Project Motzle January 2017

[seatil]

It's been a while since I posted anything from Project Motzle (if you don't know what that is, go hit the search button up top searching for 'Project Motzle').

The main goal was to produce a non-broody, heavy, with no to limited flight, black bird with white spots and frizzled feathers that laid a decent number of eggs. I'm happy to say we've at least achieved black birds with white spots and frizzling. Limited flight is a work in progress, and broodiness so far seems limited to one bird (cue them all going broody now). They're not too shabby at egg laying, but could be better. Mareks unfortunately is taking some of these birds out as they reach 2 years old, which is a bit of a shame. Hopefully somewhere down the line I can select for better resistance.

But I digress... the point of this post was to show off the side goal, which up until this point I've been mum on. That is, a frizzled mille fleur type built only from Project Motzle birds. The original birds had all of the components necessary but not in the same bird. It's taken three years and some ridiculous luck to get this far, but here she is, in all her spotty glory (No, she's not frizzled, but that part /should/ be easy to achieve next generation.)





I have one more female, offsite at present.

There's a LOT more work to do, including using these two girls to breed myself some mille fleur roosters that I can (eventually) use to make guaranteed mille fleurs (rather than winning probability roulette like I did with these two), and then refining what I've got until I've got something that doesn't roost 20m up a tree... :sigh:

[Marina]

Nice

Just a comment regarding Mareks at 2 years of age. It can happen but is unlikely. Have you ever done a post mortem? Are the poos green before they die? Is it the classic form of Markes with paralysis or do they loose weight?

[seatil]

We've worked with our vet and had samples taken and sent to various labs for diagnosis. Primary symptoms in these birds are tumours - internal and external with weight loss and eventual starvation with the green faeces typical of that.

[sewren]

She's lovely - hurrah for probability roulette! Great if you can get a roo to put with them. How big do you reckon she will grow (compared with other breeds)?

Sorry to hear you've been having disease issues - that sucks

[Marina]

Lymphoid Leucosis is much more likely than Mareks to occur in a 2 year old chook. Unless the vet was able to identify the virus I'd investigate the possibility of Lymphoid Leucosis. It's passed on though the egg, droppings are green (Mareks hardly ever shows green droppings, only really when the kidneys are riddled with tumors). Both Lymphoid Leucosis and Mareks show tumors but in Markes the intestines are never affected with tumors while in Lymphoid Leucosis the intestines are riddled with tumors in the majority of cases.

[seatil]

She's lovely - hurrah for probability roulette! Great if you can get a roo to put with them. How big do you reckon she will grow (compared with other breeds)?

I'm expecting similar to a White Leghorn or Ancona, possibly a touch larger.

[Kracka]

she's very pretty - that's why I have the Spangles/Mille Fleur Pekins, they're hard to resist (but so far eluding me with any sort of decent type)

[seatil]

Voila, the first frizzled mille fleur type bird from the project.

[eae]

Congratulations! What a funky looking bird!

[sewren]

Oh I've been wondering how your Motzles are going. Exciting - you must be really pleased!! Have you got any other good mottled birds coming along....?

[seatil]

They're going well. Spots are slowly taking over our chook paddocks! The Original Motzles are breeding well and we're getting plenty of those. Time to work on the Dumpling Factor now as quite a few of them are rather skinnier and leggier than I'd like (and way too good at ignoring fences).

The Mille Fleur population has exploded a bit this spring. I've a couple of pea-combed smooth pullets coming along (about 6 weeks old now), as well as three smooth girls from the tail-end of last season (Ginger, plus Galangal, photo'd in the OP - looking super stunning now, but good luck getting close enough to photo and Turmeric). And a couple of smooth roosters. I was really hoping for a frizzled roo, but there's still time for more hatches this year.

[Marina]

Nice to see the progress you have made.

Initially I had thought you were after a mottled frizzle - black with white feather tips? Did you pursue this as well?

[seatil]

Nice to see the progress you have made.

Initially I had thought you were after a mottled frizzle - black with white feather tips? Did you pursue this as well?

Yes, I have a fair few of those running around. Those are the ones where I'm working on the dumpling factor.

[sewren]

Sounds like it's all going really well - a paddock f mottled birds sounds cool Hope you manage to get the size up (love the phrase 'dumpling factor' - I do love a big chook!)