Description
These are a lavender version of the common Cream Legbar. They are much lighter in color, as all the blacks and greys are muted to very light grey. Our flock has been genetically tested to lay all blue eggs.
Opal Legbars are a color variant sometimes known as “isabel”. It was created by adding the gene for lavender to cream legbars. Isabel Leghorns were used to introduce the lavender gene. They are a very pretty color, but the other genetic traits important for Legbars are not completely fixed yet. I have been, and continue to, outcross with my excellent line of Cream Legbars. I am making great progress with this and am happy with the line of Opal I am producing now.
Breeding Goals
- FIXED as of July 2023 – Blue Eggs – Foremost in our breeding is to fix the dominant gene for blue eggs in out flock so that white eggs will not be possible in the future.
- Calm and docile – The cockerels are showing some aggression, even worse than what the Rees line Creams had years ago. I end up culling about half the cockerels every year for too much aggression. I am working to eliminate this in the future, but since most people are only looking for females, this is not a huge problem.
- Crests – Not all the birds have full crests, but I sometimes see a less than perfect crest in the Creams as well. The Opals have largely caught up to the creams in this regard as of spring 2025.
Breeding plan
I wrote a more detail description of how I am improving the Cream in a blog post here on this site.This is a timeline of the plans:
- 2023 – outcrossed the original, gene-tested, Opals by adding Cream hens to the breeding pen. Kept all non-cream chicks as breeders for 2024
- 2024 – pen of F1 (siblings) breeders (50% genes from my line of Creams) produced large numbers of chicks. Sold non-opals as laying chicks, kept Opals for 2025 breeders
- 2025 – pen of F2 Opals (50% genes from my line of Creams) with some pure Cream Legbar pullets added. Kept non-opal chicks for 2026 breeders (75% genes from my line of Creams)
- 2026 – pen of F3 (siblings) breeders (75% genes from my line of Creams) to produce large numbers of chicks. Sell non-opals as laying chicks, keep Opals for 2027 breeders
