Iowa Blue Chickens - Understanding The Traditional Type

[IowaBlueCurt]

If anyone has any questions along the way.........feel free to ask. I'll do my best to share what I've learned, and if I don't have the answer, it'll give us a new area to explore.

 

[IowaBlueCurt]

Another area that causes one to "think outside the box" is regarding breast markings. With my traditional type flock that I use to have around 10 years ago, most of what I had for breast markings were various forms of lacing. Some good lacing, some poor lacing. However, when we look to the historical accounts of what these markings looked like, it gives us an interesting account.
While the historical accounts are not many, they are consistand with breeders having experienced spangled, laced, and barred markings on both the male and the female. At first these patterns may seem to be at odds with eachother, but let's look into them and compare them to what we are seeing in our Silver and Dark Silver birds. We'll start with the written accounts that we currently have;

Michael Moore - Male) Chest has speckling/lacing on it. Hen) Breast was speckled, sometimes laced.

Phil Row - Male) His chest had anything from slight barring to heavy lacing.

Comparing these to our traditional birds today, my observations are as follows;

1) Silver Iowa Blues (born brown mottled) exhibit either the laced or spangled breast markings on the males, with many of the females experiencing speckling, lacing or a combination of both in an unordered pattern.

2) Dark Silver Iowa Blues (born chestnut) exhibit white barring on the breast on both the male and female in their adolescent plumage. With the adults expressing a breast pattern of a quasi-barring/spangling.

It seems logical at this time, that the gene responsible for distinguishing the brown mottled chick from the chestnut chick at hatch, is also responsible for the difference in breast pattern at adolescence and adulthood. This understanding not only matches what we are seeing in our traditional flocks today (at least with the properly colored individuals), but also aligns itself with our historical accounts.

 

[IowaBlueCurt]

Here's some pics Denny Johnston sent my way to post for him. I hope you enjoy them. The first two are pics of his cockbird. As you can see from the pics, this fella is huge! He has nice silvery white on his head and his hackle is pretty clean of excessive black in the shafts as well. You can see the silver "mane" on this guy. His depth of breast and abdomen is great, and his width of shoulder and back in impressive! You can see this width particularly in his back and this leg stance! To date, this is the best traditional Iowa Blue cockbird I have seen. I haven't held him, but my guess is that he's pushing 10+ lbs. While he looks impressive in picture, he's even more so in person. My biggest criticism would be his greater and lesser sickles. Traditionally, the greater sickles were about half the size that this fella has, and his lesser sickles could be longer and white with little amounts of black shafting. Now, he's been active in the breeding pens, and so, I imagine that after he molts we'll have a better idea of how his lessers look. Overall, a GREAT sire!




These are some pics of Denny's chicks.



A big thanks to Denny for sharing some pics of his flock!

 

[WVDan44]

Here's some pics Denny Johnston sent my way to post for him. I hope you enjoy them. The first two are pics of his cockbird. As you can see from the pics, this fella is huge! He has nice silvery white on his head and his hackle is pretty clean of excessive black in the shafts as well. You can see the silver "mane" on this guy. His depth of breast and abdomen is great, and his width of shoulder and back in impressive! You can see this width particularly in his back and this leg stance! To date, this is the best traditional Iowa Blue cockbird I have seen. I haven't held him, but my guess is that he's pushing 10+ lbs. While he looks impressive in picture, he's even more so in person. My biggest criticism would be his greater and lesser sickles. Traditionally, the greater sickles were about half the size that this fella has, and his lesser sickles could be longer and white with little amounts of black shafting. Now, he's been active in the breeding pens, and so, I imagine that after he molts we'll have a better idea of how his lessers look. Overall, a GREAT sire!




These are some pics of Denny's chicks.



A big thanks to Denny for sharing some pics of his flock!

Very impressive indeed. Thanks for sharing.

 

[Henk69]

Brief History of Today's Traditional Iowa Blue​

...
Glenn began his program to introduce outside blood by making a starting cross of a Silver Penciled Rock rooster over Silver Campine and Egyptian Fayoumi hens. ...

Other genes from that mix: Pg and Db. The latter from campine and fayoumi.

 

[Inkheart]

Such beautiful and interesting birds!

 

[IowaBlueCurt]

Thanks Henk69! I asked Henk69 to take a look at the pics posted here and see what we have going on genetically here. I suspected the genes were as such, but wanted a second opinion here from someone who new more about the genes than myself.

Ok, so what does all this mean? Well, a lot! You see, there has been much depate and confusion over the years about what really contributed to the creation of the Iowa Blue.....this genetic understanding tells us the following -

1) We now have a better understanding of how the genes work in creating the two different types of traditional Iowa Blues (Silver and Dark Silver)
2) We can greatly narrow down what breeds were used in the creation of the breed
3) We now know that the breeds Glenn used in his first crosses (the Silver Penciled Rock over Silver Campine and Fayoumi) came real close to recreating the breed. When he added these crosses into his original flock, he was adding in many genes the breed already expressed and possessed.

Ok, so let's tackle each of these three points -

1) The genetics. Silver Iowa Blue - eb/eb Pg/Pg Db/Db Dark Silver Iowa Blue - ER/ER Pg/Pg Db/Db Of course these are all on S/S birds. Traits that we are seeing such as the silver mane on the male, the disorganized patterning on the hens, the blue sheen, etc. are achieved via selection of modifiers (or selection of those birds with carry the traits you're looking to purpetuate).

2) Which breeds were most likely involved in the creation of the Iowa Blue based on our genetic understanding? Minorca, Silver Campine, and Silver Penciled Rock (keep in mind, the Silver Penciled Rocks of the 1920's were MUCH more stippled and less laced at that time). Of course with genetics, nothing is set in stone, and other breeds could have been used in the creation (say Silver Grey Sussex, White Rock, White Jersey Giant, RIR, etc.), but it could make for a hard case to include them.

3) When Glenn made his first F1 crosses to introduce his outside blood, the Rock and Campine genes were already present in the stock, the addition of Fayoumi blood was something that was not available to 1920's era farmers and so this brought in some new genetic material. While they look very similar to Silver Campines, they are in many ways quite different. The biggest difference has to do with the ER gene that they are built upon. While it's still "open" to debate, many geneticists claim that ER and ER-Fayoumi are different genes and act at times in very different ways. Apparently, the ER-Fayoumi has different way of melanizing.
My suspicion is that the Birchen Colored and Silver colored birds with black heads that we are seeing in Glenn's flock are the remnant of the Fayoumi blood that was introduced.

This has been a very exciting turn of events!

 

[WVDan44]

So > eb = partridge chicks (mottled brown) and ER = chocolate/mahogany/brown/ solid colored chicks? And cull out the black down chicks?

 

[IowaBlueCurt]

Precisely! At this point, what we understand is that everything is the same between the chestnut and brown mottled birds for the exception of the ER and eb. If the chick gets one or two copies of the ER (example ER/eb or ER/ER) it will be chestnut, but has to have two copies of the eb (example eb/eb) to appear brown mottled.

If you are wanting to breed a traditionally colored flock, then yes, cull the black chicks, they will grow up with a typical Birchen/Grey appearance.

 

[IowaBlueCurt]

Here is a pic of a flock that came from chicks ordered from Sandhill. As you can see from the picture, we have a mix of colors going on. The cockbird, the hen directly behind him (who you can hardly see), and the Silver pullet to the right of the pic have good color going on. However, there are three hens that are mostly black and one hen that is mostly white. With such diversity coming from the single line that carried this breed from the past to the present, how are we to know which way to go? The key is our historical accounts. So, let's take a look at some of the historical descriptions of the breed;

John Logston (grandson of John Logston, the breed's creator) - The hens were a grey-blue color and a light penciled pattern. The color looked like the grey-blue color of a barn pigeon. The cocks had a real silver head that was very distinctive. The silver went all the way down their back and into their lesser sickles.

Michael Moore (grandson of John Logston, the breed's creator) - Hens- grey penciled, mostly white/silver heads. Breast was speckled, sometimes laced. Definitely a penciled color, but not distinctly penciled. Cock- Silver-white neck, back, and lesser sickles. Rest of body is black. Chest has speckling/lacing of white on it. Tail blue sheen.

Phil Row - The male's “mane” was very distinctive and made a big impression. His chest had anything from slight barring to heavy lacing. The hens had a distinctive grey penciling pattern that was unique to the breed. They had a pleasant, soft greyish blue look to them.

We have many more accounts, but this gives you an idea. Once Glenn added in the outside crosses (while they were genetically very close to the Iowa Blue, they did allow for different combinations of genes to be expressed), many off types came on the scene. Unfortunately, Glenn did not eliminate these off types before offering the breed to the public. While they were genetically "Iowa Blue", they weren't always phenotypically correct. Due to many late night predator attacks, Glenn was required at times to keep an off type bird in order to carry on as many of the genes as possible. This only added to the continuance of off types. Below is a list of most the off types that we are seeing at this time;

Black birds (anywhere from nearly solid black - birchen - grey) - One of the requirements of an Iowa Blue is that is possesses Db (dark brown, this gene is responsible for the brown chick down and autosomal barring of sorts on the adult feather). But in ER based birds, they need two copies of Db to get the expression that we see in the Iowa Blue, namely the chestnut chick down. Also, Db will allow the Pg (pattern gene, this gene is responsible for creating the penciling that we see on the hens) to do it's thing on ER based bird. Without the Db, the Pg can't work on ER based bird and so we end up with nealy solid black birds like the hen in the above pic.

Silver birds with black heads don't know the exact cause of this, but it is assumed that extra melanizers are in play here, my guess is it comes from the Fayoumi that was added as the ER-Fayoumi has some crazy melanizing action from what I've learned.

Very white colored hens like the hen in the above pic (second behind the cockbird), these show up quite rarely, and look much like a Campine, it would stand to reason that the genes/melanizers from the Silver Campine would be segregated out on this individuals.

Silver Grey these birds show up more commonly than the very white hens, they are built on the e+ base of the e-locus. How these were introduced to the IB by Glenn is still a mystery to me. One of the three breeds that he used must have been hiding this gene.

Autosomal Red from what I've been able to gather from Glenn, this was introduced into his line via a Silver Penciled Rock that he used. This trait should be severely discriminated against. It produces red on the wing bows of the cockbird and can add red pigmentation elsewhere if strong enough in expression.

(As a side note, when Ideal introduced outside blood into their line, extra melanizers were added to that particular line, which translates into more black on the feathers, and gold leakage has been seen here as well, which turns the silver color into a straw gold color with age.)

So, what have we learned from all of this? That there are some bright spots when it comes to locating birds of the right color/type, but they aren't the majority.....yet! Once breeders know what to select for and begin to pair up these "bright spots", we'll start to see some fantastic flocks emerge. Remember, this breed has a way to go to get back to square one, but everything is here to accomplish that, if we as a group have an idea of what to breed for.