breeding question

[greeneggsandham]

I have read you shouldn\'t breed siblings together, but can you breed a roo to what would be his neice?
I have three splash roos and need to get rid of two.  Two I bred this season.  The one that I didn\'t breed is the one who would be the uncle and I would like to keep him over keeping the other two.  He has nice size and muffs/beard etc.  Only fault I see is there is some gold I guess you would call it, on the edges of some of his darker saddle feathers.  Assuming I can breed him back to his sisters offspring, is this gold feather edging something that is a fault?  I had a blue cockeral once and he displayed this coloring on his hackles and saddle feathers also.  Is it difficult to get rid of?
Thanks,
sharon

[Mike Gilbert]

First of all, unless you have easy access to supplementary breeders from another source, it is always best to keep at least two roosters for each variety.   It is not difficult to construct  small pens to keep extra males in.    That said,
there should be no problem with breeding uncles to nieces unless the line is already extremely inbred.   You will notice that happening when egg production, fertility, and/or hatchability suffer.    If the gold edging is only a little in the saddle area I would not worry too much about it.  But I would not breed him back to his own daughters, as that would probably fix an undesireable trait in this line.   Select well colored male offspring to breed back to this generation of hens.    Two or three breeding pens for each variety, along with good records, will help prevent too close inbreeding.  Good luck!