Increase offspring size from small/medium size parents

[Cesar Villegas]

Hi everyone, I was wondering if you can help out offspirng from small/medium size parents to gain a little size from hatch.

I have a LF black pullet that is on the tiny side. But has awesome muffs/beard and comes from a line with tight pea comb and was a very early layer. Im using her because she has a high tail angle and was an early layer. Her mate is a decent size medium cockerel, with a slightly lower tail angle (which im seeing in a lot of blacks and blues lately)

She laying about a medium size egg, Id like just a tad bit more size. (not too big)

Would feeding their offspring a 30% protein feed help with starting them off to a bigger size?

i was told that by some breeders that they have bred siblings together and have gotten bigger birds than the parents. Any validity to this?

[John W Blehm]

Would feeding their offspring a 30% protein feed help with starting them off to a bigger size?

i was told that by some breeders that they have bred siblings together and have gotten bigger birds than the parents. Any validity to this?

High protein feed is great for embryos and chicks to get a good healthy start and I've heard that a high protein feed will put weight on chickens, but I don't believe it.  Grains and feeds with high fat content will put weight on, but it is not natural or healthy.

Siblings have the potential to be smaller, the same and/or larger than their parents. 

I relate both questions to people also and note that I'm overweight due to the quality and quantity of food I eat, but when I tried a high protein diet I lost weight.  My brother and I are both taller then our father was, but our sons are shorter than us.

My LF blacks lay the largest (mostly extra large) and bluest eggs of any variety.  Although my blacks are up to standard weight, the size of the hen doesn't always determine the size of the eggs she lays.
Outcrosses to strains with larger birds and larger egg size, to bring the needed genes into your strain, may be the way to go.

[Suki]

Would feeding their offspring a 30% protein feed help with starting them off to a bigger size?

         Yes.  There was a guy who did this as a 4H experiment and used cat food which is typically 32% protein. It worked and his chooks were large but the downside were the cocks had diminished fertility..  He didn't care about that, he was just testing a theory and trying to win largest cock bird at a 4H meet (and he did)  but he did say that his next experiment was changing over to regular food at some earlier point to see the effect if he could get .  I never read that outcome.