The Heritage Rhode Island Red Site

[SallyinIndiana]

And……. if all goes well and as planned, I will be stopping by Sally's next month to pick up those cockerels anyhow.
An act of kindness on Sally's part for which I am grateful.

Ahh Thanks, I'm happy they are getting a new home and DH is happy to not process them. He failed to notice though that by re-homing all of my roosters, I have space to raise up a few meat chickens in 8 weeks. In the end he will have birds to process either way.
And they are great birds just younger than the ones I got from Ron. There are good odds that my hatching season will end in mid March to early April this yr. Making me want to hatch earlier than normal so age was really the only reason I choose Pauletta's roosters to be re-homed. At the time I made the choice it was months too early to tell much about any of the roosters other than they were growing much larger than my production roosters born the same time.

 

[monnie662]

Things that I haven't been able to work out are 1. insurance? What if someones 300$ pair of breeders don't make it - like the AC dies or something and heat exhaustion happens? 2. Crossing state lines - that whole import/export thing. 3. licensing as a courier... (WA state is so weird)
I don't have the time or energy to start the whole thing, but I sure wouldn't mind being a driver once in a while. Can fit an awful lot of chicks/eggs in the back of a Scion XB with the back seat folded flat. And if the routes are done so any one person drives no more than 250miles one way, and any stock going further gets swapped out to a different driver/car, then you don't have birds sitting while someone sleeps. Would be nice if it was all a once-a week kind of thing, since it wouldn't matter how old the chicks were, and egg collection, etc. could be planned according to when things get picked up in your area. Heck, I've even got a wine cooler that could carry eggs at 55 or 60F.
Ok, gotta do dishes, and finish sanitizing my incubator. Not a darn thing hatched. Oh, well.

The lady that takes the dogs and cats from here, rents a U-Haul truck, gets her volunteer drivers lined up and they drive all night long to Colorado with only gas and pit stops and they are there quick enough that the animals are not stressed, and she makes sure the temps are comfortable. I can ask her about the liability and other problems that arise. Interesting thoughts.

 

[202roosterlane]

Wanted to share with you. My electrician's daughter started 4H and wanted to raise poultry so I started her off with a few 1 year olders and a few pullets. She had had them a few months now and decided to show them.

Here are a couple of pictures of Jumbo’s (the big rooster) awards. One of the pullets also got 1st and Best Variety and Best Breed, but they didn’t have banners for her. These are 2nd generation from the original RIR I got from Ron Fogel. (Fogel Line) We are going to raise a bunch more in the spring. I will try to get her to take pics of the winning chickens, but right now she is just crazy excited. Hopefully Ron and I will show chickens next year. Ron and I have sent eggs and chicks all over the US this past year. I hope everyone is pleased with them.

 

[windyflat]

That's awesome!!!

 

[SallyinIndiana]

Wanted to share with you. My electrician's daughter started 4H and wanted to raise poultry so I started her off with a few 1 year olders and a few pullets. She had had them a few months now and decided to show them.

Here are a couple of pictures of Jumbo’s (the big rooster) awards. One of the pullets also got 1st and Best Variety and Best Breed, but they didn’t have banners for her. These are 2nd generation from the original RIR I got from Ron Fogel. (Fogel Line) We are going to raise a bunch more in the spring. I will try to get her to take pics of the winning chickens, but right now she is just crazy excited. Hopefully Ron and I will show chickens next year. Ron and I have sent eggs and chicks all over the US this past year. I hope everyone is pleased with them.

congrats on so many ribbons. The chickens I got from you are great. I just lost the luck of the draw and ended up with too many roosters compared to hens. Then I found out that I might not be able to hatch or brood in mid March to late April. With that in mind I decided to keep the older rooster I had from Ron and rehome my younger roosters from you. I'm keeping my female chick from you I just don't expect to breed her as soon as the others. Even keeping only the roosters from Ron's chicks, I still have a rooster for each hen. But your chicks are great and they love to forage. Plus they look good. I was showing the younger roosters (the ones from your chicks) off today and the lady fell in love with them. So I'm sure I won't be processing any of the HRIR roosters now as I have at least one home for each of them and a backup home for one of them.

 

[FOGELLY]

That looks like a happy young lady. It is good to see some young people getting into Reds, I hope a few stick with it.

Ron

 

[202roosterlane]

Sally I can bring more nest year when I pass through your way again. But tis time they will be old enough to sex.

Ron she is as giddy as I am lol. I hope she will continue too. She is an Honors student but very shy. She joined 4H this year and I think she is going to really enjoy it. I think she wants my BJGs next. But I am not doing any hatching till April or May. Or at least that what I say now.....lol

 

[SallyinIndiana]

Sally I can bring more nest year when I pass through your way again. But tis time they will be old enough to sex.

Ron she is as giddy as I am lol. I hope she will continue too. She is an Honors student but very shy. She joined 4H this year and I think she is going to really enjoy it. I think she wants my BJGs next. But I am not doing any hatching till April or May. Or at least that what I say now.....lol

I will think on this a lot. My biggest issue is that I typically keep the chicks in my laundry room and gradually move to my living room until I can put them outside. But come March / April we will be getting a new bundle of love and there is to be no baby chick smell in the house until it is at least 6 weeks old. Plus I need the space where the brooder pen goes to put the pack and play.
But if I can talk my DH into building an outdoor small pen to use until I can mingle the chicks in, it might happen. I have some small pens now that I used for the chicks last spring but I may keep them set up as breeding pens.

Lots to think about.

 

[Robert Blosl]

What happens if you don't know the relationship of the chicks when starting a family or line breeding.

This happens sometimes and you just pick the best most vigor's birds you find from your chicks you got say one male and two females. Then mate the best chicks back to their sires or dams the next year.

If you had two females then start family one with one female and family two with the other. Then down the road you will have a friend or the breeder you got our Reds from get you a new male or female and mix this into your stain in the next season. Or get five new chicks started from the breeder or a friend who got them from the same breeder that may not be related to the ones yhou got in the first place .

Most of the time this will get you back where you will not have any problems down he road in five years or more with inbreeding . Its not the end of the world if this happens you just have to think out of the box a little to make sure you don't get into trouble with vigor and hatchability in future years in your program. Just don't go out and get a new bird from another strain unless you don't care about breeding to standard or plan to share their birds with others down the road. In this case we sure don't want people who have this great line of Ron's to have someone send a beginner chicks some day and say they are pure Ron's line and then they are not. For example three years from now Mr. Jones sends some mixed stain Reds to a person who has pure Ron's line then crosses them into their line for fresh blood the next year. Then when the chicks are growing up during the summer after the big cross was made all kinds of faults in color or type shows up on the new introduction of the fresh blood from Mr. Jones.. The buyer says what the heck is going on and the reason is they seller did this and will the chicks that that buyer raises are not going to help the person and a waist of time and money. However, if the buyer got birds from a honest sub strain owner of Ron's birds the chicks should be a nice blend of chicks and you got the vigor from the cross that you where hoping for.

I know there are people who love to mix breeds or strains on this web site as they don't care out preservation of breeds or good strains but this tread I am sure has stressed the important of presentation of the breed but the hard work such as Ron has been doing to keep this old strain pure and moving forward. The same goes to what Jimmy is doing, Matt 1616, Steve and others who have the Don Nelson pure line. I urge all of you who get into R I Reds to keep a oath not to cross unless you just have to and do not want to share your birds with beginners.

Love the awards in the picture reminds me of my 4H days. Those where the good old days.

 

[Chickens Naturally]

Bob, what you are saying hear ‘as I see it’, is simply that one should be ethical and I agree. If someone got (for example only) Don Nelson birds and felt the need for whatever reason, and sometimes there are legit reasons, to introduce new blood, then it would not be ethical to call them Don Nelson line simple as that and anyone worth their salt as a breeder would know that there are time tested breeding processes and heavy culling involved ANYTIME an outcross is made.
Most of the confusion is simply from human nature. Most people understand ‘their’ point of view and assume that there is only one ‘right’ way on any subject. For example (maybe not the best one, but you get the point): Three people could look at a barred rock chicken. One says it’s black, another says its white, and yet another says it’s black and white. Who is right? ALL THREE are correct! An interesting read that on this aspect of being human is addressed in “The 7 habits of Highly Effective People” by Stephen R. Covey. Add to the mix personalities and perspectives like ‘do as I say not as I do’ or ‘it’s ok for me, but not ok for you’ and well, there you go.
Then add in the fact that many folks are more interested in their own opinion than taking the time to actually consider what someone else has to say. To get to ‘the truth’ you simply have to learn to drop the lies, ‘the truth’ is there waiting. The person who says the barred rock is ‘ black AND white’ may be ‘more’ correct than the one who says its black or the one who says its white, but that does not mean that the other two observations are WRONG.
Another issue is that some folks are so wrapped up in their own opinions and possibly lack social skills that anything other than ‘their way’ is infuriating to them. He might say, ‘no, it’s neither black nor white, its black AND white!”. Is he right? Well, only partially. As I said before ALL THREE ARE RIGHT. We may even have to concede that he is ‘more’ right to say the chicken is black AND white. However, when he says the other two opinions are WRONG and he is RIGHT, guess what, he becomes WRONG again! That is, or should be, the purpose of argument to begin with, to arrive at the TRUTH. People who have personality problems give ‘argument’ a bad connotation. Take away the attitude problems and argument is a good thing.
How does this affect the discussion of whether it is ‘right’ or ‘wrong’ to outcross, ever, for any reason? Well I can (and have) challenged the idea that there is never a reason to bring new blood and doing so is WRONG. Anticipating imperfections in our character (none of us are perfect) I would always put out a disclaimer like, “I HAVE NO PLANS TO OUTCROSS ANYTHING, HOWEVER I CHALLENGE THIS IDEA THAT BRINGING IN NEW BLOOD IS NEVER NEEDED FOR ANY REASON AND IF YOU DO YOU ARE MUCKING UP MY BREED AND YOU MUST BE ANOTHER ONE OF THESE NOVICES WHO CAN’T LEAVE WELL ENOUGH ALONE etc. Invariably, I will get responses like, ‘you do whatever you want to with your….’. First, I already said I had no plans to do this and then explain that you ‘assumed’ that I even had these fowl to begin with, which in this case, I don’t. To add to the other communication problems, now we have ‘reading for comprehension’. What I’m attempting to point out is that all three opinions about what color a barred rock chicken is, started out as CORRECT. Don’t make your point INCORRECT by taking on the position that ‘it is neither black nor white, it’s black and white’ because now you are wrong again. Let me put out my disclaimer here lol. Bob, I’m NOT saying ‘you’ meaning ‘you’ personally. In fact, I agree with most of what you say. I’m speaking in general about the different camps of thought on the subject of out crossing and whether it RIGHT or WRONG. Here is what I think:

First, I don’t think any line of fowl have been ‘kept pure’ for a hundred years. I’m sorry, but that’s my opinion. I know human nature and ten decades and numerous breeders, accidents, need to experiment, or even the NEED for new blood which will present itself eventually because of poor breeding practices intentional or accidental. Maybe a fox ate most of your flock and your breeding brothers and sisters for the third generation and you live on a small deserted Island and this unrelated Cock swam up, whatever.
Second, why do anomalies pop up when crossing, for example, two lines of RIR to begin with? Because they are different genetically. You would be ‘stirring the pot’ so to speak. Is it wrong? Again, is it black? Is it white? Is it black and white? One person is crossing Don Nelson reds on Silkies and selling them on ebay as Don Nelson Heritage RIR. I think we can all agree that this is wrong. Another person got some of ‘Jimmy Jacks’ line, they are small, lay three eggs a year when the weather is nice and some years they get one to hatch, otherwise they have good color and type. He happens to have another line of ‘Bobby Joe’ RIR that lay two hundred eggs a year and hatchability is pretty good, but their type is not so good. He knows the proper breeding practices for introducing new blood and is prepared to eat the culls and cull heavy for the next five years (after which is going to continue to cull heavy lol) and after five years he begins to let a few birds go as ‘Franks line RIR’. Would he be WRONG? I don’t think so. The barred rock can be black, it can be white, and it can be black and white.
Now I’m waiting with chagrin for replies and the inevitable, “you do whatever you want to with your birds I don’t care, but I’m going to do it the RIGHT way and why do you insist on talking about this anyway cause I get mad when you talk about it, not when someone else talks about it, but trouble makers like you MAKE me get mad, has nothing to do with my character I can get along with ANYBODY as long as they think, believe and act like me because I could never learn anything from anybody else!” lol.
Sorry for being long winded, but I’ve already typed it so I’m not going to delete it! Hope everyone has a great day. Have fun with your birds. I’m going to see if I can cross up some chicken ducks lol!