Potential Breed Creation

[Blw18]

Three years ago, I began a breeding project to make a chicken breed of my own to fit my farm. I’ve had a bunch of different breeds over the years but I’ve never really been satisfied with any of them. Being a college kid, I can’t afford tons feed so my birds are fully free ranging. But being free ranging, they’re exposed to predators constantly. Hawks are especially bad. Smaller chickens just don’t last long. Also being in central Mississippi, they need to be able to tolerate heat, wet weather, and also freezing weather during winter. I also want a good layer that will go broody but can also be used as a meat bird. They need to be really good at spotting predators and able to fend for themselves majority of the time. Large size REALLY seems to help with warding off attacks. I also want a bird that is really disease and parasite resistant. They would really need to have a pea comb because my single combed birds get so many gnat bites it’s ridiculous whereas it doesn’t seem to affect the pea combed ones. Even in Mississippi where we have mild winters, frostbite still happens. A cold snap in March froze off the spikes on two of my single combed roosters. I also don’t care if the legs are feathered or not as long as they aren’t TOO heavily feathered. They don’t have to be mass producers of eggs or anything but enough to keep me and my neighbors happy. Anyways, I started out with a exhibition black langshan rooster over one of my naked neck hens that layed exceptionally well. I kept a rooster off of them and bred him to an English Orpington hen. Of those, I kept three hens back (two black and a cuckoo) and they are amazing! They lay large/extra large eggs daily and weigh about 8-9 pounds each. They’ve free ranged since they were born. All three sleep 20 feet in a tree. I wanted to get the size up a little bit and add some color so I crossed them with a buff laced Brahma rooster. The chicks are twice as large as the Ayam cemani’s they are being raised with at a month old. I’ve got another line that’s a mixture of langshan, English Orpington, naked neck, and Egyptian fayoumi that fit most of my criteria. I’m keeping back some Cornish rock pullets on a diet and ranging to add some meatiness to the breed.

This is my original F1 Langshan-naked neck cross.

These are the hens from my F1 rooster above and a chocolate cuckoo English Orpington I no longer have.

Buff laced Brahma rooster I crossed to the F2 hens.

One of the Brahma/F2 chicks beside an Ayam Cemani of the same age. All the chicks born this year have either been solid black or solid white with black spots mixed in. All chicks have the pea comb and the legs are lightly feathered.

And this is a roo from the other similar line. His dad was half Egyptian fayoumi half naked neck and his mom was half English blue Orpington and half black langshan.

Anyways, if anyone had any advice to me in trying to do this it would be greatly appreciated. I understand this will be a lengthy, difficult thing to do and I can’t seem to find much information on the subject. I’m not looking to start a new “trend” or anything...just a breed I can maintain on my place from here on out. I want an extremely hardy, big as can possible, meaty, egg layer that is tolerant of all weather and has some aesthetic qualities as well. I would like to know if anyone had any tips on the topic and any potential improvements to my idea. I apologize for the lengthiness of my post I had my idea it was that long!!

 

[Blw18]

Also, if anyone has done a project like this before I would definitely like to hear about it.

 

[RaineyTN]

Nice I have played around with Brahma mixes the last couple years. My main mixed rooster I still got started with Brahma and Orpington but I can’t remember what all else was mixed in before I got to him. Pretty similar build and comb to your rooster in the last picture. I’m also planning on gettin that line back to pea comb but I just bred him back to Orpington and the 2 week old chicks are huge compared to my same age pure brahma chicks.

I started another line last year with Brahma to RIR which had pretty good size but took too long to fill out and was a little slimmer than I wanted.

 

[Blw18]

They all seem to fill out better with the Orpington influence. I tried my F1 rooster with RIR hens and the hens were great layers but when I dressed out the extra cockrells they were a lot scrawnier than I was hoping. I’m thinking about introducing more naked neck blood into them because my brahmas and Orpingtons spend more time in the barn panting in the summer than they do walking around with the others foraging.

 

[RaineyTN]

Yep, my rir mixed had decent meat on the legs but nothin up top. This is the only picture I have still of one of them

This is the rooster I just bred back to the orpingtons. And yes that’s funny you said that cause he sits in the barn half the day too. I’m thinking about using my ameraucanas to bring the pea comb back in and maybe bring the size down a little.

 

[rocking chickens]

It looks good. How broody the hens get? How is temperament? I am in a cold climate and when I go to my go to breeds that I know a lot about most of them are so cold hardy that your summers would cook them.

 

[Blw18]

They are kinda in a sweet spot right now so I’m almost hesitant to add any other genetics to them. Everything I have is extremely human friendly. I cull/sell anything that is aggressive to people or too wild to handle. They’re also really docile around the other chickens. Even though they’re the biggest, they are usually only midway in the pecking order. The roos are fantastic to their girls and I’ve had zero problems with overbreeding or fighting even with multiple roosters in the flock at once. A little fighting here and there until the “boss” is established and then they’re best friends again. The hens don’t care anything about going broody until you leave eggs in the nest for extended periods and then they’ll drive you crazy wanting to sit on everything. The project birds do well all year minus getting a little hot...the pure orpingtons and other cold-hardy breeds thrive in the cold but as soon as those 95+ degrees days hit, they sit in the barn, lose weight, and basically inhale water to keep cool. I’d like to reduce the feathering on the projects a little more but not so much that they start getting chilled when it gets cold.

 

[Blw18]

RaineyTN, he’s gorgeous. I have ameraucanas and was thinking about using them for the pea comb but everything I have with muffs free ranging gets eaten by hawks, coyotes, etc. I guess the muffs make it harder to see predators through all the briar patches, hedges, and tall grass they range in so I didn’t want that trait in the project birds.

 

[RaineyTN]

Mine are extremely flighty. I don’t free range my ameraucanas much though since I can’t afford to lose them. Against a coyote I wouldn’t think any chicken would survive unless they got to high ground quick.

But you know your birds better than me and your breeding for a purpose i just do it for the heck of it hah.

 

[Blw18]

Luckily we haven’t had just a ton of large predator problems this year. Yeah I don’t expect any of them to put up too much of a fight against a coyote!! The fayoumi crosses simply pick up and fly into the nearest tree but they’re not quite as large as the project birds. I wish there was a way to breed for better flying ability while still maintaining the integrity of size in the breed. I know flying ability isn’t normally desirable but I live in an area where you can ride down the road a mile and see 10 coyotes scattered out in a field during broad daylight. However, of the chickens I have taken by predators each year, 90% are by hawks. The larger ones almost never get messed with while the smaller chickens get picked off.