Cross breeding New hampshires with Sussex light with Rhode island whites

[DIGGIN CHICKEN]

I was told that when cross breeding chickens the young end up retaining the better characteristics of the two breeds

OK ... I've had my New Hampshire's for about 2 years now and not very impressed with their egg production ...its not bad .. but i'm also a bit bored now ... I played around with their feed , time of year ect ...still no joy ... decided to start doing something about it ....did a little reading ... and looked around for what i was able to source !

had a choice between leghorns , orphington buffs , lohmann's , australopes ,valers, potch koekoek, Rhode island reds and whites, WYANDOTTE GOLDEN LACED and Sussex light . All of these are ''pure breds'' ... don't really want to get into the pavement special business - which can from time to time produce excellent layers but when trying trying to sell the damn things and people ask ''what breed are they ??''. ''Dunno '' doesn't seem like an educated response ......

First order of business was the brown lohmann's ... which is a hybrid New Hampshire together with brown egg layers ... apparently their eggs are infertile (?????????)... according to one breeder i spoke to (maybe his rooster was gay ???) ... so not going to invest time on that one at all .. but here in SA ... they are the queens of egg laying (if i had said ''kings'' i think i would have had a few eyebrows lifted) .. however not very suitable for free ranging .. and besides I already have New Hampshire ! So that was an easy one to scratch off the list !

Then i looked at the leghorns ... yes they do lay a nest full of eggs but somehow i'm put off by them .. i purchased 5 chicks and only 1 survived ...they were amongst my 30 or so New Hampshire chicks (all my New Hampshire survived in exactly the same conditions)... the one that survived puberty ...well... the fastest chicken know to man ... my old man named her 'Zola Bud' due to her speed and agility ... but she wasn't fast enough to eluded the neighbours dog though ... was a sad day for the old man !!! So i bought some geese to protect the chickens ... Well if Zola couldn't outrun a dog what chance would a buff have ?? Anyway i narrowed the list down using pure breeding logic as one can tell ...

Sussex light ... Pretty chicken .. reminds me of princess Di with a necklace ...good egg layer apparently .. good for meat too... so got me some eggs ... 9 to be exact ... pretty dam expensive eggs at 30 bucks a pop ! Point of lay hens were 500 bucks each ...bit too rich for my blood !

While i was there , the breeder pointed to the Rhode Island browns ... we had a discussion and i ended up purchasing the Rhode Island white eggs (see the breeders logic shining through ??)... 9 to be exact ... at 15 bucks a pop .. got enough brown chickens running around ..wanted to spice things up a bit without having to resort to luminol and black lights in order to pinpoint a midnight shopper dashing through the brush .... also good egg layers and not a bad looking bird !

so lets see what these 3 breeds come up with ... got the 18 eggs i purchased together with a further 114 New Hampshire roasting away in my deep freezer ...(deep freezer now an incubator)
.. on a more personal note ...also told my one one employee that at 38 degrees eggs would hatch in 21 days ... but if you incubate them at 72 degrees the process would only take 10 days ... its was so hard to laugh on the inside ... I could see the dollar signs aligning in his eyes like a slot machine ! Haven't told him i was just yanking his chain yet !! Haha ! 2 years from now we'll be hearing about the new Zimbabwean breeding technique to boil an egg over ten days!

Question is ... anybody try this mixture ??? Or would like to take an educated guess as to the result ... pls feel free to comment....Would love to know what i'm going to end up with in about a year or two's time ! Got a name all planned out too ...NSR .. New Sussex Rhode .. hopefully they end up something like the lohmann's ... but free range! and if the egg production sucks .... got a name that covers that too ... '' F----- ------- --------- ----------- chickens"..

 

[Lady of McCamley]

By crossing a male NH with a female Light Sussex you will get a Red Sex Link, the backbone of the American commercial egg laying industry (the other being the White Leghorn). This formula goes by many names depending upon the hatchery (and the country...which I sense you are not in the United States).

This crossing produces sex links only the first generation. It will produce prolific layers, assuming good quality lines were used for both parents.

If you use that formula, and only that formula, the male rooster red NH and the silver hen Light Sussex, you will use the genetics of color to your advantage.

All male chicks will inherit their mother's silver coloring and hatch yellow-white to grow up as white birds with red wing bars and some red bleed through on the saddles.

The female chicks will hatch as foxy gold and grow into wonderful layers of large brown eggs. The hens will be red birds with white lacing around the neck and some white trim on tail and sometimes wings.

You will have to breed fresh from NH male and LS female each breeding season as this is genetically induced sex-linking, not auto-sexing (a breed true feature found in breeds such as Cream Legbar and Rhodebars and many Welsummer lines).

If you take an RSL and breed to an RSL the sex-linking will be lost. All genders of RSL to RSL come out looking red with white trim. Still good layers, but the valuable sex linking is lost.

New Hampshires are a sadly neglected breed, and honestly a valuable commodity in America. If you simply wish to improve your NH line, get some good quality breeder Rhode Island Reds and toss some of that blood back into your line to improve egg production.

Carefully choose only the best results to breed back to the NH parents. You can thus line breed up to 3 or 4 times back to those parents before you choose best siblings from different generations to breed. That will then set your line and improve production.

Or carefully select and improve your Light Sussex. That also is a popular bird. However, depending upon where you are at, the white coloring can become a problem for predators.

If you are keen to create a production line, breeding a Light Sussex male with a NH female will get red birds, both genders, foxy red chicks, no sex linking. You'll get a good dual purpose bird with improved laying. Perfect that, and you'll simply be making what is known in America as Production Reds.

There are many formulas for Productions Reds across the world, with specific formula names, so you would be recreating one of those types by selectively choosing for best body type and laying ability.

And...just so you know...breeding two birds together doesn't always give you the best of both. Statistically you will get some that get the best of both, some who get some traits but not others, and some who will get the worse of both. You cull those that don't meet your goals.

I'll link some good genetic reading and breeding articles for you below.

Good luck with your project.
LofMc

Breed calculator (for feather coloring)
https://www.breedbook.org/?action=geneticscalculator&tab=CHICKEN
http://kippenjungle.nl/basisEN.htm

Genetic series
https://scratchcradle.wordpress.com/genetics-mini-series/

Line breeding basics
http://www.the-coop.org/forums/ubbthreads.php?ubb=showflat&Number=28027

 

[JedJackson]

The young don't always retain the better characteristics when you cross breed chickens. Hatcheries use and mix specific strains to produce their hybrid and or sex link breeds. Same with meat birds. If you are going to cross breed do it because you have a goal in mind. Creating your own sex links or better producers are good goals but it's much easier to let the hatcheries do the work for you. It's doubtful you can exceed their results. Also, geese are no match for medium to large dogs or coyotes. I learned that the hard way

 

[DIGGIN CHICKEN]

Lady and Jed ...thank you so very much for your replies ... Lady ... had to read yours a couple of times to understand and get the message to sink in ( actually created a line chart and planning to stick it up on the incubator)... but it sounds as if i'm on the right track here ... already got me some small coloured cable ties (aka cheap pretty ankle bracelets) for keeping track of the parent stock etc .... but looks like i'm going to have to do more research and flock management.

The Red Sex link i'm assuming is an equivalent of what we call the lohmann's ( so the breeder was partially/kinda right about infertility/producing sex links)... P.s i'm South African. Thank you for the attachments ... ps will include a pic of the lohmann browns ... think this is what you mean by red with white lacing around the neck

Jed ... Goal is more eggs ... got people queing at my gate for both eggs and chickens ( black people prefer the tougher meat compared to broilers).... had to stop selling eggs to get some for the incubator.

AS for hatcheries ... only 1 available that i know of (that's where i got my RIW,LS eggs ...he only focuses on pure breds.. he supplies nation wide and cant keep up)... all the rest focus on broilers ... which i dont have the heart for .... The bigger Hatcheries only supply by the thousands and any middle man in between wants to set up a retirement fund on a handful of chicks ... its all depressing!

My goosies are retire of late ..as for security ... i have electrified about a hectare (1.6 meters high)... got lasers installed within the perimeter and have IR detectors around the coup that set off lights ... got a camera system up too ... think my girls are well protected .

 

[Lady of McCamley]

Yes, your Lohmans are essentially our Red Sex Links which also go by a lot of different names including Red Star, Isa Brown, Cinnamon Queen, depending on the hatchery....the formula is slightly different but always uses a red layer breed male over a silver layer breed female....just stay away from dominant white as in Leghorns and some lines of White Rocks as all chicks will be white.

Sounds like you would have a good market for layers, and sexed chicks would make that even more desirable. Well developed RSL lines are laying machines.

Not much meat on RSL, but if tougher meat is desired, the retired hens make good soup.

Hope it goes well. Keep us updated.

 

[Lady of McCamley]

On second look, I see a red rooster in the Lohman bunch, so they would be more on the line of our Production Reds...high producing layers but not sex linked.
LofMc

 

[JedJackson]

Lady and Jed ...thank you so very much for your replies ... Lady ... had to read yours a couple of times to understand and get the message to sink in ( actually created a line chart and planning to stick it up on the incubator)... but it sounds as if i'm on the right track here ... already got me some small coloured cable ties (aka cheap pretty ankle bracelets) for keeping track of the parent stock etc .... but looks like i'm going to have to do more research and flock management.

The Red Sex link i'm assuming is an equivalent of what we call the lohmann's ( so the breeder was partially/kinda right about infertility/producing sex links)... P.s i'm South African. Thank you for the attachments ... ps will include a pic of the lohmann browns ... think this is what you mean by red with white lacing around the neckView attachment 1133278 View attachment 1133279 View attachment 1133279 View attachment 1133278 View attachment 1133279

Jed ... Goal is more eggs ... got people queing at my gate for both eggs and chickens ( black people prefer the tougher meat compared to broilers).... had to stop selling eggs to get some for the incubator.

AS for hatcheries ... only 1 available that i know of (that's where i got my RIW,LS eggs ...he only focuses on pure breds.. he supplies nation wide and cant keep up)... all the rest focus on broilers ... which i dont have the heart for .... The bigger Hatcheries only supply by the thousands and any middle man in between wants to set up a retirement fund on a handful of chicks ... its all depressing!

My goosies are retire of late ..as for security ... i have electrified about a hectare (1.6 meters high)... got lasers installed within the perimeter and have IR detectors around the coup that set off lights ... got a camera system up too ... think my girls are well protected .

Oh, I didn't realize the hatchery situation down there. Sound irritating! Lady of McCamley offers sound advice on sex links, and they are our best layers here besides white Leghorns. If I were trying to produce great layers I'd certainly mix Leghorns with Rhode Island Reds. The progeny tend to be intermediate in temperament-- not so flighty as Leghorns but nearly as good and sometimes even better layers as them. And little to no broodiness. Anyway, good luck with whatever you decide to do!

 

[DIGGIN CHICKEN]

update ...heres my deep freezer i converted to and incubator ... loads of eggs due on the 21st and 27th of this month ....

also found some bees in a tree .....
so what does one do with homeless bees ... well build a top bar hive so my chickens can reap then benefits later ....

 

[DIGGIN CHICKEN]

My converted deep freezer ...... lots of little souls waiting to meet the world

 

[Cheep-cheep]

Chick digger where in S.A. are you I have 4 zulu fowl and a rooster I get 16 eggs per chicken ! As population control I take a few away to eat which keeps my family of 5 in eggs . While the hatching success rate is about 10 to 12 per clutch ! So I try to keep it to about five eggs per hen to hatch and raise .