Breeding D'uccles

[wyldehorses]

I am getting ready to set up breeding pens and would love some input on breeding d'uccles. Most of my stock is from Jim Grober. I have porcelain and milles. (Also other colors - black, blue, and white) Jim said that I could cross the 2 colors. With the following results:

1 - the porcelain to mille cross will keep the mille background color from getting too dark.
2 - the introduction of milles to porcelain will give better feather quality to the porcelains.

Has anyone else found this to be true. I have been running 3 pens - mille, porcelain, and mille/porcelain. All the colors came out correct except for one cockerel that looks like a mille, but has blue splashes in his tail. Could this male be of any use in breeding, or should I just cull him?

I have one mille cock that has excellent color, nice diamond tips and v's. His main fault is in his comb. A little too big and beefy. The other mille cock I am using has better body type, maybe better on beards and muffs, but his color isn't as close to perfect as the other cock.

Thanks in advance,
Yolonda

[MKG]

I don't breed D'Uccles, but I know Jim Grober is a square shooter. Have you heard the term "compensation mating?" The male is only half the mating.
In the areas he is weak you should try to select females to mate with him that are strong in that area. For example, if the one male's comb is too big and beefy, select females with combs that are extra small and refined. If muffs and beard are small, select mates with larger, fuller muffs and beards. Good luck.

[wyldehorses]

Thank you for the advice. I have heard of that method, and finally have enough breeding stock to be able to try different methods. I started out with trios, and just had to breed what I had. Now that I have choices to make I am filled with self doubt about my choices.

Jim is a wonderful man. I met him at the Ohio nationals a couple of years ago, and he spent an enormous amount of time showing me the d'uccles and going through the show hall, patiently explaining what to look for. I don't doubt any of his advice.

I just have a ton of questions:

In general mating, does the age of the breeders affect the quality of the offspring?

What is your opinion on producing the best blue. Which combination in your experience produces the best blue color? blue/blue, blue/splash, blue/black. I know that each mating will produce a percentage of blue, but does one produce a better quality blue?

Yolonda

[Patrick]

I am getting ready to set up breeding pens and would love some input on breeding d'uccles. Most of my stock is from Jim Grober. I have porcelain and milles. (Also other colors - black, blue, and white) Jim said that I could cross the 2 colors. With the following results:

1 - the porcelain to mille cross will keep the mille background color from getting too dark.
2 - the introduction of milles to porcelain will give better feather quality to the porcelains.

Has anyone else found this to be true. I have been running 3 pens - mille, porcelain, and mille/porcelain. All the colors came out correct except for one cockerel that looks like a mille, but has blue splashes in his tail. Could this male be of any use in breeding, or should I just cull him?

I have one mille cock that has excellent color, nice diamond tips and v's. His main fault is in his comb. A little too big and beefy. The other mille cock I am using has better body type, maybe better on beards and muffs, but his color isn't as close to perfect as the other cock.

Thanks in advance,
Yolonda

It's nice to see someone take a serious interest in the details of breeding, and ask sensible questions. I've been admiring this breed for a while, although I much prefer the Booted. I wish that they were as common as the d'Uccles.

Statement #1: I disagree. I see statements like this a lot, regarding various breeds, but in general that kind of partial or incomplete dominance does not work that way. If it did, and the lighter porcelain did work to reduce the intensity of the mille background, then by the same theory we would be able to create self blue (gray) birds by simply crossing black with white. In some species of plants, you may cross a red flower with a white, and get either pink or red and white speckled offspring, and in some cattle, crossing a red with a white will give you a red roan, but most traits are either fully expressed or recessed. They don't often get expressed midway between both parents of different varieties. I believe that keeping the background color on mille is simply a matter of continued selection for the right shade.

Statement #2: Yes, but IMO not due to anything specific to the mille trait. I believe that it has more to do with the fact that the milles are much more popular than the porcelains, and as such have reached a higher state of perfection in all traits, including feather quality, so it stands to reason that they can be used to improve the quailty overall of the porcelains, especially since the two varieties are so compatible. Both of those varieties I imagine would require a high state of feather quality to show off the intricate markings so well. I believe that is why mille and speckled look so attractive in OEG. I just scratch my head and wonder what cochin breeders who are working with mille are thinking.

The male with blue splashes: I would not use him in mille breeding. If the tail is well marked with good diamonds, maybe use him as a test mating on porcelains and see what happens, but my first thought is to cull him unless he is otherwise very good, or you have nothing else to work with.

I agree with Mike about the cock with a big comb. If that's all you can fault him on, on a Mille d'Uccle, consider yourself very lucky. You could also try to hatch chicks from him only early in the season, when the weather is still cool, and keep the brooder temps on the low side. Hot temperatures tend to encourage large comb growth.

Age of breeders can affect the quality of the offspring, with older feeble birds producing weaker chicks, but if the breeders are in good health I would use them. You probably know that mille and porcelain tend to get whiter with age. Some birds that have prime markings as young birds may have too much white as adults, and some which have too little as first year birds may mature to have better markings. Pick your poison, and decide which of those you want to develop in your line. I don't know if it's possible in a mille marked bird to have it reach a state where the markings do not change in successive molts. It would be great if that were achievable too.

Blue breeding: You cannot tell the quality of the lacing or blue color that a splash or a black bird is carrying. I know that blue to blue gives you a lot of unshowable birds, but that's the only way to continue to improve your lacing and color. Pick your poison again. You might need to strike a balance, using mainly blue to blue, but occasionally using a good splash or black which otherwise has good traits that you need. I would at least try to use such a bird that is out of well laced blues.

Good luck, and don't forget those blacks and whites. We need to see more of the self d'Uccles.

[Patrick]

"Now that I have choices to make I am filled with self doubt about my choices."

Welcome to world of selective breeding. You make your choices based on the best information you can find, then you see what happens. You repeat what worked well, you try something different if you didn't get what you hoped for. The challenge is the whole point. If it were so simple, everyone would be doing it.

[wyldehorses]

This is just the sort of discussion I was hoping for. Great advice and lots to think about.

I had some booted bantams for a while, but everyone thought they were poor quality d'uccles. They didn't seem to be very popular.

The self colors seem a little easier to select breeders. I don't have as many doubts there. Black is black, white is white, just look for type. But those milles, I love them.

My best two mille hens are 3 and 5 years old. They are still laying, and the color on them is great. They have not developed too much white. I want to use them with the best cock, but was worried about the strength of the chicks. But I'm going to hope for quality over quantity, since I won't have as many eggs from the older hens.

Another question, or observation - When I got my bantam polish, they wre from top breeders, and decent birds. I had trios, so I didn't have to worry about mating. The birds I hatched out were not nearly as nice as the original stock. I took some of those, bred them back and the next generation was as good as if not better than the original stock. Is that normal? I thought about getting rid of them, but am glad I chose to breed them back. But it makes culling harder. Now I am setting up the 3rd generation and am wondering what to expect. Lousy birds again, or even better?

Thanks,
Yolonda

[ritterhahn]

One could be terse and say that your porcelain and millefleur birds are the same genetically apart from the presence of the lavender gene, that is, a porcelain bird is just a millefleur expressing the lav gene. Crossing the two should in theory be a simple matter. Not quite – a few problems are particular to each colour.

I started out in poultry with Watermael bantams (wish I could get them here!). I went in for the quail variety, but my brother was devoted to the millefleur. As I recall, it was a proper challenge keeping the quality of the colouration. Millefleur is not a very stable phenotype across the bird’s life. The colour tends to ‘fade’ over time, which is to say that the white spreads as the birds age – especially on the wings. Females tend to show more white than males. Thus, I would take age into consideration before you cull. You could sacrifice type in an attempt to compensate for what is a feature of the bird’s age.

Not all millefleur birds are based on the same genes – there are at two genetic bases I can think of (Wh and eb -- the latter is the better), but I am not an expert. In America, the genes are different, but one could hazard: Mille Fluer is dominant wheaten, columbian, and mottled (eWheWhCoComomo). I would try to figure out how your birds are based before trying to mix the colours. Though, I can say my brother crossed to cuckoo to get better millefleur. (unless you have cukoo d’Uccle here I would not try it – crossing to another breed of bantam would be a headache for years to come.) I guess freely here, but the pattern genes like mottles and barred are more at play than the appearance of colour in many light or dark coloured birds. Do you have red millefleur birds here in America? If they are recognized, you have a use for your too dark millefleurs.

Porcelaine is dominant wheaten, columbian, mottled, lavender (eWheWhCoComomolavlav). The reason the Porcelaine have poor feathering is the presence of Lav -- the genetics of the colour itself make for varying degrees of poor feathering. The gene is closely linked with narrow, frayed feathers in tail, wing, and saddle (esp. in males).

The lavender gene is recessive, so unless your millefleur have been crossed to birds carrying lav already, a cross will not produce porcelaine – you would have to backcross to the porcelaine parent or to a sibling that carries the lav gene. If you are trying to breed good milefleur, crossing to porcelaine (assuming the millefleur do not carry lav) might produce a good bird, but as a short term goal only. You would really be doing more for your porcelains – but for type. As regards feathering per se, it is not impossible to have lav birds with good-ish tails, but the best of them will not be as good as a really excellent specimen lacking lav. I would segregate colours and work on them separately.

Once you have settled your breeding pens, hatch as many chicks as you can. Culling is hard, but you increase your chances of getting a nice spread of options with more birds. Genetics is a numbers game. You need lots of chicks to make selection for decent feathering in lav birds, not to mention the pattern genes for millefleur.

[wyldehorses]

I looked up the Watermael bantams. They seem similar to the d'anvers we have here. (Other than the crest.) I also have d'anvers. (Quail,blue,black and white) Fiesty little birds. For their size, the most aggressive birds I have.

I've had good luck with most of my milles not gaining too much white as they age. I have tried to use those as breeders. I have sparingly used the ones that had good color as pullets and cockerels, but molted back with too much white.

How would one go about determining which type of mille one has? I originally had only the mille pattern, but hatched out a few porcelaine from them and figured what the heck, if I'm going to get them, I might as well go with it. I must confess that genetics was not one of my better subjects in school, and that was some time ago. Do you have an opinion on the cross that has splashes of blue in his tail? I am curious what he would produce.

I have the colors separated, but added an extra pen of the color cross as an experiment. I've hatched out a chick here and there this winter, and as chicks, the milles seem to be producing the best type. I expected that!

[wyldehorses]

I forgot to add thank you!

[ritterhahn]

I have a fondness for the Belgians – chickens (not the people!). The d’Anvers are charming in a Prussian sort of way. The legends of the Watermaels claim the recipe for their creation is a secret, and has been lost. I fancy I have an idea, and often ponder having a go at trying to make them here. Trying to get eggs from home would be very tricky with the avian flu hysteria.

Your Polish: The trick to breeding well is getting a really good pair (by purchase or as the result of ones own efforts) and line breeding them. You will reduce the heterozygosity (amount of genetic difference) in your birds as you inbreed to fix and settle characteristics. As homozygosity (genetic similarity) of your flock increases, you will have more uniform phenotype. Some breeders go awry here. They begin in time to see the effects of ‘inbreeding depression’ such as loss of fertility, etc. They forget that the traits one must select for are not mere fine points of the bird’s appearance (phenotype) but other important traits like fertility. With a sound culling programme and three or more lineages that are descendents of your first excellent pair, you make a cross from one to another to limit the degree of inbreeding while avoiding the problems with a full outcross. This would be to breed a bird from another flock to one of your birds. They might appear very similar when you pair them, but the heterozygosity of the first crosses will be high, and the offspring will probably be varying degrees of poor in terms of the standard. You see, one breeds in two main ways: for selection of a type closest to standard as possible (stabilization: need to hatch lots of chicks), then general maintenance of the line you have created. Culling against poor phenotype and infertility, you can maintain a flock in isolation for many years. Eventually, you will have to outcross, but it is a mistake to outcross constantly, as you keep bringing in unwanted (and often invisible) variations with new birds.

Each breed is its own breeding problem. Some must be bred separately for the traits of hen and cock, so one shows only the hens or cocks from that line; others produce both good cocks and hens with attention to the general requirements of the breed. It happens, however, in either flock that the breeders that produce excellent offspring of the highest quality are not themselves of outstanding type – thus there are the breeding pairs and the exhibition specimens that they produce. It is all so complicated at times, as Patrick says, but that is why it is a pleasure. So cross daughter back to father, son to mother and see what happens. If your birds were not very closely related, then the variation you are seeing is the result. ‘Show quality’ is a quaint term – two good birds, barring any nasty recessives, have some good genes: they just might be very different ones. Thus, your pairing was an outcross, perhaps. You must establish your own line by refining the variation, selecting toward the standard then creating lines from among your successes.

I am glad you are keeping the millefleurs closed to outcross, and selecting against the fading. The blue in the tails could be anything, given the complicated history of the breeds, and the flocks they have passed through over the centuries. Not all blues are the same. I would try breeding two birds with this trait together. There is a blue millefleur in Europe – not sure if there is here. Note any pens that produce them and in time you can either select for it or against it. As to the birds with lav, the close linkage with the colour gene(s) to poor feathering (like that between blue egg shell pigment and pea comb) could be broken, I expect, with enough selection, but of course type would have gone to ruin.

If you have good genes, carry on; if not, outcross to gain then, always selecting carefully according to standard; but do not outcross more than necessary. With enough hatchings and keeping your eye on the standard as you cull and fill breeding pens, you will improve, as you have good material and a goal in mind.

[Dustin Biery]

Please forgive my ignorance, but could the blue splashes in the millie not be a result of the lav gene working? If by some possible chance, the millies in the porc/millie pen are a result of this previous breeding, you could have some birds that are split for lav?

[ritterhahn]

I meant to intend this when I said not to breed the two together. English is not my native language, but keep an eye on those birds with bluish bits (and their parents) and you can get rid of this characteristic.

Sorry to be confusing,

Richard

[littlebit6657]

In my F1 generation of mille/porcelain old english I didn't see any blue, only additional white in the tail

[ritterhahn]

Wyldehorses,

Here is an excellent site -- better than my laboured English!

http://belgians.edelras.nl/

Happy New Year,

Richard

[MKG]

Richard, there is nothing wrong with your english. It is excellent. Thanks for the link - I had been pronouncing D'Uccle incorrectly all these years, and I appreciate being corrected.

[wyldehorses]

Richard, the site was excellent! Thank you so much! As to your english, I believe it's better than mine.

Yolonda

[Evy]

Richard, there is nothing wrong with your english. It is excellent. Thanks for the link - I had been pronouncing D'Uccle incorrectly all these years, and I appreciate being corrected.

Is ''do-clay'' the correct pronounciation ? I used it once & the breeder I was talking to looked at me like I was crazy & informed me it was ''dee'-oocle''.

[MKG]

Is ''do-clay'' the correct pronounciation ? I used it once & the breeder I was talking to looked at me like I was crazy & informed me it was ''dee'-oocle''.

According to the site, the pronuciation is d' you-clay. As in "d' you play?" So three syllables.

[Evy]

According to the site, the pronuciation is d' you-clay. As in "d' you play?" So three syllables.

Ah !. They'll still never know what we're talking about! :-)

[Neil E. Grassbaugh]

I know a d'Uccle breeder who came into the game thru her grandfather who raised the dam things.

He fell in love with them and learned all about them when he was stationed in Begium with NATO.

They say the correct pronunciation is-

"de Us Sell"

All I know for certain about Begium is that their French Fries are better than they are in France, Brugge is a facinating town, and some women at nude beaches there should have been nuns.

[ritterhahn]

I like Luxembourg better.

OK, high school French: DOOK-leh. Second syllable is hardly accented. The ‘u’ is like German ü. In the South around here it sounds a lot like when shop assistants with strong accents say ‘thank YOU’. Can be piercing when they are in a good mood and enthusiastic.

I once was at a swimming pool in Hungary. A few real shockers.

[Patrick]

I say everyone should just breed Booted Bantams, then we don't have to worry about how to pronounce it, ..........and, no ugly beards.
I like Brugge too. Missed the naked nuns though.

[jasonak]

I have had D'Uccles for years.I was wanting to try and breed some new colors,have any of you tried this ?
I was wanting Barred/Cuockoo or maybe Colombian.I have a Crele OE that I was thinking of crossing but wasnt sure how id breed back to get the beards and feathered feet.
Ive used the chicken calculator but it only tells you what the color pattern will be and does not have a option for feathering.At least not that I could tell.
Is there any websites out there about breeding new colors etc ?
Ideally Id have a selection of D'Uccle colors like the selection of OE's on Ideals website :)
Right now I have Millie,Black mottled,Porcelain,Buff colombian and Golden neck