Nice lacing on the blue wheaten and the muff color is really strong. They appear young still, how old? The wheaten cage looks like it has feathers. Is he molting by chance?
Thanks, Don. And yes, they are both still pretty young. Only a little over 6mos old. I'm hoping to see their frontline and chest area broaden and deepen over the next several months. And yes, the Wheaten is molting. You can really see it in his hackles and in the sharp break at the base of the tail. A month ago that break and the fluff wasn't there. I put that pic up there to mainly show his Type and his beard too. I've got one Wheaten cockerel that is at least 2mos younger than this one and he's already got a full-colored muff/beard!!
They've both still got a lot of striping in the hackles that will have to go but you'll notice there is NO red in the tails of either. Eye color is better in the W than the BW but it's not too bad. Comb is better on the W than the BW too but, again, I don't think it's too big. Leg color is pretty good on both.
Overall, they're definitely the best I've put out thus far. I'll use the BW boy most likely to see what kind of SW I can get out of him. Still looking to get a really nice SW to keep.
I concur with Don's comments. Oftentimes you don't see that nice dark edging around the breast feathers in the blue wheaten males, but the standard does call for it. Actually it does say lacing, but probably should say edging. Looks like you have been working on the muffs coloring too. Nice job!
Thank you, Mike! Coming from you that really means a lot. I know you have a keen eye for detail.
I hatched out a couple hundred Ameraucana chicks this year. Because of the loss of several birds during the separation, and subsequent divorce, coupled with a huge amount of chicks that didn't get toe-punched that hatched while I was outta the home, I basically had to start over with my breeding program. Fortunately, I had maintained a closed flock and had made minor improvements each year.
So this year I went for broke. Went from 3 Lines (the #3 Line being white egg layers that I use to color test my males) to I think 14. I didn't even have a decent BW male to use so I picked out my 3 best W males and covered them over some hens from previous years and a bunch of pullets based mostly on egg color and numbered those pens accordingly. I just wanted to try and see if I might make a bigger leap forward by hatching a ton of chicks and then culling way back down afterwards. The biggest problem with doing that is the cost. And I guess all the extra work. Because the Am's take so long to mature, especially the males, you have to feed them for a lot longer. I'm still going thru 75 lbs of Chick Starter a day!! But I'm hoping that I'll have a few studs now that I can keep for several years and won't have to be raising quite so many males at least.
I recently sold 35 males and I've still got 20 or more that are younger than these two in which I have to wait and see how they turn out in the next 3-8 months. And I've got a bunch of pullets yet to sort thru. 20-25 of them should start laying within a month or two. I have more color in the tails and wings of the females than I've ever had before but they are still not where they need to be.
I'm also still working on some minor issues like single muff/beards. The BW has a single. Easy fix.
All in all, I'm really glad my little experiment turned out for the better. Had I failed to make any real significant improvement after hatching all those chicks, I'm afraid I would've had to either given up on the variety or thought about going outside to bring in new blood. Which is basically starting all over.
Mike, do you remember that "Calico" Wheaten pullet that I posted a pic of a few years ago? I got two more this year.
I probably should've name this thread Wheaten and Blue Wheatens as that was really more what I was thinking at the time I posted. I will also try to add some pics of the pullets on here too when I can.
God Bless,
