Culling day-olds

[Beth C]

I know this has come up several times, and I\'ve come up with bits and pieces searching the forum, but, if you guys don\'t mind, could you give a run-down of what you cull for in day-olds (buffs in particular) and at various stages of growth (if I haven\'t seen \"X\" by a certain age, I cull; as soon as I see \"Y,\" I cull)?  Last year I dumped way too much feed into way too many birds for way too long, and I simply can\'t afford to do that again. I NEED to get rid of as many birds as I can as early as practical, so any tips/advice/suggestions would be greatly appreciated.

[John]

Make sure day-old buffs don\'t have slate shanks/legs.  They are based on EWh and they should hatch with flesh colored legs that darken as they mature like wheatens do.
This is only my guess, since I haven\'t checked it out, but the chicks with buff down everywhere will be the better colored adults with good buff undercolor also.  So, if you have enough chicks that are buff all over I would cull the ones with cream colored heads.

[Beth C]

Thanks! Sorry it has taken so long to get back - jury duty last week. Yay me.  :stare: Actually, as jury duty goes, it went well. A civil case in which the participants were actually civil!

Here is the first buff to hatch. It hatched with flesh colored legs, but they darkened really fast (less than 2 weeks) - I recall last year\'s chicks taking longer than that? Also, the color in it\'s primaries is very uneven. I\'ve read elsewhere that is not likely to improve - has that been your experience? Can I safely cull this one?

[John]

The white in the wings isn\'t good and the shanks should take longer to darken for a EWh/EWh chick.  Having said that I also go back to saying \"breed from the best you have\", so if you get better ones don\'t breed from this one.