Non Molting Chickens, breeding project update Nov 2011
Like 2 Dislike 0 Published on 7 Nov 2011
Updates on my non-molting chickens. The second generation is born! Yay!!
In case you were wondering, these adult birds were hatched on or about May 20th (over a 3 day period). So they are almost 6 months old and fully sexually mature. The boys started crowing at 4 months and the girls started laying soon after. They seem to incubate, develop and grow a little faster than your standard chickens.
If you are interested in hatching eggs, please contact me by private message.
At this time I cannot guarantee that all babies will express the non-molting gene. All I can say is that the flock carries the gene and in future generations I hope to isolate it better in order to produce young that only express the gene.
You can think of it similar to the cresting gene in ducks. The flock may carry the gene but not every bird expresses the gene.
Similarly in humans, a recessive gene may be passed down for generations and only be expressed every so often. This is why 2 brown eye parents occasionally produce a blue-eyed child.
It is my goal to isolate all birds who express the non-molting gene. This may take years... =)