Ameraucana thread for posting pictures and discussing our birds

[jajeanpierre]

Now my Wheaten cockerels that will be slaughtered as soon as I grow the backbone to do it. This weekend? Next? I don't think either of these boys are very good, but I really would appreciate your comments on what is wrong and what is right with them. It doesn't help that they have both lost feathers at the nape of their neck (they are the two biggest cockerels but the also the two bottom cockerels and well below the little bossy splash pullet). The black in the hackle feathers is molting out to a clear orange color. They won't live long enough for me to find out if all the black in the hackles eventually molts out to a clear orange. Cockerel #1 (pictured first) has a really ugly outline and never had any balance. When he first started developing this top line, I thought he had been hurt by a hawk and went through his feathers looking for the wound that was causing the feathers to lift making his back to look like Quasimodo. No wound. When I put him in the cage to photograph him, I noticed he has a couple of feathers growing from his shank, just below the hock joint. I don't know the relationship between this cockerel and the wheaten pullet pictured in a previous post, but if he came from the same breeding pen, how does that affect the wheaten pullet if (a very big if) I chose to breed her? The breeder has toe punched them all, I just haven't checked their toe punches to see if they might be related.

Wheaten Cockerel #1:








Wheaten Cockerel #2

This second cockerel is a lot more balanced and gives a better outline, but he just doesn't excite me at all. This one has a lot of brown feathering in the tail and the rear body feathers. That wouldn't show up in a pullet, would it? How big a fault is it? The black in the hackles is molting out, but he won't live long enough for me to see if it completely goes away or if the brown on his rear body feathers corrects.

 

[delisha]

Your lavender has the best body *type*. I am not crazy about her tail or feather condition, but, that is typical of lavenders. They are hard to get good quality feathering. They need extra fat in the diet.(Calf Manna)
I like all of your birds. There are many things that are good and a few things to work on(color and size). Color is one of those things. I have a muddy blue myself. I am chicken to hatch any of her eggs. I would not use a muddy male for breeding. Your blue male is nice except his color. I like all the leg lengths, and beards..very pretty. Splash shows in legs in some birds. Your birds are young and will fill out quite a bit more. They seem to take a little while to fill in the chest and round out last. You are lacking curves and fullness. I do not think your tail set is low on your splash pullet. It will round out a bit more as she sexually matures. The splash males tail is a bit high but nothing to worry about IMO. I would sure like to see these birds in 3 more months. They will fill out nice. Good leg colors. Your wheaten has black ticking and I am not sure that is desirable or not. For me it throws off the bird, but, I have little knowledge about that color. I don't like her front at this time, but, that might change with some time to mature. In two months time she might get some breast meat. You can weigh them in a box or invest in a mail scale.

 

[jajeanpierre]

Meant to include this with my blue cockerel's pictures. He seems really fluffy with a lot of down. Is he too fluffy?

 

[jajeanpierre]

Your lavender has the best body *type*. I am not crazy about her tail or feather condition, but, that is typical of lavenders. They are hard to get good quality feathering. They need extra fat in the diet.(Calf Manna)
I like all of your birds. There are many things that are good and a few things to work on(color and size). Color is one of those things. I have a muddy blue myself. I am chicken to hatch any of her eggs. I would not use a muddy male for breeding. Your blue male is nice except his color. I like all the leg lengths, and beards..very pretty. Splash shows in legs in some birds. Your birds are young and will fill out quite a bit more. They seem to take a little while to fill in the chest and round out last. You are lacking curves and fullness. I do not think your tail set is low on your splash pullet. It will round out a bit more as she sexually matures. The splash males tail is a bit high but nothing to worry about IMO. I would sure like to see these birds in 3 more months. They will fill out nice. Good leg colors. Your wheaten has black ticking and I am not sure that is desirable or not. For me it throws off the bird, but, I have little knowledge about that color. I don't like her front at this time, but, that might change with some time to mature. In two months time she might get some breast meat. You can weigh them in a box or invest in a mail scale.

Thanks so much for your comments, although I don't think you are going to like the Wheaten cockerels. The splash cockerel was pretty excited in the cage--he was trying to jump through the top. He was photographed alone while everyone else had a friend beside them. I don't think his tail set is as high as it is in the pictures, but it is certainly higher than the blue's. I've just started feeding them Calf Manna.

Is the poor feather quality related to the lavender color in all breeds, or just in Ameraucanas?

 

[ChickNmamma]

Quote: All Lavender based birds have feather problems. It has to do with the Lavender gene that strips the black from the feathers. If you think of it sort of like bleach - it pulls the pigment out of the feathers and strips their color - I think it also strips their strength which is why you get awful feathers. Crossing back to black is to replace the strength of the feathers but then you have to cross back to Lavender again to get the Lavender color. If you breed Lavender to Lavender the feathers get worse and worse. However, I have seen Crystal Creek's Lavender birds, and they don't have the fretting and their feathers look good - but I don't know if she was doing Lav x Lav or using Splits to strengthen the feathers. All I know is they look really good... so maybe there is a gene that can be brought in that strengthens the feathers and removes the fretting.

In other breeds they call the Lavender birds Self Blue. There are also Self Blue birds that are based on the Blue gene instead of the Lavender gene. Those birds breed like B/B/S and they don't have the fretting or the feather problems.

 

[Goose and Fig]

Lavender CUCKOO have no poor feather quality issues. Perhaps its time for all of us to stop obsessing over breeding to black and think outside the box for a change.

 

[unkadan]

Next is my Wheaten pullet, again hatched April 1. She's a blue Wheaten, right? She is quite small. Her tail feathers have not fully grown in so her tail set looks worse than it probably is. I didn't like her at all as a younger chick, but she gets nicer and more balanced as she grows up. Her breeder (and the breeder of all my Ameraucanas) told me to wait and not be quick to judge. The black on her hackles is molting out. I believe that was one thing that Paul Smith told me, to wait that things like the hackle feathers would correct as they matured. This pullet and the two Wheaten cockerels have molted out most of their black feathers in their hackles, starting at the head and working down to the nape of the neck. It is funny that the hackle feathers on the left side of this pullet have more black than the right side, even in pictures I took of her at the end of August.

At least the way this color displays on my screen this is not a Blue Wheaten, and being a Wheaten it would be nice if that black in the tail (and I have to assume on the wings) was more vivid. I have issues with the black in the hackles, my 1 yr old pullets are in a prolonged moult but I seems they might have lost it. Mine came from Meredith but I know he works with Smith on these.

 

[delisha]

Quote: lol..I am strange..so you never know..I might love the cockerel..

I do not have Lavender Orpingtons because of feather problems. The fretting of the feathers makes them look like they went threw the blender. I don't do stupid or ugly in my birds. I am the cull machine.

BBS is a nice enough project for me. I love the color of the Blue Wheaten and I might dabble eventually if I run across some nice stock and I can actually put my hands on them.

 

[jajeanpierre]

At least the way this color displays on my screen this is not a Blue Wheaten, and being a Wheaten it would be nice if that black in the tail (and I have to assume on the wings) was more vivid. I have issues with the black in the hackles, my 1 yr old pullets are in a prolonged moult but I seems they might have lost it. Mine came from Meredith but I know he works with Smith on these.

Here's a picture I just took in full sun. Sorry about the shadows from the cage. The grey on the primary wing feathers are grey, not black although I see they look black in the photo I just uploaded. The underside of the wing is grey. The tail is grey. How is the colored part of the wing and tail feathers supposed to look like? The top of the wing feathers has a lot of wheaten, but if you turn the wing over, it is almost solid grey. Would a wheaten ever have grey colored feathers on their wing? What color is she? Thanks.

 

[jajeanpierre]

lol..I am strange..so you never know..I might love the cockerel..

I do not have Lavender Orpingtons because of feather problems. The fretting of the feathers makes them look like they went threw the blender. I don't do stupid or ugly in my birds. I am the cull machine.

BBS is a nice enough project for me. I love the color of the Blue Wheaten and I might dabble eventually if I run across some nice stock and I can actually put my hands on them.

I'm feeling the same way--I hate ratty feathers. I have parrots and one of mine came to me as a 20-year old neurotic mess and had plucked his chest, legs and belly bald. His condition is an embarrassment to me.

I didn't know what I wanted so I asked Paul to send me some of everything except black.

Did you look at my Wheaten cockerels pictures I posted? The only thing I like is that they aren't big poof balls like my blue. Is that fluffy plumage (of my blue) a fault?