Sexing Chicks

[chicken lodge]

Hi Everyone.At the moment i have managed to hatch 3 chicks in my incubator with another 3 on the way out. Could anyone please give me some advice on how to sex the boys from the girls, as last time they were quite old before it was clear to me what sex they were, and i dont want to wait that long.
I managed to hatch only 5 but 4 out of 5 were boys, last time so this time i'm keeping fingers crossed.
I am a complete beginer at this so any help would not go amiss.
Many thanks.

 

[chrismahon]

Unless they are an autosexing (male and female chicks have different markings) breed Chicken Lodge you will have to wait and guess like the rest of us. It isn't certain until they crow in my experience, but some breeds do grow large wattles and comb quickly so they are obvious. What breed have you hatched, as some sex much faster than others? We have only hatched Wyandottes, Leghorns, Orpingtons and TNN's.

 

[chicken lodge]

Hi Thanks for your reply,
At the moment they are only mixed bantams.
I lost my chickens earlia this year due to old age, and a fox so i brought some eggs hoping they would hatch out and the kind lady wrote on the eggs what they were.
I have 12 in total and they range from bantams to leghorns and on some eggs it just mentions mixed ?

 

[Tim]

Hi Chicken Lodge,

As Chris says, they will need to mature a little before you can get some clues. It will be harder having a mixed batch as well, if they are all the same breed, you have lots to compare.

I sexed my Light Sussex chicks a few weeks back and wrote a blog post about it here if you're interested: http://blog.poultrykeeper.com/tim-chicken-blog/sexing-chicks/

Good luck ;-)

 

[Courage]

You can use the feather sexing method, but some people say that it doesn't work for bantams.

At two or three days old when the pin feathers just start coming in, there will be two rows of 'stubs'. With males, the two rows will be even, with females, one row will be longer than the other.