What useful crosses can I make?

[shsesc]

Oh, well I have several books. The one I spoke of earlier is "Exhibition Poultry" by David Scrivener. I also have "Storey's Guide to Raising Chickens" by Gail Damerow, which I use a lot, too. L

A good ratio isn't set in stone. For heavy breeds 1:8 is optimum, and 1:12 is max

For light breeds like Leghorns, it's 1:12 and 1:20

Just out of curiosity, do you plan to make separate pens or chop heads?

I have one smaller coop and run totally enclosed with cattle panels, and one big coop 12'*10'+5'*5' attached to a 200' perimeter electric poultry netting run.

All the chickens are currently in the large coop and run. I would assume it takes a few weeks to clear any residual semen from the female before I can set the eggs. I'd probably use the small coop as a honeymoon suite so to speak. I've not had any trouble with the males fighting. I'll eat any males that are not useful for crosses. The only male I wanted was the BCM. He is from a breeder. The Easter egger was a coin toss and the white one was supposed to be a girl.

 

[Fanci Feathers Marans]

I have one smaller coop and run totally enclosed with cattle panels, and one big coop 12'*10'+5'*5' attached to a 200' perimeter electric poultry netting run.

All the chickens are currently in the large coop and run. I would assume it takes a few weeks to clear any residual semen from the female before I can set the eggs. I'd probably use the small coop as a honeymoon suite so to speak. I've not had any trouble with the males fighting. I'll eat any males that are not useful for crosses. The only male I wanted was the BCM. He is from a breeder. The Easter egger was a coin toss and the white one was supposed to be a girl.

He is from a breeder? I took one look at him and assumed he was from Cackle. Could you take a better photo of him?

 

[Fanci Feathers Marans]

I think I love you.

I also think it may be my life's goal to breed for that far right shamrock-colored egg in the last row.

 

[Fanci Feathers Marans]

I have one smaller coop and run totally enclosed with cattle panels, and one big coop 12'*10'+5'*5' attached to a 200' perimeter electric poultry netting run.

All the chickens are currently in the large coop and run. I would assume it takes a few weeks to clear any residual semen from the female before I can set the eggs. I'd probably use the small coop as a honeymoon suite so to speak. I've not had any trouble with the males fighting. I'll eat any males that are not useful for crosses. The only male I wanted was the BCM. He is from a breeder. The Easter egger was a coin toss and the white one was supposed to be a girl.

The honeymoon suite is a good idea, I like to use that method myself. It also helps restrict movement and put some 'show fat' on them. Plus, you can feed them special breeder ration and monitor rate of lay. All kinds of good things. So, how big is it?

Also, I would wait a month after separating the huns before collecting hatching eggs. Just as a rule of thumb.

 

[Fanci Feathers Marans]

Huns.

 

[shsesc]

Huns.

Sorry for the delay.
Bubba is about 27 weeks old. He is supposedly from a Tennessee line, though he was rejected for breeding stock. I got him from Rhode Island at about 8 weeks.

The honeymoon suite is a prefab coop and three cattle panels arched to make a run with hardware cloth around the openings and underneath the prefab coop and into the ground around the run.

 

[shsesc]

What traits make him less desirable or what makes him look like a hatchery bird?

 

[Krazyquilts]

What traits make him less desirable or what makes him look like a hatchery bird?

I'd be interested to know that, too. It's my first year with chickens so I'm still learning and there's so many breeds to learn about!

 

[Fanci Feathers Marans]

View attachment 1176571
Sorry for the delay.
Bubba is about 27 weeks old. He is supposedly from a Tennessee line, though he was rejected for breeding stock. I got him from Rhode Island at about 8 weeks.

The honeymoon suite is a prefab coop and three cattle panels arched to make a run with hardware cloth around the openings and underneath the prefab coop and into the ground around the run.

Well, from this picture, his comb is a little irregular, but shape isn't as important as color.
He needs to have a deep red shoulder (his is mostly black) his neck should be copper (his has a little straw coloring) and grey shanks (his are pink).

If you knew he was a reject, I wouldn't be too worried. He probably has good egg genes, we just can't see that. He also looks nice and big. He'll be fine if you are looking to make crosses.

 

[Indyshent]

I have a croad Langshan female, Dominique females, red females uncertain lineage(came in a mixed heavy breed box from cackle) , white rock females, welsummer females, Easter egger females(light green eggs) , a French black copper Marans rooster, a white rock rooster, an Easter egger rooster (dark gray)

What can I get as crosses and which might be "best" for anything or particularly useful? Is the white rooster useful for sex links with the dominiques? I know the ee and the Marans could be olive eggs.
If I could add one male what should it be to get useful crosses? Rhode island or new Hampshire red male maybe?

Thanks.

Croad Langshans ideally should lay "plum" (dark brown with a pale bloom) but it's exceedingly rare for them to do it, so most lay medium browns (dark brown if you're lucky). Marans are actually descended from Langshans if you go far enough down their family trees.

If you want feathered legs, tall stature, and a more traditional French (feather footed) Marans look, go ahead and breed Langshan and BCM. If you're looking just to get some nice dark eggs, breed your BCM with the darkest layers you've got. If you want sure fire olive eggers, breed your BCM over your EE instead of the other way around because...

EE have no defined ancestry. They're mutts, so you can guarantee absolutely nothing about their egg genes and often very little about their genotypes. If your EE roo has a very neat pea comb, you can reliably assume he carries at least one blue egg gene (the genes are very close on the same chromosome, so they tend to get inherited together more than 90% of the time). If he has a sloppy, tall or otherwise odd pea comb, he is likely heterozygous for both pea comb and blue eggs.

White is a funky color in chickens. Silver gets rid of gold--not black--so if you have a red-and-white bird or a completely white bird, you're actually looking at "white" and not silver, which means you cannot use them in any sex linked breedings as white is autosomal (the trait isn't located on a sex chromosome). If a bird is black and white but not red, it's likely silver (if a rooster has red shoulders but is otherwise black and white, he's probably heterozygous for gold). White cannot be used over barring to make a sex link, even though it's a solid color.

Red (and any other colors with striped down as chicks) is typically used to make autosexing barred breeds because barring dilutes down color (in addition to giving headspots) more obviously on striped backgrounds, though if one doesn't want to make an autosexing breed and only sex linked F1 chicks, most solid colors should work. For instance, crossing a splash rooster over barred hens to make solid blue pullets and barred blue boys.

Keep your Rocks together because pure bred birds will always be worth more, and they're not good for any particular halfbreeds. You might elect to keep your EE together for the same reason, but as they're already mutts, you don't need to bother.

More info and pictures would be appreciated