Balance ~ Beauty ~ Grace  

We quickly became very fond of our first Black Copper Marans flock. The gorgeous well-mannered roosters, the curious yet graceful hens and the shinning blue and green sheened black feathers. All around just beautiful birds. We had originally purchased hatching eggs to add in those dark chocolate eggs to our egg basket, but when our pullets started laying, we were not impressed with the egg shades that they were producing. We had a couple hens that could lay a 4 at the beginning of the season but this quickly faded, and they laid less than a 4 for most of the laying season. We were also unimpressed with the foundation of the birds, they had sparsely feathered shanks if even feathered at all and they were lacking overall balance and proportion.

 

In search of reasons as to why our flock was so underwhelming we stumbled into the heritage of the breed, familiarized ourselves with the Marans breed Standard and we jumped into the rabbit hole and sourced quality birds from breeders focused on the true heritage of the Marans breed. We were able to find 3 quality Black Copper lines within Canada and 2 additional Blue Copper lines within North America. Each line balanced in body type and temperament, thus began our adventure into French Copper Marans. 

We breed above all else for the foundation of the bird, body type, temperament, and vigor. We select for balanced proportions and true marans type above all else. Marans should look proportionate from the top, sides and rear. We select birds with a nice long straight keel bone and nice fleshing of the breast, as Marans are a dual purpose breed. We check for legs that are not too long and are set wide enough apart, proper feathering down the shanks and outer toes. We also select for the deepest copper (Mahogany) colouring in both males and females. 

We have selected our best over the seasons to breed forward and worked our way into two distinct lines. One line being Straight Black Copper Marans and the second line a Blue Copper Marans line. Egg shades do vary. 

 

Once we have selected the birds we want to keep for breeding we continue to monitor their growth, temperament and overall vigor. Once our pullets begin to lay we assess the eggs for colour and size and continue to monitor this through the first year. Our pullets typically start laying 48 – 50 gram eggs and climb to that 65 – 75 gram egg by the time they are a year old. When you purchase hatching eggs from us you will also only receive eggs from hens that are fully mature and laying full sized eggs. We find that by waiting for the larger eggs we are also able to achieve better size on our Marans at an earlier age due to the chicks being larger at hatch.

Marans hens on average will lay for about 5 years, you will see a decrease in egg production going into their 3rd year. 

 

Because we do "hard cull" our extra roosters and add our non breeding hens into our laying flock we are able to hatch in abundance , this gives us an advantage in speeding up the selective breeding process and seeing our work pay off a little earlier. Selecting only your best means that out of a hatch of 30 chicks you may end up with 2-5 quality birds for breeding. Breeding for quality in any poultry requires a determined mind with a clear set of goals. We are working on our Black Copper Marans lines in preparation for exhibition in 2026.  

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For any other questions regarding our Copper Marans please contact us. We are consistently working on this breed and will have updates here on our Marans page when we have them.