Chicken Genetics

August 5, 2009

in Farm Critters

We started out with three breeds of chickens here:

  1. Buff Orpington
  2. Polish Silver Laced
  3. Sicilian Buttercup

Our chickens free range during the day, so we don’t dictate what rooster breeds what hen. They decide that all for themselves. smile16
That means that sometimes the genetics produce some interesting results.

Take a rooster that was a cross of Buff Orpington hens. . .

Buff Orpington Hens

And a Polish Silver Laced Rooster, and you get a rooster that looks close to the original, but still carries some different genes.

Polish Silver Laced Rooster

Now let him breed with a Sicilian Buttercup hen. . .

Sicilian Buttercup Hen

And you end up with this handsome fellow. . .

Mixed Breed Rooster

We’ve also ended up with a lot of all white chickens, and other variations like Peepers. . .

Peepers with chick

And as usual, I’m waiting to see how many of this year’s chicks are going to turn out to be roosters.  It seems to me that there are always more roosters than hens.  What’s with that?  With two adult roosters, I probably have one rooster too many anyway!

But it’s a lot of fun seeing which genetics come home to roost!

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Fowl Update on July 23rd, 2007

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{ 7 comments… read them below or add one }

1 Ceecee August 5, 2009 at 1:52 pm

Mutt chickens make the prettiest chickens. :)

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2 Laughing Orca Ranch August 5, 2009 at 9:38 pm

lol! I’ve been meaning to ask you about this because my silky hen has been feeling broody for a long time and I was considering just letting her sit on some eggs until they hatch, but with my flock of hens (ameracauna, buff laced polish, barred rock, rhode island red, silver laced wyandottes and brown leghorn) and the the two roosters (golden laced polish and white silky) who knows what would peck their way out of those eggs. lol!

Your flock is very unique and quite lovely.

~Lisa

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3 Rural Writer August 6, 2009 at 10:46 am

Mutt chickens can be quite colorful!

Well, hey Lisa! It might be interesting to see what hatched out from such a variety of chickens.

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4 Laughing Orca Ranch August 6, 2009 at 2:23 pm

lol! That’s what I was thinking, too! Maybe I could sell the pullets as fancy designer breeds, sort of like people do who breed anything with a poodle. lol!

~Lisa

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5 Rural Writer August 7, 2009 at 11:46 am

Lisa, that is just tooooo funny! Like the people who breed anything with a poodle, ha, ha! I’d never thought of it that way, but there do seem to be a lot of “poo” somethings, huh? ;-)

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6 Laughing Orca Ranch August 9, 2009 at 8:40 pm

That gives me an idea! Since my two roosters are a Polish and a Silky, I could market the chicks as ‘Rhody chicks’, ‘Bardish Rock’, ‘Polacauana’, and ‘Wyandottish’. Fancy designer breed chickens, indeed! hehe!

~Lisa

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7 Kade Bartlett March 11, 2010 at 4:35 pm

Hey there I was just looking at how beautiful your chicks turned out to be from that cross I have some buttercups but no polish bloodlines intermingled in mine, But I was wondering if you would be interested in selling some eggs so I May hatch them. I live in Eastern Oregon. Thanks

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