Cream Legbar Working Group: Standard of Perfection

[blackbirds13]

Ok different topic if you are interested in this question at all: Merlin's daughters all had crooked toes. I'm very disappointed. Thinking about culling all of them out of the genetic mix. Elvis's line doesn't have this problem. Should I bother testing the cross of these bad toed girls with Elvis? They should have nice blue eggs.

WHmarans - I'd say breed them and see if it is genetic or maybe issues during incubation, especially if they are all you currently have along with the original hens. You can still incubate eggs from Elvis and the original hens but then you have to wait to grow them out so why not see what you have on hand. Lot of folks will take in less than perfect layers. I have a crooked toe rooster who hatched on day 19 in the incubator with the turner going. He has not thrown any crooked toe chicks. In fact this year I had only 2 girls with crooked toes from my other rooster, both turned out too gold so I gave them to a friend. Are they the only girls you hatched and kept or were there more that had the same issue? If this was one hatch it may simply be issues with humidity during the incubation as I hear that can happen quite a lot. I am a big fan of hatching to test just about anything, as a newbie it gives me a visual that I can learn from much more so than anything posted online or that I read in a book. If they have good blue egg genetics I'd be hesitant to just toss out those genes without verifying that the issue is truly genetic or cannot be solved with just using Elvis... who is a nice cream.

 

[nicalandia]

Quote:
I am/was one of the few people here saying it was important to save the ig/ig cream gene before building the Barn.... so you are welcome...!

 

[WHmarans]

blackbirds13 that is a good point. I do know this: Merlin's sister had horribly crooked toes, I rehomed her, and the other chicks, wheaten marans, that hatched in the incubator with Merlin's daughters are nice. This also occurred for his daughters over two hatches both with other good chicks. The marans don't have issues, definitely not with their toes. So what I'm afraid of is that this is somehow not straight forward genetically because Merlin himself had good toes. So if I hatch nice blue eggs using Elvis from these girls... he and his line have good toes and cream color but green egg color... will it be difficult getting the crooked toe genetics out down the line? I guess one way to help make the decision will be to see what the offspring from these girl's mother, who lays good egg color..and Elvis look like.

I rehomed Merlin because I wanted to give Elvis a try and just don't have room for both at this point. He got a great home.. lots of girls to be in charge of and a very attentive owner. Also he had something seriously against me picking up hens or the feed pan which really became a pain in the rear for me. I know they're supposed to protect the flock and I guess the feed source. Shame to let him go because he was nice and big....but geeze.. I'm doing this for fun and if he's making it no fun then out he goes. Very sweet roo otherwise.

 

[blackbirds13]

WHmarans - I am not familiar with toe genetics but it seems there may be some issues there from your description. What you have is what you have to work with so I'd test hatch and see. It would depend whether the gene(s) responsible are dominant or recessive. If both Merlin and the hens had good toes then maybe it's recessive and needs 2 genes to show and could linger within the genetics of future hatches but give you good toes and blue eggs so long as they don't pair up with a new rooster in the mix. If the hens also had crooked toes then maybe it's dominant and anything they produce will have the same issues. Why not pair the hen up with Elvis to see what pops out and if the toes are crooked then maybe she is just a nice blue egg layer hen.

And I agree, keeping it fun is my most important issue

 

[WHmarans]

I don't know how the genetics work but I have to guess that it is like height or tail angle.. its a matter of degree. A high tail and a low tail cross will give you an in between angle.. a large parent and a small parent will give you a medium sized offspring... but when the population has mixed sizes sometimes you cross two small parents and seemingly out of nowhere you get this large offspring... a throw back to a grand father or grand mother.

So.. I'm thinking I'd be better off to get some blue egg color from birds without the toe issues. I don't know how common that is or not though.

 

[CibolaChooks]

I don't know how the genetics work but I have to guess that it is like height or tail angle.. its a matter of degree. A high tail and a low tail cross will give you an in between angle.. a large parent and a small parent will give you a medium sized offspring... but when the population has mixed sizes sometimes you cross two small parents and seemingly out of nowhere you get this large offspring... a throw back to a grand father or grand mother.

So.. I'm thinking I'd be better off to get some blue egg color from birds without the toe issues. I don't know how common that is or not though.

i wonder if your birds with crooked toes got scared at some point. Maybe they tried to climb the fencing flying and climbing the fence to get away. I had a rooster do that and he broke/ dislocated his toe.it was fine before that happend then crooked after. maybe its the same with yours and not a genetic issue

 

[WHmarans]

It makes perfect sense that it could happen by injury too. But I'm pretty sure this is genetic. Every single one has it to some degree, and they're too young to have all injured themselves.. especially the same way. I've read it can be genetic and in particular from too much inbreeding though these girls' parents were from different sides of the country.

 

[dretd]

Quote: I was really hoping to eventually get good males and good females from the same birds eventually.

Quote: Nicalandia, could you please elaborate on your statement regarding breeding to the SOP and Dual line breeding. In one quote you are saying that you can breed to the SOP in one pen and then you are saying that to win at shows it would be best to have 2 pens so I am confused again.

WHMarans has expressed what all of the breeders I have talked to about Cream Legbars--that we want a breed that can match the SOP that does not require dual line breeding as this goes against the spirit of an autosexing utility breed.

I find it somewhat disheartening that the SOP as written motivates a breeder to need 2 pens to win at a show. I am struggling to understand if there are minor wording flaws that make it hard to breed to the SOP in a single pen, and what exactly those details are so that I can understand the genetics behind the SOP better.

Being our resident genetics hand-holding guru, could you please help me out a bit and explain what parts don't match between the male and the female SOP--what specific parts of the SOP make it necessary to breed a male and female line if the breeder wants to win?

 

[CibolaChooks]

Nicalandia, could you please elaborate on your statement regarding breeding to the SOP and Dual line breeding. In one quote you are saying that you can breed to the SOP in one pen and then you are saying that to win at shows it would be best to have 2 pens so I am confused again.

WHMarans has expressed what all of the breeders I have talked to about Cream Legbars--that we want a breed that can match the SOP that does not require dual line breeding as this goes against the spirit of an autosexing utility breed.

I find it somewhat disheartening that the SOP as written motivates a breeder to need 2 pens to win at a show. I am struggling to understand if there are minor wording flaws that make it hard to breed to the SOP in a single pen, and what exactly those details are so that I can understand the genetics behind the SOP better.

Being our resident genetics hand-holding guru, could you please help me out a bit and explain what parts don't match between the male and the female SOP--what specific parts of the SOP make it necessary to breed a male and female line if the breeder wants to win?

i think he was saying its no problem to breed single pen and meet the SOP. But if you want to win shows against other breeds dbl breeding would be necessary. Breeds that are a single color like all black or all white have an advantage in getting best of show. Everyone has to work on form but our ccl have like 4-5 places male and female that color or barring can go wrong.

 

[nicalandia]

Quote:
This... Remember that how basic the Brown leghorn color is(not having cream, and barring) yet in the uk there exist 2 breeding lines(male line and female lines) while this is reserved to the people that shows is everything and they do enything to win.... I mean I am sure ther is a single pen small guy going to shows and enjoing seeing his birds place good... and from time to time the samll guy may even win(its on one the judges head anyways) but this does not stop people with deep pockets in having two or more breeding pens..