Ameraucana Breeders Club

The Official Forum of the Ameraucana Breeders Club => Breeding => Topic started by: Lindsay Helton on July 06, 2020, 04:23:58 PM

Title: Tailsets in young and old birds
Post by: Lindsay Helton on July 06, 2020, 04:23:58 PM
ABC member Susan Mouw recently created the following educational post. Sharing it here for our members.

Ok, folks..just thought I'd jump in here and share some of my experience, especially pertaining to tailsets in the young vs that tailset in a mature bird.

So, I've gathered a few pics of birds that were bred and raised here, to show you the difference. In the attached pics, each row is of the same bird and that bird's wing band is captioned below that pair of pictures. Each of these photos were taken 3-4 months apart, as you can see by the date taken in the captions.

This is just one of the reasons it is important not to cull too early, especially for too low a tailset. If I had culled these birds when those first pics were taken because of low tailsets, I would have lost at least one District Champion, and a couple of class CH winners. This applies to pullets (third row) and cockerels.

Edited to add: This rule of thumb has also applied across all varieties I have had here: white, black, blue, splash, wheaten, blue wheaten, and splash wheaten. I would daresay, it should apply to all varieties of Ameraucana, as the Standard, except for color, does not, and should not, change from variety to variety.
Title: Re: Tailsets in young and old birds
Post by: Birdcrazy on July 07, 2020, 12:34:13 AM
Amazing what 3 or 4 months can do with maturity in birds. Susan the trio you sent to the 2017 National Meet in Hutchinson MN and put on the silent auction and I happened to get the winning bid. They were a little young at show time especially compared to Jan's more matured birds. I still have that trio in a breeding pen. The cock bird continued to develop well and is my #1 Black Breeding pen out of 4 Black pens. I have a young 4 month old cockerel out of his pen that I am keeping my eye on! With the LF Splash recognition program starting, I plan to cut down to 3 breeding pens of Black LF Ameraucana and add another breeder pen of LF Blue/Blue next spring to help out with the LF Splash recognition effort.
Title: Re: Tailsets in young and old birds
Post by: Susan Mouw on July 27, 2020, 08:50:58 PM
Wow, Gordon!  That's very nice that you kept him that long and are still getting fertility out of him.  Solomon, my Grand CH, was just a year older (2016 hatch) and he's dried completely up. :)

But he's going to be around for as long as he lives - he's staying here, along with a few of his favorite hens.