feathered legs (with pictures)

[farmerChef]

I have a 3 month old Blue Cayuga Drake what has some small feathers on his legs. I have never seen a duck with feathered legs before. I guess it is a genetic mutation? If I breed him to may cayuga hen, will he pass on the feathered legs? The breeder has had cayugas for 4+ years, and never had this happen.

These is a picture from the day he hatched


This is a picture taken last month

 

[Wynette]

If I remember correctly about dominant & recessive, the offspring of this bird would be recessive for feathered shanks, and would appear clean-legged. You would need to breed that clean-legged offspring to another bird that is recessive for feathered shanks, and then THOSE offspring would be feather shanked. I'm barely into genetics now, so I could be wrong - anyone?

 

[Mike Winters]

cool runner can have feathered legs also. on national geographic channel that down feathers are a recessive form of a modified kind of scute. they where doing experiments on chicken embryos turn on and off genes to try and make a dinosaur and learned that when certain genes were turned on and others off the legs would be covered with downy feather like scutes and others would have feathered legs and some be clean legged. so in theory you can make a duck with feathery legs just like how there are chickens with feathery legs

 

[v.cyr]

can't let my GF see this... she loves our feather legged chooks, and would absolutly flip if she even thought it was possible in ducks too...

 

[chickengoose14]

i have a rouen duckling like this to