Quote:
Originally Posted by
RachaelS 
Man, just finished reading all 183 pages
. So much good info. Okay so back history at the beginning of the year I had Barnevelder Roo and a Barred PR Hen. When researching what the cross would be I found out about "Auto sexed" breeds. I had never heard of them before, just sexed linked. The idea is GREAT. So I bred the two and kept a great Roo, I will then cross that Roo over some pure Barnevelder hens, creating my own Barnebar, brown egg/auto sexed (I know it will take 4 gens, so a work in progress).
But of course I can't have just 1 breed of auto sexed
So when I saw a listing on CL for Crested Legbars I turned to BYC and I stumbled on this thread about a blue egg/auto sexed bird. I decided I must have them!!!!
Then on page 131 of this thread Gary Dean posted on how to get different colored egg. So, if I have a brown and a blue, gotta have a green right? To do this would it work to put a Legbar Roo over a Barnevelder Hen? Or would I need a Barnevelder Roo over a Legbar Hen? The babies should be auto sexed correct? I really hope it is Legbar Roo over a Barnie Hen, that would work perfect for my current set up and not require another pen, well not right now at least
.
If that works then my next step would be to get some Gold Legbars and I would have an auto sexed breed of every egg color!!!!!
Great project! As far as your Barne X Cream Legbar crossing goes. You should get a darker egg if you use a Barney rooster over Cream Legbar hens, but either combination can be used.
Punnett's research in egg color genetics showed that there is one gene for the blue egg color, and more than a dozen genes for brown egg color. Some of the brown egg color genes are sex linked genes so the rooster contributes more brown genes than the hen to the pullets of the cross.
As far as the auto-sexing goes, a Barne Roo (who is not barred) over Cream Legbar hens (single barring gene) will produce a sex link. All the pullet will be non-barred and all the cockerels will be barred. This would similar to your Barne X Barred Plymouth Rock.
If you reverse the Cream Legbars (roos with two barring genes) with the Barnes (non-barred), then the sex-link is lost because both the cockerels and pullets will receive a single barring gene from the father.
For your Barnebar, you will need to produce a roosters with two barring genes. You currently have single barred rosters breed back to Barne hens. You can breed the Barred Barne hens from that crossing back to the Single Barred roosters and you should get 50% single barred 50% double barred Barnebar roosters. Breeding the double barred rooster to barred females will produce auto-sexing offspring with all the males being double barred and the females only single barred.