The Official Forum of the Ameraucana Breeders Club > Breeding
New with questions
Don:
That's one of the things I like about the Wheaten lines is disposition. I have had only one male that will challenge me when I go into the pen so far, knock on wood. And he will not be around long.
But that reminds me that I kept him because he was the next best Wheaten male that I had. And it really pays to keep an extra. You don't realize how many times your best male will get sick, be infertile or suddenly die at the beginning of breeding season. The second string is not as good, but it sure bets nothing at that point in time. So If you find birds that have serious faults like enamel or cross beak, certainly cull them and sell them as EEs or backyard layers. But if you have more good birds than you need, pick out the best for your breeding flock. And maybe find a someone close by that wants some good family AMs to use as layers. If push comes to shove in the middle of breeding season you can borrow a male or at least get some help with out having to drive several hundred miles away for replacement stock. Even if you know a breeder in the next state, the likelihood that they will have an extra male is pretty slim at that point in the season.
BTW I mentioned crooked toes earlier. I only use that to cull between two really good almost equal birds for breeding. I am sure some here will disagree. But I think a lot of crooked toes are accidental. If you find a number of them in a hatch of a specific mating then I would take it a whole lot more serious. But If I have a super nice Wheaten male will golden hackles and nice type and a crooked toe, then I would choose him over the second best male. But I would watch my hatches for straight toes for sure.
DeWayne Edgin:
My kids are in 4H here in PA but we can`t show chickens! I wish we could. Our local fair stopped showing chickens in the mid 80s also. :(
John Scruggs:
Fortunately, I didn't have a single chick with crooked toes. Some of my EE chicks did and some of the copper marans that we hatched out earlier in the year did. The marans took 22 days to hatch and Susan's Ameraucana's eggs only took 20. I wonder if there is a correlation between late hatches and crooked toes?
Don:
John, I wonder if a lot of crooked toe and some of the other issues that we see aren't caused by incubators in one way or another. Clif mentioned in another post that he had much better luck with natural incubation by broody hens. What kind of incubator do you have and what time of year were the two hatches, Marans and EEs compared to the AMs?
John Scruggs:
The EE hatched February 19th in someone else's cabinet incubator.
I bought a Hovabator Genesis and hatched the marans in March, and April respectively. The incubator was kept at 99.5 and I dry hatched those until lockdown. Humidity stayed about 30-35% as I was instructed, but I had a very low hatch rate at about 45% and they took 22 days to hatch.
The Ameraucana's hatched May 20/21st out of the same Hovabator Genesis. One thing I did do with the Ameraucanas was decrease the heat to 99 and kept the humidity between 40-45% until lockdown. I had 90% hatch rate on day 20. Another thing I did differently with these was that I placed the eggs in a plastic crate at lockdown to prevent the hatching chicks from rolling the unhatched eggs all over the floor. I was a little skeptical at first, but after seeing it in action, I don't think I will ever hatch without the crate again.
Navigation
[0] Message Index
[#] Next page
[*] Previous page
Go to full version