Breed of Araucan chickens: description and characteristics, breeding rules, diseases

The South American breed of domesticated chickens - Araucan, is known for the fact that its representatives have a bright interesting color, and laying hens give large eggs with blue or turquoise shells. The breed is decorative, but, with proper care, it acquires a high practical value. What else is interesting, and why is Araucana popular? Let's try to figure it out.

Benefits of Breeding

The breed of Araucan chickens has many advantages, which makes its breeding quite profitable and interesting. Poultry breeders (amateurs and professionals) are increasingly opting for it, since birds have a lot of positive breed qualities:

• delicious, moderately fatty meat;
• large pale blue or green eggs;
• high productivity, which is determined by early puberty;
• hardiness and unpretentiousness;
• adaptability in adverse conditions.

Origin of the breed

Araucana is an ancient Chilean breed of chickens. For the first time, it was bred by the Indians of the Araucan tribe, who live in small settlements located in the foothills of the Andes. Aborigines were very interested in chickens that lay colored eggs, and warlike tailless cockerels, as if specially created for participation in cockfights

This breed was unknown to anyone for a long time. For the first time, they started talking about it at the World Scientific Association of Poultry Breeders, held in The Hague in 1920. Since that time, the breed has gained popularity, has been actively bred and has been included in the international standard.

Description and characteristics of Araucan chickens

The main feature of Araucan chickens and roosters is the complete absence of a tail, although the English and Australian standards allow for a small tail. The turquoise tint of the eggs is another important property of the breed. Each of them weighs up to 60 grams. The green bile pigment, biliverdin, produced by the body of females and entering the shell at the stage of its formation, is responsible for the unusual shade of the shell.

The breed standard also implies a special plumage of the head. Three combinations are allowed: beard and sideburns, tassels or tassels and beard. The breed standard also allows 12 varieties of body colors:

• wild;
• golden-maned;
• black and red;
• wild blue;
• blue golden mane;
• blue wheat;
• wheat;
• silver-maned;
• black;
• blue;
• blue bordered;
• cuckoo.

Chickens themselves are small birds weighing between 1.6 kilograms (females) and 2.5 kilograms (males).

What do they look like?

The unusual appearance of chickens of this breed gave rise to several theories. According to one of them, modern Araucan chickens are a cross between ordinary chickens and wild pheasants. There is no scientific confirmation of this assumption.

In addition to the tailless, short body and small head, decorated with bright plumage, representatives of the breed can be distinguished:

• slightly convex chest;
• wings close to the body;
• powerful belly;
• four-toed blue-green paws,
• orange eyes;
• small standing comb;
• curved beak;
• thick plumage.

Breed productivity

Araucan chickens are bred mainly for the sake of large eggs of the original color. The breed is an egg-layer - each chicken brings from 160 to 180 eggs a year.

The main part of the females starts laying by the age of 6 months. A little later, individuals of a late brood - autumn or winter - rush. The bird is able to give eggs all year round, except for periods of molting.

Breeders are actively crossing Araucan chickens with other breeds. It turns out unpretentious viable offspring with good pedigree qualities. Particularly good results were obtained by crossing these birds with Russian Crested chickens.

Araucana meat is also appreciated - it is excellent both in taste and nutritional content. But specially fattening birds for meat is useless. Overeating will turn into obesity for them, not an increase in muscle mass.

Bird Character

Roosters of the Araucan breed are known for their cocky disposition and, protecting the territory, can attack both strangers and their own. There are cases of demonstration of aggression even in relation to their own owner.

Chickens are peaceful, but they have another drawback. Most females lack the instinct to hatch offspring. Therefore, it is possible to obtain purebred chickens from eggs only through incubation.

Main pros and cons

The popularity of Araucan chickens is increasing year by year. Their cultivation is quite profitable, has many advantages.The most valued are good egg production, unpretentiousness, high immunity, immunity to diseases and original appearance. But when deciding to buy chickens, you should keep in mind that there are certain difficulties in breeding:

1. High price for birds.
2. Lack of female incubation instinct.
3. Low meat productivity.
4. Purebred Araucans are hard to come by because they are few in number. For inexperience, you can buy outbred chicken or a cross.

The nuances of keeping a private household

This rare breed requires separate keeping. Living together with chickens of other breeds leads to a mixture of genes and the gradual degeneration of the breed. It is recommended to keep chickens in small families, in special cages or aviaries.

Finishing the premises

The room for keeping Araucan chickens is equipped in a classic style - in the same way as for birds of any other breed. Permissible conditions of detention - in cages, aviaries or free range. The area of the room should be calculated so that no more than 4 chickens are placed on 1 square meter.

Preferably - keeping in enclosures. This will avoid fights between males. The room is divided with the help of bars into enclosures, each of which accommodates 1 rooster and no more than 8 hens.

You need to take care of a sufficient number of perches and nests. Dry hay, sawdust, or sand should be placed on wood, earth, or concrete floors.

The optimal temperature for mating birds and breeding offspring is from 17 to 20 degrees Celsius. On long winter evenings, a source of artificial lighting will be needed, and a ventilation installation should be provided for the hot season.

Preparing the exercise yard

If the birds will live indoors, it is necessary to organize a walking yard. This is a space surrounded by a metal fence at least 1.5 meters high. The leeward side is covered with plywood shields. For the summer, they build a canopy - protection from sunlight and rain. The walking yard should have a sufficient number of feeders, drinkers, a container with chalk and gravel, an ash bath.

Installation of feeders, drinkers and ash baths

Feeders should be placed on high ground to avoid puddles. Between feedings, containers should be washed clean and uneaten food removed. Spoiled food can cause significant harm to he alth.

Birds should always have free access to fresh clean water. This is especially important in the summer heat.

Ash baths are essential for birds to clean their plumage. Deep containers are filled with a mixture of ash and sand. Having bathed in this mixture, the bird reliably protects its feather cover from the penetration of skin and feather parasites.

Seasonal molt and lay break

Every year at the end of August, the molting season begins for chickens. This period is quite difficult for birds and is accompanied by a break in egg production. But with good care, proper feeding, vitamin diet, the egg production of birds will decrease slightly or not suffer at all.

Planned herd replacement

Egg production in Araucan chickens lasts 10 years. The most active period lasts two years, then the number of eggs brought is significantly reduced.

Those females that have stopped laying should be replaced with new ones. It is quite difficult to buy purebred Araucan chickens, so it is recommended to raise young egg-laying chickens on your own. This process comes with certain problems, but all of them can be solved:

1. To increase the fertility rate, every 20 days it is necessary to trim the thick feathers around the cesspool of the chicken and rooster.
2. Most Araucan chickens have no brooding instinct. In order to produce chicks, the eggs are placed in a domestic incubator or placed in the nests of other breeds of hens to hatch.

Diet

Overeating is the main consequence of an incorrectly composed menu. A large amount of food quickly leads to bird obesity, and hence a decrease in egg production. The diet for chickens of the Araucan breed is compiled according to the classical scheme. Its main principles are:

1. Enough protein food. Protein sources - earthworms, fish waste, legumes, bone meal.
2. Enough carbohydrates. Carbohydrate foods - cereals, potatoes, pumpkin.
3. Fats. Good egg production depends on their quantity. Suppliers of vegetable fats - corn and oat grains.
4. Food rich in vitamins. Vitamins necessary for birds - groups A, B, D, are found in silage, yeast, bone meal.
5. Adequate amount of minerals, especially calcium. This mineral is necessary for the formation of a strong shell. Ashes, shells, crushed shells are rich in microelements.

The diet must be carefully adjusted so that the amount of a particular product does not exceed the maximum allowable daily intake.

Adult chickens

Adult birds should eat at least three times a day. In the morning and in the evening they give dry grain, and at lunch they prepare a liquid nutrient mixture based on cereals. The daily allowance for one adult chicken should be about 150 grams of feed.

In the summer, birds get vitamins and minerals from grass. In the cold season, a vitamin supplement is prepared based on crushed pine needles.Young chickens are given compound feed with a high protein content for active growth, and sources of calcium (chalk, crushed eggshells).

Chicks

Chickens of the Araucan breed are fed according to the classical scheme. The first week is given with chopped boiled eggs, millet porridge, cottage cheese and greens. At a week of age, greens are connected - nettles, dandelions, clover. It is allowed to give nutritious feed for chickens. A prerequisite for proper feeding is fresh drinking water in sufficient quantities.

Features of breeding

Araucan chickens have some features that cannot be ignored when breeding the breed.

• presence of a semi-lethal gene;
• congenital taillessness.

If you do not pay attention to them, then you will not be able to produce a sufficient number of viable purebred chickens.

Semi-lethal gene

The semi-lethal gene is responsible for the shape of the tufts on the bird's head. These are tanks, a beard and brushes. The gene is called semi-lethal because if both parents have it, non-viable offspring may appear. This is what happens when the family is wrong. To avoid the risk of losing offspring, it is recommended to mate birds in the following way: one of them should have tassels on their heads, and the other should have a beard.

Congenital taillessness

Birds of this breed lack the lower vertebrae that make up the coccyx. The absence of a tail led to the development of dense plumage in the back of the body. This hinders the mating process, which is a big problem. Under normal conditions, its percentage is no more than 60.

Significantly increase it allows the procedure of cutting five to six centimeters of long fluff around the cloaca of a chicken and a rooster. This increases the fertility rate to 90-100%.

Possible diseases

Purebred chickens have strong innate immunity and are not susceptible to disease. Improper care and lack of prevention can provoke infection and infection with helminths.

The most common parasitic infections are:

1. Feather mite. The disease is incurable, infected birds are doomed.
2. Fuzzy. Sick birds are treated with insecticides. In humans, this parasite can cause an allergic reaction.
3. Helminthiases. The disease is transmitted from wild birds that have entered the chicken coop.
4. Fleas. Infected animals experience severe skin itching, become restless, lose their appetite.

An obligatory preventive measure that protects Araucan chickens from the penetration of all types of parasites is the regular treatment of the chicken coop with special complex preparations.

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