6 Toes?

[Compost King]

I keep coming up with different anomalies in making my Olive Eggers, Some how I ended up with a 5 Toe chicken that laid a beautiful Blue Egg. I have been Crossing her with my Black Copper Maran rooster and every batch I seem to get something strange. A Cockerel from one batch looked to have 5 toes, nothing out of the ordinary then one day wandered close enough for me to grab so I did and looked him over. I found a a toe nail popping out of his foot and it looks to be a stunted extra toe. Since he already has 5 toes this might make it a total of 6 toes on one food (5 on the other). So at night when he was easy to grab off the roost I attempted to take pictures with my cheap point and shoot camera. there is also an odd feather on his foot, look below that tiny feather

Has anyone seen anything like this before? Maybe I should bred him over his mother and see if it repeats. Tomorrow morning I am going to inspect the feet of the parents and see if they have the same thing.

 

[ChickenLeg]

I havent but if you cross with the mother, be sure to update with offspring toe count

 

[Jrd7788]

Thats cool! I would start a breeding program for blue eggs. Also, I think the cockerel with 5 toes may have a genetic defect. It would be best(if does have a defect) not to pass it along to any offspring

 

[Sydney Acres]

There are several chicken breeds that are supposed to have 5 toes: Silkies, Sultans, Dorkings, and several breeds where the Dorking was used as one of its foundation breeds such as Lincolnshire Buff, Houdan, Faverolles and Meusienne, as well as several breeds that are not seen in the US, and breeds that have gone extinct. Having more than 4 toes is called polydactylism, it tends to be either fully or partially dominant, and the polydactyl gene has a tendency to get a little twitchy. It is common for these birds to have unusually toe combinations.

There have been several papers published about it, including ways to predict offspring, if you have the interest to wade through all of it:
http://www.summagallicana.it/Volume3/Five_toed_chickens_Izvestiya_2010.pdf
http://www.genetics.org/content/genetics/29/3/217.full.pdf
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC4747547/
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC4065260/

 

[336White Phoenix]

I have had this before in birds but even if u try breeding to 6 toe birds to together sometimes the chicks can have 6 toes but the majority don't
It's a strange thing and I hope u can find out more about this and keep use updated

 

[Compost King]

I inspected the father no toe anomolies at all, he doesn't even have 5 toes. I went to the pen where the 6 toed fellow has 4 younger siblings but they weren't in the mood to be handled and I do not like to force the issue. I wanted to see if any others had that extra toe. I will be inspecting the mother at night to see if she has that 6th toe that I overlooked. The mother was not treated well by previous owners so I give her all the space she wants.

 

[336White Phoenix]

I inspected the father no toe anomolies at all, he doesn't even have 5 toes. I went to the pen where the 6 toed fellow has 4 younger siblings but they weren't in the mood to be handled and I do not like to force the issue. I wanted to see if any others had that extra toe. I will be inspecting the mother at night to see if she has that 6th toe that I overlooked. The mother was not treated well by previous owners so I give her all the space she wants.

It'll be interesting to see how this all plays out

 

[Compost King]

I checked the mother when she was roosting, she was kind enough to stand up tall so I could feel her feet, she has her five toes and no extra little flat toe like her son had. I need to check all his siblings I have about 10 of them but most are still in a brooder so I won't be checking them until they are a little bigger.

 

[336White Phoenix]

Interesting are all the siblings from the same father or mother

 

[Compost King]

Yep same parents. I have one BCM Rooster and at the time just one Blue egg laying female. I have 2 now and soon many.