Black Sexlink

 Red Sexlink

Gold Sexlink

Black Sexlink…what is a sexlinked chicken anyway???

Black sexlinks, Red sexlinks, Gold sexlinks and another chicken, by another name, this can get confusing. We sell a lot of sexlink chicks but the black sexlinks tend to be the most popular. This is because they are a solid, dual purpose chicken that is hardy, lays 300 plus (mostly) large brown eggs a year, even in winter. They live and lay a long life span, and are also docile and easily tamed.      

First…. sexlinks are a Hybrid Chicken, hybrid Chickens were first developed in the 1930’s. The first rule of any hybrid is that if you breed two sexlink chickens you will NOT get a sexlink off spring. AND breeding a sexlink to a pure bred chicken will NOT get you another sexlink. Short of it is, you can not breed a sexlinked chicken in any cross to produce a sexlink off spring. So if you are looking to breed chickens, sexlinks are not what you want. Unless you want mutts. I will leave the rest up to those chicken breeders that know all the genetics of breeding chickens. It’s all in the genes and a little confusing to me. Best to let someone else explain this. I underlined the qualities I find important.

From Wikipedia, This article is about hybrid chickens. For the biologic principles of sex linked inheritance, see Sex linkage.

Sex-links are cross-bred chickens whose color at hatching is differentiated by sex, thus making chick sexing an easier process. Sex-links come in several varieties. As hybrids of laying or dual-purpose breeds infused with extra vigor via heterosis, sex-links can be extremely good egg-layers which often produce 300 eggs a year or more depending on the quality of care and feed. The color of their eggs vary according to the mix of breeds, and blue-green eggs are possible.

Many common varieties are known as the black sex-link (also called Black Stars) and the red sex-link (also called Red Stars). More specific variety names are common as well. Blacks are a cross between a Rhode Island Red or New Hampshire rooster and a Barred Rock hen.

Red sex-links sometimes called Gold sex-links are a cross between a Rhode Island Red or New Hampshire rooster and a White Rock (This variety pair is known as a Golden Comet, Silver Laced Wyandotte, Rhode Island White or Delaware hen.