Jersey Giant × Legbar

What the chicks of a Jersey Giant and a Legbar look like and lay, worked out from both breeds' standards.

Egg colour

Green100%

A Jersey Giant hen crossed with a Legbar rooster gives you what keepers call a first-generation (F1) cross. Every pullet should lay green eggs (some may be blue or olive): both sides pass the blue gene. Every chick gets a single comb. Most chicks (50%) are barred. Expect a large bird, a good layer, calm, the average of the two parents.

Try other parents

Preset to a Jersey Giant hen and a Legbar rooster. Change either side to see how the blue gene and the brown coat move the shell colour.

The hen lays

The rooster's mother laid

He never lays, so his blue gene is read from his mother's eggs.

Olivemost likely

also possible

Probably Olive (possibly Green): 50–100% blue-based; otherwise Brown.

Blue-based50–100%

0%100%

Brown shade shifts with a hen's age, diet and stress, so identical genes still lay a little differently. Speckling and bloom are cosmetic and not modelled.

Chick genetics: Jersey Giant hen × Legbar rooster

Trait	Jersey Giant hen	Legbar rooster	Chicks
Comb type	Single	Single	Single
Barring	Not barred	Barred	Barred 50% · Not barred 50%assumes the sire carries not barred, so it could be 0%; a hatch or a known genotype can confirm (uncertain)
Fibromelanosis	Absent	Absent	Absent
Skin color	Yellow	Yellow	Yellow
Leg color	Black	Yellow	varies: polygenic, parents differ

The other way round: Legbar hen × Jersey Giant rooster

Barring and silver are carried on the Z chromosome, so which parent is which changes the chicks.

Trait	Legbar hen	Jersey Giant rooster	Chicks
Comb type	Single	Single	Single
Barring	Barred	Not barred	Barred 50% · Not barred 50%sex-linked: ♂ 100% barred, ♀ 0% barred
Fibromelanosis	Absent	Absent	Absent
Skin color	Yellow	Yellow	Yellow
Leg color	Yellow	Black	varies: polygenic, parents differ

♂♀ This direction is sex-linked too: barring.

A Legbar hen crossed with a Jersey Giant rooster gives you what keepers call a first-generation (F1) cross. Every pullet should lay green eggs (some may be blue or olive): both sides pass the blue gene. Every chick gets a single comb. Barring is sex-linked in this direction: the cockerels hatch barred and the pullets do not, so the chicks can be sexed on hatch day. Expect a large bird, a good layer, calm, the average of the two parents.

Size, laying and temperament

Trait	Jersey Giant	Legbar	Chicks
Frame height	giant	medium	large
Egg production	fair layer	good layer	good layer
Broodiness	rarely broody	rarely broody	rarely broody
Docility	calm	easygoing	calm
Bone density	heavy	medium	sturdy
Foraging skill	decent forager	good forager	good forager
Cold hardiness	very cold-hardy	fairly hardy	cold-hardy

Chicks land near the average of the two parents for these traits. Reaching one parent's extreme takes another generation of selection.

More crosses

Jersey Giant ×

Legbar ×

Now with your own birds

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Sources

Breed standards and profiles

The Livestock Conservancy: breed pages and the "Pick a Breed" comparison chart (egg colour, rate of lay, broodiness, temperament, foraging, cold hardiness)
Oklahoma State University, Breeds of Livestock: chickens (comb, skin and shank colour, egg colour, weights, origin)
University of Wisconsin-Madison Extension A2880, Chicken Breeds and Varieties (egg colour, skin colour, comb, class and use)
American Poultry Association, recognised breeds and varieties (which breeds and varieties are standardised)
The Poultry Club of Great Britain, breed pages (British and rare breeds)

The genetics behind the predictions

Checked September 2026. Hybrids and breeds no reference covers are marked approximate. Egg colour on these pages follows one rule: Brown is any shade a buyer would call brown; Cream/tinted is off-white.