Breeding larger survival chickens?

[SourRoses]

Was this the book you read? Free Range Survival Chickens

 

[MysteryChicken]

Or indio gigantes. I guess the two are real similar.

They're to large, & wings are alot shorter, so flight is minimal.

 

[CoopBoots]

This sounds like a cool project! Following along

 

[MysteryChicken]

I'm trying to breed a lineage of very cold hardy birds like the chicken equivalent of a capercaillie or kinda like a giant icelandic chicken with the ability to fly like a turkey... And ones who have the survival instincts needed to not rely on humans quite as much abd sleep in trees if not given a coop...

My Mini Games are excellent fliers, but not the size you are looking for. All what I breed are cold hardy.
He's from a pair Mystery Game Bantams.

This Black Pullet is a blend of: Mystery Game Bantam/Blue Face Hatch/Oriental cross X Red JungleFowl/Sumatra.

 

[Cammo77]

I'm reading this book now myself. Interested to see what you come up with I'm thinking of doing similar but I have the heat and humidity issue so should be a bit easier. I don't plan on going full free range with them yet but building a bigger but more natural enclosure with multiple plants for food sources plus supplementary feeding. I'm thinking of using an OEG rooster over leghorn/andalusian hens to begin with.

 

[cubalaya]

try brazilian gamefowl they already possess most of these traits, not indio

 

[RobG7aChattTN]

One big difference between chickens and birds like turkeys and capercaillies is those birds naturally live in cold climates and the ancestors of domestic chickens are tropical so you might want to start with breeds that have already been adapted to cold and try to get the other traits crossed in.
There also seems to be an inverse relationship between size and flying ability. Small chickens fly and large chickens don’t. Even if you get the wing size larger adding the bulk needed for better egg capacity and for more meat makes flight that much harder. I’ve got a breeding project going right now and I’ve been trying to increase size and egg laying but some of the earlier birds were extremely small. One of those hens got away from me in the barn and without hitting the ground she flew out through the barn and landed about 30’ up in a tree 60’ away. When I retired those hens from my breeding program I gave them to a neighbor and one flew out of his barn and across a field and hit a power line and half flew, half tumbled to the ground and ran off. Not sure if she was trying to land on the power line or if she just didn’t see it. Anyway, those birds flew great but very few, very tiny eggs and not much bigger than a pigeon.

 

[LaurenRitz]

My birds don't fly, except as chicks. However, the ability (not discussing tendency at this point) to roost high is there. All my sister's birds roost in the rafters of her shed, maybe 10 feet up. They've done this since her first roo, a Jersey Giant, figured it out and his girls followed him. No leg problems.

Short flights are no problem, provided the birds figure it out as chicks.

My current birds never had that example, and I've never seen one of them fly more than a foot off the ground as adults. I suspect that if they start flying as chicks they'll have the developed muscles to lift themselves as adults.

I am working on a similar project. Have you seen this post?
https://www.backyardchickens.com/threads/landrace-adaptive-breeding-discussion.1624350/

 

[Skyeknight]

My birds don't fly, except as chicks. However, the ability (not discussing tendency at this point) to roost high is there. All my sister's birds roost in the rafters of her shed, maybe 10 feet up. They've done this since her first roo, a Jersey Giant, figured it out and his girls followed him. No leg problems.

Short flights are no problem, provided the birds figure it out as chicks.

My current birds never had that example, and I've never seen one of them fly more than a foot off the ground as adults. I suspect that if they start flying as chicks they'll have the developed muscles to lift themselves as adults.

I am working on a similar project. Have you seen this post?
https://www.backyardchickens.com/threads/landrace-adaptive-breeding-discussion.1624350/

Then it might be best for the chicks of this project te be raised by small flighty chicken breeds. That way they develop the muscles from an early age.

Australorp or brahma that could handle extremely cold temperatures and be able to easily traverse through the snow similar to a capercaillie or turkey...

Since you want them to be adapted to snow what specific traits do you want to breed int them? If I were to personally do something like this I would probably want beards, small crests, pea combs, feathered shanks and dominant white birds. The beards creates an extra layer of feathers and keeps the wattles very small. A small crest might not be needed, but I would assume it might help with keeping warm because of the extra layer of feathers. Pea comb for no frostbite. Feathered shanks for leg warmth, I don't know if I would want them all the way down on the toes. Snow is wet and might actually make the feet colder if the toe feathers stay wet.

Dominant white would mainly be for camouflage in snow. M,uch like the white/winter coats of stoats, hares, foxes, wolves, mountain goats and polar bears. You could make the skin fibromelanistic so much like the black skin of polar bears they absorb warmth better. Because the feathers are white they will still have relatively good camouflage.