Boys or girls again

[Guest]

Hi all, I have another batch of chickens that I\'m having a hard time telling the cockerels from the pullets.  These ones are \"real\" Ameraucanas (as opposed to the feed-store ones I\'ve had in the past) and are coming up on almost 3 months old.  They\'re all at least 10.5 weeks old--some may be a week or 2 older.

Again I\'m having real trouble posting pictures to this forum--small enough that the upload is allowed, but large enough to see anything at all--so I have posted them to the \"ABC Shareing Place\" at http://groups.msn.com/ABCshareingplace/girlsorboys.msnw?Page=1 There should be 2 consecutive pix of each bird, from a different angle.

Any help guessing what gender these kids are would be so much appreciated.  Thanks all!

Liz in Utah (who usually lurks!)

[bantamhill]

Liz,

Can you discern any difference in the hackle feather shape of the birds? The males should be more pointed. There appear to be a few with comb development starting, but I have found that to be less accurate with pea comb birds as compared to single combed birds.

Michael

[Guest]

Liz,

Can you discern any difference in the hackle feather shape of the birds? The males should be more pointed. There appear to be a few with comb development starting, but I have found that to be less accurate with pea comb birds as compared to single combed birds.

Michael

Hi Michael, thanks for looking.  We really don\'t see much difference in feathering at this point, but the problem is we really don\'t know what we\'re looking for.

I think the different color patterned birds have different shaped feathers, too.  It might just appear that way from lacing making a feather look pointier, or something, but that\'s what we\'re seeing so far.

I dunno, hard telling I guess until they start to crow.

How old are they usually when they start crowing?

Thanks,

Liz in Utah

[Jean]

Liz,

What I see is:

M
F
M
F
F- blue
M- blue
F- can\'t see color very good
F

I have been known to be wrong on late developing cockerels, it happens.

Jean

PS I am only looking at comb development.  I have some crowing at 10 weeks right now.

[Guest]

Liz,

What I see is:

M
F
M
F
F- blue
M- blue
F- can\'t see color very good
F

I have been known to be wrong on late developing cockerels, it happens.

Jean

PS I am only looking at comb development.  I have some crowing at 10 weeks right now.

Thank you Jean, that\'s tremendously helpful.  We assumed the three with the much larger, bright red combs were definitely boys (so 1 black, 1 blue, and one splash roo) but there were at least three more that had more comb development than the other 2 we definitely felt were female, but not nearly as much as the definite roos.  Thanks for letting us know the equivocal ones may well be female.  Let\'s hope

Wow crowing at 10 wks?  Well, maybe we won\'t have as long to wait as we thought to find out absolutely unquestionably what genders these li\'l birds are.

Thanks again, sure appreciate the input!

Liz in Utah

[verycherry]

Hi,

Just wanted to say that my of my roosters just started crowing at 12 weeks.  I thought I heard him once last week, but if it was him it sounded aweful so he probably was too embarrassed to try again for a few days, lol!  Your boys might just crank up and let you know their gender in a week or two.

I\'m pretty new to all this, but your Splash1 and Splash2 looks like a male to me, and a pretty one at that.  One or two more may be, but harder to see in those photos.

[Guest]

It usually helps me to see the saddle feathers, or at least the natural stance of the bird. Honestly, cockerels will often be the friendliest; hens can be much shier until later.

Pretty birds, though!

I had a terrible little Napoleon of a bantam cochin once who began crowing at 10 weeks, too--we could hardly believe it. Ten weeks is unusual but it does happen. It also happens that they wait a long time to crow.

My 16 week old Ameraucana cockerels are still not crowing. Usually roosters begin crowing around four or five months; bantams tend to begin a bit earlier, maybe three or four months (on average). As you can imagine, though, they don\'t always read the book and do what they are supposed to do...

[Guest]

Thanks so much for the info, everyone.  That\'s very helpful...and I agree there\'s a Splash roo baby, but I think there\'s also one blue and one black...and a couple more we weren\'t sure on.

Thanks again very much for piping up and helping!

Best to all,

Liz in Utah