Inbreeding. Good, bad, doesn't matter??

I guess my goals for keeping birds are different from others, and that's why I'm not a fan of inbreeding. If you are seeking to produce birds with certain characteristics with regularity, then inbreeding would be used to create a line of birds that produce birds just like them. Just be aware that lots of things are affected by inbreeding, including fertility, immune system, longevity, susceptibility to cancer, etc. and not just "type." In the beginning of creating a line, you'll have to do lots of culling to remove homozygotes for harmful or undesirable recessive traits. In the end, you'll start to produce cookie-cutter birds. For people interested in showing birds, this is a goal. For people interested in maintaining captive populations of wild species, this is to be avoided. My mindset is from more of a zoological perspective. The species I'm interested in keeping would be bred with only unrelated individuals so as to maintain vigor and long-term population health. I prefer variability. If you prefer to consistently produce birds of a desired type, then inbreeding is your tool. If you prefer to keep a species in captivity and maintain genetic diversity, then inbreeding is to be avoided.

Also keep in mind that when beginning a line of birds, you must begin with truly exceptional individuals. Simply taking any old ordinary bird and inbreeding it will give you lots more ordinary birds. The goal in creating a line is to perpetuate exceptional traits that reproduce consistently. The OP isn't stating that this was the original goal. Rather, what I'm gathering is that the inbreeding is happening simply because he hasn't gotten any other stock.

Agree inbreeding is more for show stock. trying to produce a bird to a standard. Yes lots ot culling........

SuperPeacockman said:

Wild India Blue peafowl look different?

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Yes they do wild blue peafowl have legs at least 3-4 times the size, about the same as greens, Because peafowl here are so heavily inbred that the trait has been lost. Also wild peafowl have a larger body size just smaller than a wild turkey

ok so I've read the whole post. here's my situation. I have three chicks, two male one female. all have the same father - I only have one bs male. one male chicks is ib - I have 4 hens two are ib. one ib is pied and one is loud pied. this chick shows no white flights, or patches. either way the ib chick has to be from one of those hens. the other two chicks are bs, one male one female. these two chicks mothers have to be one of my bs hens, I have a bs and a purple bs hen. (or could one of the ib hens be the mom and this won't show up till later? - so far they look 100% bs)
anyways - the lady that is getting them asked if it would be safe to breed them. they're only half brother and sister does that matter? from what I've read I think I should tell her not to breed them together if possible. she'll have 2-3 years to get another hen, so I don't want to say she can't have them just in case she leaves them together. i'll just encourage her not to let them breed. any thoughts???

either way from what I've read I'm going to get rid of my bs hen as I purchased my roo and her as a pair and I'm not sure they're not brother and sister. - I went and picked them up and they got them out of the same cage with many chicks. I was thinking of getting rid of one I think I don't have enough room. now I'm sure which one.

The good thing about india blue peafowls that they have the less inbreeding from peafowl colors, but of course if she could replace one bird later it would be better.

Inbreeding in peafowls is the worst from all the birds i raised before, especially in the cameo and peach color.

In reality probably 90% of all pairs of peafowl mated in the states are related within three generations. That is just the nature of the limited number of birds in the market. You don't see many issues occurring do you? I could also take the other side of the argument and say that inbreeding of the IB line has created the short, squat duck like peahens we have.

Ideally you would not do this but the bottom line is that two healthy quality siblings bred together produces better offspring than two genetically weak unrelated birds or one healthy bird and one weak bird.

In breeding can perpetuate negative or unhealthy traits faster than unrelated lines all things being equal. All things are not equal with the limited number of birds in the states. Although not desirable, inbreeding is looked upon more negatively than it truly is. It occurs in nature in many species on a regular basis.

EVERY mutation must be inbred to an extent to create a stable line.