Extracted from Breeding Leghorns
& Articles from Members of the Leghorn Club of Australia

 Duckwing Leghorns         return to
Breeding Duckwing Leghorns

You then take the cockerel of the best Leghorn type, with striped hackle. It may look like a Bircham or a Grey. Mate to a pullet breeding brown which is as light and as close to the standard as possible. You should then get some very good types of brown females. ONLY USE THESE FEMALES TO BREED DUCKWINGS.

Mate these females to the original male you bred with at the start, or an OEG Duckwing with light or yellow legs if possible. This should produce silver duckwings of both sexes.

Your brown female will act as a neutral hen for breeding golden or silver. If you want golden you go for a darker female and for silver a lighter female.

Once you have created two separate strains, you line-breed mother and son and father and daughter.

Cockerel Breeding
You take a brown Leghorn Cockerel of best show standard, making sure he has a good striped hackle, sound black breast and wing bays to the end of the wing. Mate the cockerel to a duckwing pullet or hen of coarse marking, rust in wings. Sometimes you may get silver winged bays in females, this is an advantage. You may get a pullet or two with olive green legs, or feet with yellow soles or pads. These will produce good cockerels. The harlequins which were bred at the start can be mated back to a silver to also breed good cockerels.

At this stage you are on your own to achieving your goal. You may find you will get some females with good body colour and black hackles and some harlequin with salmon breast and black bodies. Do not destroy these off-springs because they blend in, making your colour duckwings. It is somewhat like mixing paint.

The main characteristic of a Leghorn is its head, which means good deep wide serrations, almond shaped lobes, and good eye colour. The colour is useless without the right head formation, so at all times remember that you are breeding Leghorns. You must breed to type.

by courtesy of Slack, Canon Hill, Qtd ....
A keen and devoted breeder of the less popular leghorn colours as well as being an enthusiastic supporter of blacks and whites.

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