jerryf
13 posts
Feb 05, 2006
6:56 AM
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I have acquired a couple of 1999 cock birds. Should I be leary of their ability to breed? I have individual coops and an open breeding loft.
Jerry
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glenn
9 posts
Feb 05, 2006
9:20 AM
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Hello:
I have several older cocks they are still fertile, a 1988,1992,1993, a couple of 1998's. They are still fertile and I am going to breed out of them. The 1988 cock is sitting on a youngster as we speak, I am afarid to break him up, he might go dry while he is broken up so I just change hens after (3) rounds.
Glenn
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nicksiders
418 posts
Feb 05, 2006
11:24 AM
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You will not have a problem with a '99 cock. They can do well into the teens in age. The hens may have problems after the 8 year mark (my experience) but, many of them also go into thier teens doeing well.
Keep the breeders supplied with grit, mineral suppliments, and vitamins and you can breed them for many years.
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tapp
43 posts
Feb 05, 2006
12:16 PM
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Jerry I have a 95 cock and 96 hen. They raied two young in mid, November thatI have been flying last 10 days.And they have two more in the nest that are 10 days old. I live in Mi. and december was the worst one for being cold in a lot of years. And Jan. was above normal. And I have No heat. I asked this same question before I got this pair. They doing just fine.
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Tapp
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fhtfire
327 posts
Feb 05, 2006
8:14 PM
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Hey,
I have a 97 hen and a two 98 hens and they are all laying just fine!! If the eggs start getting rough and odd sized or smaller...you better get what you want while you can...she is getting close to drying up. You should have no problem with a 99 cock or hen for that matter
rock and ROLL
Paul
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Mount Airy Lofts
99 posts
Feb 05, 2006
10:43 PM
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Most of my breeders are mid 90's and still producing with out a hitch. I had the option to bring home a '85 bird last year but decided not too. This bird had not missed a beat since his career as a breeder. Was still filling eggs last year. He went to Oregon for a while residing at Ivan H.'s loft. If I recall, Ivan bred a ton of youngs from him, so that meant he did his job in filling eggs. To my knowledge he and many other has produced way pass their late teens to early twenties. The oldest bird I know of that is still filling egg happens to be the '85 Cock. I know acouple of '89 cock birds still producing as well. It gets hard on such old birds to raise their own youngs so any egg filled is fostered off. This seems to work well because you get the most out of the old 'uns and still keep them stress free during breeding season.
1999 birds in my mind are still quite young, even for hens. I have been using all my 2000 or young birds as fosters because of this.
Here are all the age of my breeding pairs this year - 1995 White Tick Cock, 2002 Black Grizzle Hen, 1997 Light Red Grizzle Hen, 1999 Rec. Red Cock, 1991 Black Grizzle Cock, 2004 Red Check Hen, 1999 Blue Bar Hen. I had a 1993 Blue Bar hen but she went barren early last year. The average in my family for hens before they go barren are 11 years. As you can see, I only have two relatively young hens in the individuals pens this year. They are there to balance out the age of my older two cock birds. Not only that, they match them in pheno type plus they are the best I have in young hens.
Altho all of the above isn't true in all Roller Families. I know of very few families that will go barren/infertile as old as 3-6 years. I think this was due to all the inbreeding done to those particular families.
Good luck,
Thor
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