I have been breeding project chocolate birds since the spring of 2011. I started with my bantam project first and used a bantam black ameraucana cockerel over bantam chocolate orpingtons.
I made sure the orpingtons I used were true bantams and I tried to find some that laid a very light pinkish colored egg. These choices helped my bantam project move along quite fast.
Using the ameraucana as the male in the cross helped to promote the blue egg gene in the offspring. And then I used a split cockerel to mate to pure ameraucana for the second generation. Now several generations later, I am working on reducing the size just a bit and wing carriage. I feel the feather quality is good as well as type and egg color.
With the large fowl project I was not able to do the cross the same way. I had to use a small large fowl chocolate orpington cockerel over my black ameraucana hens. My last generation of birds are very fluffy, have poor egg color, poor laying ability and not so great type.
It hasn't moved forward the way the bantams did and it has been a little disappointing, but I have to just keep moving forward.
The chocolate gene was discovered by an orpington breeder named Clive Carefoot in England. It was a mutation he found in his black orpingtons. It is a sex linked recessive gene. This means that it is recessive in males and if a female has the gene, she will display the color. So, you can only have split to chocolate males in the chocolate varieties. The females are or are not chocolate, they don't carry the gene.
This gene is not the same chocolate that some people say their polish display. Polish are dun/khaki. The variety breeds true. The gene modifies the black in the beaks, toe nails and legs to be chocolate in color.
I was not able to send out any LF project chicks or eggs this year due to the poor laying ability. It is something I will continue to work on. I have been able to send out many bantam chocolate hatching egg orders and am waiting for the girls to start back up so I can get more people working on them.
If anyone has any questions about the variety or the project or if you are also working with them feel free to post.