Hen Coloring

[Hobby Farmer]

Hi everyone,

This is my first post, but I check the site regularly and have learned an enormous amount from all of your collective knowledge and experience.  I'd like to tap into that experience. 

I have noticed that my pullets start out with good color, but get progressively lighter with each progressive molt.  In addition, feather quality seems to deteriorate.

Is that a general Nankin trait?  If so, is there something I (we) can do about it?  It seems that I will never be able to show a Nankin hen, only pullets. 

Any thoughts/suggestions would be greatly appreciated.

Thanks,

Dylan

[Rog]

 have noticed that my pullets start out with good color, but get progressively lighter with each progressive molt.  In addition, feather quality seems to deteriorate.

Is that a general Nankin trait?          No.  Sounds more to me that the feed maybe the culprit. If you are feeding a feed without some animal protein that will happen.   Rog

[Lordcluck]

why not try feeding a little cut maize ( corn?) a known yellowing agent, or some shredded carrot for the natural reddening agent carotene, especially as the birds approach and embark on the moult? corn will affect leg colour, so be careful how much you feed just in case birds start to show a willow tinge to their shanks.

Of course keeping birds in direct sun will weather and bleach plumage, so perhaps any birds earmarked for exhibition are best kept in shaded runs, or well ventilated indoor pens.

[Falling Tree Farm]

Actually my experience is that not only do hens bleach in the sun but the older they get the more they bleach.  I also see a tendency in certain hens to get lighter with each molt by the time they are 3 or 4 years old.  For a breed that has been around for such a long time there is still much we do not understand about Nankin genetics.  Add to that all the breeds that have been introduced to 'improve' the breed and it can be quite a challenge. 
In addition, I think an argument can be made in favor of the larger Nankins that were imported from England 50 or so years ago as the 'original type' that deserve to be preserved as a rare breed.  Perhaps as seperate from the 'show type'?  It wouldn't be the first poultry breed with this sort of dual type.  Nankins are quite the breed!  Howard

[Lordcluck]

Hmmmmm. . . . Utility Nankins. . . now there's a thought! the larger Nankins you refer to Howard, are very much the norm here, although historically i believe the breed was a tiny bird, akin to a typical Sebright in size with a similar type and wealth of feather to a Rosecomb.
No doubt over the centuries here in England,where the breed has always been overlooked and less selectively bred than its other true bantam cousins, and as it drifted into obscurity, and lay undiscovered,believed extinct, many outcrosses to different breeds and mongrel fowl were made, leading to a degeneration in type and an increase in size.
 Mary Ann suggested that certain breeders here are offended by the insinuation that our birds are to large, but much as i love the breed, i can't argue with history, and if the old texts are to be believed, then i feel we must strive to reduce the size of our current stocks. It is true to say that at the moment, if you were to line up the best representatives of each of the True Bantam tribe, our Nankins are the "Herman Munsters" of the group, standing head and shoulders above the rest!! closer in size to New Hampshire bantams than say a good Dutch or Rosecomb.
However, genetic diversity is what its all about, and for those with a mind to, preserving the larger type is fine, although be prepared for disappointment if you try to exhibit them. Their continuation would be valuable from a historic standpoint, and a useful, future genetic resource for the breed as a whole.

[Falling Tree Farm]

Lots to think about here.  If ones major interest is preservation of a rare breed what exactly should be preserved?  The earliest historic type available?  The bird described in the standard?  The UK standard?  The USA standard?  Aren't there standards from other countries but not the country of origin?  Remember any standard comes out of a particular time frame reflecting the interests of a certain group of fanciers.  It describes their idea of what a breed should look like but there is more to a breed than what it looks like and what about those other traits. 
My concern is that over time we will create a Nankin that is a great 'show bird' but lose much of what we value today in the hardy, friendly Nankin we all love.  It has happened before in the history of poultry breeding.  Let's not turn a real chicken into a hothouse flower or at least if some of us do that, let's be sure that others preserve the 'historic' type.  Howard

[Mary Ann Harley]

Right you are Howard.  If I find that I'am losing the ability of the Nankin to breed, be good broodies & mothers I will cull that out.  Having a show bird is great, but we must not get so zealous about shows that we lose all the good qualities of heritage birds.

Mary Ann

[nankin3]

 I have a question on the coloring on the birds at about what age can you make the final cull on the birds as a rule? My first hatch are at about 3 months and showing a lot of the pattern I'm sure they will carry into adulthood. One hen has real good looking tail feathering at this point the other not so good the little roo is light in color but I'm hopeful he will darken up. I know they are to young for it yet and it varies with all birds but just so I have a gauge about what age will they start laying?
Thanks,
Danny

[Lordcluck]

I cull any birds showing obvious faults in comb, or just general weakness at a matter of a month to eight weeks. selection for colour I would leave until at least four to six months, and type up to a year. a bird can fill out and feather up into a completely different looking individual in this time.

I remember selling a small group of Black Rosecomb growers to a friend of mine many years ago, a pen of two cockerels and four pullets I felt were not quite going to make the grade.
A visit to his establishment some months later, saw these birds transformed into raging beauties, combs, lobes and feather width I would have killed for!! Needless to say, he didnt want to sell them back to me!!

The moral of this story is, unless the bird shows a major and obvious fault, don't cull in haste, you never know what it might grow into!

[Falling Tree Farm]

I agree that one must not cull too early except for obvious major faults.  At six to eight months of age you have a better idea of what the bird 'looks like' but as to how it will behave as an adult, its temperment, ability to live peaceably with other Nankins, tameness, broodiness and mothering abilities-that will take a year or more.  Ask yourself what qualities you are breeding for and then at what age are those qualities apparent?  For example if you were breeding to improve longevity and wanted birds that continued to breed (to lay viable eggs or to fertilize eggs) into their fifth, sixth or even seventh year, you'd have to keep the birds a good long while.  What if you want to breed for an important quality like the ability to maintain heath without medications?  How long would you have to keep a bird before you knew that?  You get the idea.  Howard

[Mousy]

I hate culling at the best of times. But if I am going to cull I try to make it something more useful. So providing there is no welfare issue. I'd let them get to Adult size so that there is more for the pot.

Mousy.

[Rog]

  Ah yes Mousy. Culling is hard to do if you do not have the numbers to be able to breed a lot of birds. It is hard to get it done.  Rog

[nankin3]

 Thanks everyone for the input I appreciate it I am in no hurry to cull but then again if I can eliminate obvious fualts I will.
 Howard you brought up some good points to ponder on keeping the broodiness and other what I consider survival traits in the birds even if they are'nt show material.
I am lucky that these birds came from MaryAnn so she has already done the hard work on them I believe it will just be up to me to keep the flock up to standard with future breeding.

[WoodyMcGehee]

I am struggling right now with what to cull.  I have a great rooster, dark chesnut red coloring, really pretty, but he is really small.  He is I would say almost slightly smaller than a OEGB rooster.  His pullet is also small, and doesnt have a lot of black in her tail.

I have 3 hens and a rooster that are much larger, likely just a big bigger than a Sebright, but he is almost hen colored, not deep chesnut at all. 

So - what to do...

[Falling Tree Farm]

Small is good!  Nankins, at least mine, tend to be too large.  I wouldn't cull that rooster!  Unless you have many birds, I would breed as many as you can this year and hold off culling until you see what you get.  After all, aside from the show pen, what the bird produces is what matters. Howard