Iowa Blues Chicken Club (IBCC) - Breed Standard Discussion / Club Discussion

And hey everyone, a reminder...

Nominations for IBCC Officers and Breed Standard Committee end tomorrow at Midnight!

At this time we have 3 people nominated for all 3 positions and a nice group already applying to sit the committee. It's your last chance to throw your name in the hat!

This group will be setting THE standard for Iowa Blues, so if you want to be involved, the time is now.

Quote:Originally Posted by Hurley










This guy has plenty of lacing!



Also interesting is that the breed artwork that I've found on the internet always shows the Birchen as the coloration, not that this means anything, but interesting.




And yet the pictures in Storey's guide don't look like this. I know Storey doesn't always get it right, but the birds pictured in the book and the description of them are provided by Glenn Drown of Sandhill. I rather think someone tried to make them Birchen and that should be easy enough to continue. I think those of you who want focus on the birchen won't have any trouble, just cull the brown chicks. Or give em to me

I borrowed these pics from the other thread, borrowed from Storey's Guide to Poultry:





So in respect to the Standard, can you have a breed that produces more than one variety in the same clutch? They are supposed to breed true, correct?

My hypothesis is that the SP is recessive to Birchen just like Lavandar and black. Just a hypothesis since I don't have a SP cockerel old enough to breed yet.

They have to breed true >50% of the time. If you have Birchens throwing 25% SPs, they would still qualify as a breed.

They will have to be accepted as two separate breeds/varieties, just like all the other breeds that have to go through the process each time they want another color recognized. I spoke with Walt, and yes that means two separate qualifying meets, 50 quality birds OF EACH VARIETY. We can try for both at once or we can pick one variety to get in the SOP first and then work towards the second. But yes, each variety is separate as far as qualification.

The first decision the officers/board will have to decide is which of these do we pursue:

1) Apply for IB acceptance with Birchen coloration, show only the birches, get the qualifying meet in the birches, 5 years of showing, etc. Then work on getting Silver Penciled Iowa Blues accepted.

2) Apply for IB acceptance with Silver Penciled coloration, show only the SPs, get the qualifying meet in the SPs, 5 years of showing, etc. Then work on getting Birchen Iowa Blues accepted.

3) Apply jointly for both colors, requiring twice the numbers of birds and will likely be much harder to accomplish unless we explode the people showing them.

In my mind, if we decide to go for one color first, it makes sense for all of us to focus on that color to start with to really get the numbers up to get them approved.


As to "what was the original Iowa Blue's coloration?" I do not know. The folk tale always calls for striped chipmunk chicks or is listed as a mix of chicks including some that look striped. Storey's book shows some (fairly sad looking) silver penciled Iowa Blues. Most of the time I see them advertised, they are shown as black chicks (birchen). Most of the ones I see from Sandhill are Birchens, but when I ordered from them I got an even split, more or less.

I am happy to go either way, though at this time I am Birchen heavy, so will have to recruit more SPs if we decide to make that the first accepted color.

I don't claim to be an expert on this, but I think we have a few genes at work. Obviously we have the ER-Birchen - distinguished by being born black. The brown chicks could be either wild type e+ or eb (brown). I've had results that indicate both are involved. Does anyone have any thoughts on that? I'd be curious to know what we're dealing with.

I think as you start raising a bunch of chicks, you will continue to get the brown ones, and you may find some worth keeping. I know some people are going to have to choose which to focus on, but I will raise, promote and show both, even though we may not have the numbers over all. They are the only breed I concentrate on, so I can devote the resources to both varieties.

So let's "pick apart" the Storey birds. I think that might be a good neutral exercise

The two types of chicks I've gotten with my Iowa Blues are shown above. I've been trying to figure out what the genetic difference is between them. Given the chick appearance, they look like black chicks are ER (birchen) and brown chicks are eb (brown/partridge).

However, from what I've been able to dig up, eb alone won't give us the silver penciled birds.

E Locus base of Birchen (E^R) or Partridge/Brown (eb)

• Birchen - E^R - chicks being mostly black with small areas of yellow, black legs
• Partridge/Brown - eb - chicks are brown

E Locus (E extended black (half black chicks/penguin); ER birchen (black chicks with yellow chins); e+ wild type (chipmunk chicks); eb partridge/brown (brown chicks); es (speckled); ebc (buttercups); ey wheaten (yellow chicks)

The order of dominance among the generally accepted E‐locus alleles is: E>ER>e+>eb>es>ebc>ey.
The birchen allele is incompletely dominant to dominant wheaten and the wild‐type alleles.

The image below shows birds that are eb (brown/partridge):







compared to this image of birds that are ER (birchen):



I think it's safe to say that we have both of these in our Iowa Blues, based on the appearance of the chicks.

Edit to add...
For comparison here is the wild type:







Silver locus


Silver (S) / gold (s+) is a sex-linked trait, so if we are going to breed towards the breeding being Silver, ideally the cocks would be S/S and the hens S/-
(Currently I think we have a number of S/s+ cocks out there, but haven't seen any gold birds s+/s+ cocks - s+/- hens)





Birds showing Silver + Pattern Gene + what looks like dark brown/partridge e base to me on that chick:





Pattern gene

Pg - Dominant.
This is the pattern gene which, together with other genes is responsible for the patterns of plumage. The pattern gene doesn’t seem to express in the absence of Ml in combination with some of the E locus alleles.

pg+ Recessive.
Wild‐type gene. Lack of pattern gene.

Chicks showing Pg show chipmunk striping down their backs







In combination, Silver Penciled birds would be S/S (cocks) or S/- (hens) with Pg/Pg (homozygous for pattern gene - partridge patterning). I don't know the difference in appearance between animals that are silver/patterned/birchen vs. silver/patterned/brown. I've got a couple brown chicks from the last hatch from birchen parents, curious to see how they mature feather out. I don't have any silver penciled birds at the moment to compare to. I am curious to see how these brown/partridge (eb) but not patterned chicks will turn out. I'm not sure where they fit into things, but pretty sure they won't be good birchens and aren't penciled. Wondering if these will just end up mostly black. They will get culled down the road, but I want to see them mature. Looks like I'll be hitting up Kari for some silver penciled IBs this year.

I think we've definitely got a mix at play. I need some numbers to look at to begin to pick it apart more. At present, I've got black chicks and brown chicks to watch mature (birchens ER and brown/partridge eb). I don't have any partridge pattern (i.e. pattern gene) and since it's dominant, it's not likely to pop up here.


These are silver penciled Chochin chicks listed at Ideal. Look a lot like the chipmunk chicks I had in the past.

I there is definitely a variety of feathering genes in the mix. I've got 2 or 3 in the last bunch that are dramatically slower in feathering in than their clutchmates. Looks like rapid feathering individuals should breed true, so once I'm getting numbers, I'll be culling the slow feathering ones and hopefully wipe that out in a generation.

Feathering Rate Genes:


k+ Sometimes called rapid feathering. Recessive.
K Late feathering gene

Ks Slow feathering gene
Kn Very slow feathering or 'delayed' feathering gene.

The order of dominance among the genes allelic to this locus is Kn>Ks>K>k+. The slow feathering gene is believed to be associated with a bald patch on the back of the adolescent bird. The feathers do come in given enough time. Since this is likely due to a dose effect of the slow feathering gene, the homozygous males should be the most likely to exhibit the trait. In my personal flocks, I have both males and females exhibiting this. Many novice poultry keepers wrongly attribute the bald back phenotype with a picking problem.

Sounds like fun. Here's my go at it:



Comb seems poorly defined, not 6 distinct points. General condition appears thin and ragged. Good tail angle, nice green sheen on tail feathers, coloration appears to me to be Birchen as every Silver Penciled cock I've been able to find shows white wing tips. Coloration over the head is lovely. Looks a little long and level in back. Overall decent coloration, hard to tell in the photo if he may have a little gold showing in the saddle.



Silver penciled hen, nicely spread tail and a nice angle, small comb, good depth of body though the angle of the back is more level than I see in my guys. Looks to me that this girl may be pattern gene over birchen, given the appearance of the neck, what do you think?

The thing that made me include the wild type(e+) as a possibility is the reddish tinge in the breast of some of my hens/pullets. e+ would produce a reddish color in the breast on the female but eb brown wouldn't have that. That could be caused by the Autosomal red on eb-brown though, correct?