Babies sexes

[tweddle]

Hi all, just wondering if anyone is able to help me sex my babies. They are just over 2 months old , their mum is a pied and dad is an Indian blue. Thanks!

 

[MinxFox]

Are there 3 of them? All of them look like peahens to me. The one in the third photo has some barring but it looks like it is going away so that is why I say peahen for that one as well.

 

[tweddle]

Ok thanks for that, there's actually 4 of them, I'll try to get better photos

 

[tweddle]

Hopefully these pics are a bit clearer

[/IMG]

 

[DylansMom]

Hi all, just wondering if anyone is able to help me sex my babies. They are just over 2 months old , their mum is a pied and dad is an Indian blue. Thanks!

All of the chicks with obvious white feathers on their wings and shoulders look like hens to me. The ones that do not appear to have white on their wings also look like they have stripes on those wings and shoulders. So if they are all the same age I am going to have to go with male on those.

Lovely babies!

 

[scootj79]

I agree from what i can see. This also helps me with pied genetics... only one parent needs to be pied to pass it on...

 

[DylansMom]

I agree from what i can see. This also helps me with pied genetics... only one parent needs to be pied to pass it on...

Don't get too excited! Dad can't possibly be plain IB and be the father of these chicks. An obviously Pied bird like the mother hen in the pictures carries 1 copy of the White gene and one copy of the Pied gene, these genes are alleles ( meaning they are located at the same spot on the chromosomes) she can only pass 1 of these to her offspring. If she were mated to a plain IB then all the offspring would carry 1 single copy of white or a 1 single copy of Pied, this would make them either split to White or split to Pied, neither of which would exhibit the amount of white we see on these chicks. These chicks are Pied (1 copy White + 1 copy of Pied) like their mom and that means the father is carrying either a single copy of White or a single copy of Pied. I would guess single copy Pied, it seems to me Pied can be harder to spot than white, usually White will have white flight feathers on the wings. Pied seems like it can hide better, since the OP thinks her bird is an IB he is probably carrying a gene that is well hidden. Bottom line you won't get a Pied chick if only 1 parent is Pied, you can get a bird that is split to Pied but that is it. Hope this makes sense.

I found a pic that shows the difference pretty well. The bird in front is Pied the bird in back is split to Pied. Split Pied has a white throat latch and only a random white feather here and there, but no big white patches like the Pied. With a split Pied you need to breed back to White or Split White to get actual Pieds again.

 

[scootj79]

It makes sense to me totally. I was thinking that and just slipped my mind that dad may carry one copy of pied gene and it not really showing up at all like one copy of white normally does. Which i figured if it had a white gene then one of those chicks wouldve been white most likely at least.

 

[DylansMom]

It makes sense to me totally. I was thinking that and just slipped my mind that dad may carry one copy of pied gene and it not really showing up at all like one copy of white normally does. Which i figured if it had a white gene then one of those chicks wouldve been white most likely at least.

Exactly! Now, there is always a chance that the egg that would have produced a White got broken and that's why there is no White, but chances are dad is split Pied. If a White was produced, we would know 100% that dad was split White.