➡ Quail Hatch Along🥚

[Kiki]

I'm writing my review to enter into the contest. Do you think it's fair to include that I hatched colors other than what I purchased?

I know that can happen in genetics and I understand weird unexpected recessives that you didn't know you had showing up (and I hatched one of those, looked like it was Italian or something), BUT half of the ones I hatched are actually visually heterozygous for Fee. One's also a Pharoah, so with that I know for sure they have at least some heterozygous Fees in their breeding pens, and that's something that you can visually see, since it's incompletely dominant. Probably more than just some since half my hatch is heterozygous. So it's not really an 'accident' that it happened.

But I don't want to be nitpicky or anything, and overall I am happy with them.

Almost none of the quail colors breed 100% true.
What did you order?

 

[Pyxis]

Almost none of the quail colors breed 100% true.
What did you order?

I ordered Falb Fees - which do breed true.

Most colors will breed true if you know how to make it happen With the exception of any that require only one copy of an incomplete dominant gene, of course, like Rosetta (but you COULD still get all Rosettas if you bred only Tibetans to Pharoahs, so you can still make it happen).

The color GROUPS won't breed true if you don't separate them out - like the SSC and German Pastels, but that's because that's a bunch of genes and colors thrown together and it's not one color. Meanwhile, my lavenders, which are from the German Pastel collection but that I've pulled just one gene out of the collection to work on, DO breed true, for example.

For those that are interested, Falb Fee genetics under the spoiler.

Spoiler: Genetics Stuff

Falb Fee will breed true, if you have only homozygous Falb Fees in the pen. But, if you have heterozygous, it doesn't breed true.

It's incompletely dominant, so liken it to breeding Splash in chickens. If your flock is just Splash birds, which is two copies of blue, then all you're going to get is Splash. But if your breeding flock also has Blue birds, which is one copy of blue, then you're going to be getting blue chicks, black chicks, and splash chicks.

In this comparison, Falb Fee is like Splash - it's two copies of the Fee diluter gene. Heterozygous Fee is like blue, only one copy, but you can see that they only have one copy. And Pharoah is like black, no copies at all.

Now, you could get something weird popping up because of unexpected recessives, like maybe out of nowhere your flock of splash chickens produces a recessive white chick. I get that, that happens. That's like the one little weirdo chick I hatched, which I'm totally fine with.

But other than that, if all your breeders are splash (homozygous Fee), you're going to only get splash birds. If you're hatching blue (heterozygous Fee) and black (Pharoah), then that means you have blue birds in your flock. And you CAN see that they're blue, of course, so you know you're going to be also hatching blue and black and not just splash (unless you're not educated on how it works).

Here, this is a heterozygous male next to a homozygous male. You can see the difference:

It's not a great picture, since I just took it in my garage with my cellphone, but you can see how the male on the right is more brown/red in tone. That's because he only has one copy of Fee. The male on the left is lighter, because he has two copies.

Don't mind the missing head feathers. They were bullying each other, so they've been split up, but the feathers are still regrowing.

But, like I said, overall I'm happy with them. That's my only 'complaint' and it's really not much of a complaint. So like I said, I don't want to be too nitpicky and will leave it out of the review if it comes off that way.

In fact, I think I will just leave it out. But what I was saying was, you can see if your quail aren't homozygous for Fee, which means you'll know they won't breed true (unless the genetics weren't understood/you don't know you can see the difference/you don't know what the difference in color means). But if you make sure all your breeders are homozygous, then they'll breed true, barring unexpected recessives.

 

[Pyxis]

Brace yourselves, here comes more genetics stuff, lol. I feel like I didn't totally explain it before.

Spoiler: More Genetics Stuff

I guess that part of the issue is that we don't have a name for a Pharoah with one copy of Fee. We would just call that Falb Fee, too. But that bird won't breed true, whereas one that had two copies of Fee would breed true. Here's a Punnett square. F is Fee, f is lack of Fee. As you can see, two parents homozygous for Fee breed true.

But if they aren't homozygous for Fee...

Another example would be Grau Fee, which is technically Tibetan and homozygous Fee on wild base. But if the bird has only copy of extended brown (Rosetta) and only one copy of Fee, we'd probably still call that Grau Fee. Put two of those together though and you're definitely gonna hatch a ton of things that aren't Grau Fee.

Put two Grau Fee together that are Tibetan and homozygous for Fee, though, and all you're going to hatch, barring unexpected recessive genes, is Grau Fee.

So, in terms of referring to all of the above as one color even with the heterozygous genes, it would be like if we called one copy of extended brown and two copies of extended brown the same color, and then said it doesn't breed true. It DOES breed true if you have two copies. And we didn't call one and two copies the same. We called one copy Rosetta, which does not breed true because it's one copy. We called two copies Tibetan - which breeds true.

So the colors do breed true, as long as you make sure you have the proper genetics to make them breed true, if that makes sense.

So saying most colors don't breed true isn't correct. Most colors do indeed breed true, it's just that breeders aren't hammering down the genetics needed to make it happen, and are calling birds that have different genetics and thus, really, are a different color, the same color.

 

[Ravenlover]

So quick question about button quail o.o i been sifting his/her food but got a bullet blender and turned a cup of it into powder lol is it safe for them to eat the powder ? They are 9 days old and have started feather tubes sorry for the blurred pics savi moves fast and is in there temp ben while i clean there brooder they semi like egg so far mostly stick to food

 

[Matieus27]

Brace yourselves, here comes more genetics stuff, lol. I feel like I didn't totally explain it before.

Spoiler: More Genetics Stuff

I guess that part of the issue is that we don't have a name for a Pharoah with one copy of Fee. We would just call that Falb Fee, too. But that bird won't breed true, whereas one that had two copies of Fee would breed true. Here's a Punnett square. F is Fee, f is lack of Fee. As you can see, two parents homozygous for Fee breed true.

But if they aren't homozygous for Fee...

Another example would be Grau Fee, which is technically Tibetan and homozygous Fee on wild base. But if the bird has only copy of extended brown (Rosetta) and only one copy of Fee, we'd probably still call that Grau Fee. Put two of those together though and you're definitely gonna hatch a ton of things that aren't Grau Fee.

Put two Grau Fee together that are Tibetan and homozygous for Fee, though, and all you're going to hatch, barring unexpected recessive genes, is Grau Fee.

So, in terms of referring to all of the above as one color even with the heterozygous genes, it would be like if we called one copy of extended brown and two copies of extended brown the same color, and then said it doesn't breed true. It DOES breed true if you have two copies. And we didn't call one and two copies the same. We called one copy Rosetta, which does not breed true because it's one copy. We called two copies Tibetan - which breeds true.

So the colors do breed true, as long as you make sure you have the proper genetics to make them breed true, if that makes sense.

So saying most colors don't breed true isn't correct. Most colors do indeed breed true, it's just that breeders aren't hammering down the genetics needed to make it happen, and are calling birds that have different genetics and thus, really, are a different color, the same color.

That’s a lot of genetics but very interesting

 

[Pyxis]

That’s a lot of genetics but very interesting

I enjoy genetics, lol. A lot of my quail breeding is going to be playing with color.

For instance, I just got some Pearl eggs. I plan to get Sparkly and do myself a little experiment. Also planning to use the Falb Fees to make Lavender Fee and see what that looks like. Probably also gonna use the Fees with the Tibetan males I have and make my own Grau Fees. Lavender Pearl might also be a fun project, we'll see. And if I do that, I could also do Lavender Italian with the resulting offspring, which would technically count as Snowie (Snowie being, apparently, fawn plus any diluter that isn't Fee).

Might try to get ahold of something with Roux genes so I can do Le Creme using that and my lavenders. That would mean I'd be after some Egyptians. Darn, I think I just talked myself into it. Le Creme is so pretty.

 

[Ravenlover]

I enjoy genetics, lol. A lot of my quail breeding is going to be playing with color.

For instance, I just got some Pearl eggs. I plan to get Sparkly and do myself a little experiment. Also planning to use the Falb Fees to make Lavender Fee and see what that looks like. Probably also gonna use the Fees with the Tibetan males I have and make my own Grau Fees. Lavender Pearl might also be a fun project, we'll see. And if I do that, I could also do Lavender Italian with the resulting offspring, which would technically count as Snowie (Snowie being, apparently, fawn plus any diluter that isn't Fee).

Might try to get ahold of something with Roux genes so I can do Le Creme using that and my lavenders. That would mean I'd be after some Egyptians. Darn, I think I just talked myself into it. Le Creme is so pretty.

This has been extremely informative o.o i do plan to try to breed morphs later thank you

 

[Fenrisulfr]

I enjoy genetics, lol. A lot of my quail breeding is going to be playing with color.

For instance, I just got some Pearl eggs. I plan to get Sparkly and do myself a little experiment. Also planning to use the Falb Fees to make Lavender Fee and see what that looks like. Probably also gonna use the Fees with the Tibetan males I have and make my own Grau Fees. Lavender Pearl might also be a fun project, we'll see. And if I do that, I could also do Lavender Italian with the resulting offspring, which would technically count as Snowie (Snowie being, apparently, fawn plus any diluter that isn't Fee).

Might try to get ahold of something with Roux genes so I can do Le Creme using that and my lavenders. That would mean I'd be after some Egyptians. Darn, I think I just talked myself into it. Le Creme is so pretty.

I am still figuring out, the different dilution factors.

I became unsure, when I crossed my Roux Dilute girls with a Pharaoh roo.
I was expexting Light Pharaohs, but I received 100% Falb Fees.

Any idea @Pyxis?

 

[Pyxis]

I am still figuring out, the different dilution factors.

I became unsure, when I crossed my Roux Dilute girls with a Pharaoh roo.
I was expexting Light Pharaohs, but I received 100% Falb Fees.

Any idea @Pyxis?

Well that's weird, lol. Can I see pictures of the parents? And also the resulting offspring?

Roux is a recessive sex linked dilution gene. So that cross should have resulted in all just normal Pharoahs.

But I think we're in different countries, so I wonder if we're calling the colors different names. That happens in ducks, where each country might have a different name for the same color.

 

[Matieus27]

@Kiki ive got 24 quail eggs in the bator right now. I’ll give you hatch count when they hatch in a week or so. Their on day 9.