcting my own notion because I’d always read that the sire contributed egg colour more, but he said it was roughly equal.

This is news to me and I don't recall seeing this anywhere. If you come across the quote, please share. It seems to me as common sense would dictate for instance hatching eggs from a #8 hen x a roo coming from say a #4 would put you generally in the offsprings #6 egg range theoretically speaking. So it seems using a darker egg roo would be off utmost importance to darken future generations.
I do realize it's not as simple as that, just an example. I do remember him also saying that pairing 8/9 roo x 8/9 hen doesn't necessarily mean you'll get 9's all day long. Making test mates with multiple males that much more important

 

[wrathsfarm]

I have another batch of chicks from November. Lots of them have some white feathers, is that ok on chicks? She said her birds were from the Stallings Farm line. The eggs were not large, I’m hoping they were just young birds. Nothing I dislike more than a big bird that lays medium to small eggs. This current batch are nice big eggs. I’ll have to band these two lines so I can tell the difference.

Completely normal and they should molt out.