Albino Quail

[tabiandruss]

Can anyone tell me if I have an albino chick? It's body is white with tan and black spots, but it's head is tan with a dark brown strip on top of the head. The body itself has a lot of white coloration to it with the tan and black spots throughout. I am hatching Bobwhite Quails, but this is the first chick that I have had like this.

 

[TwoCrows]

Can anyone tell me if I have an albino chick? It's body is white with tan and black spots, but it's head is tan with a dark brown strip on top of the head. The body itself has a lot of white coloration to it with the tan and black spots throughout. I am hatching Bobwhite Quails, but this is the first chick that I have had like this.

It is possible that it has partial albinism. Usually when they are fully albino, their eyes are generally red in color. I am not sure with parital albinism.

You might post a pic so we can have a look see.

 

[tabiandruss]

This is the best picture I could get. All of the real light color is white, with the tan and black spots

 

[TwoCrows]

He looks fairly normal in feather pattern for a Bob chick. This is not albinism. However he does look like he has a color mutation, and is a mix of Northern Bob to another type of Bob like a Butler, or Tennesssee Bob. Post a pic when he has all his adult feathers, (12 weeks or older) and maybe we can figure out what he is a mix of.

 

[tabiandruss]

That's what I was thinking. I was looking through some pics and it looked to be similar to the Mexican Snowflake. I will post picture when the chick is an adult.

 

[Weirdness555]

Theoretically there's no reason why a random true albino chick shouldn't just appear, because it can be caused by a freak mutation, which is what most albinos are. However, I would say that 1 in 10,000 is probably too common for it to be mutated albinos that are showing up, and I would think that what you have is a recessive white (A&M or English) and that 2 of their breeding birds carry a gene for it but obviously due to the nature of their system that particular cockerel isn't always in with that particular hen and such and it's only very occasionally that a white chick shows up.

However, sometimes in animals the red eyes aren't easy to see, because they don't show the whites of their eyes and most of the eye that we see on an animal is actually dark pupil. We have lutino budgies which have red eyes, but they look black to me, it's only when I look REALLY closely (not easy on a small bird) that you can see that their eyes are actually dark red with a big black pupil.

I wouldn't be surprised if there isn't a true albino out there which someone thinks is just an A&M or English white with no spots because they've never looked at the eyes closely enough. The sheer number of quail in the world, the chances are very high that there's a mutant out there, like in most other species.

 

[tabiandruss]

Thank you for the information. Unfortunately, we will not know with this chick because it died yesterday. It was a late hatch and it slept most of the time though it did eat and drink a little. Maybe next time.

 

[TwoCrows]

So sorry about your chick.

 

[scottishwildcat]

i have just had an albino quail hatch yesterday morning

 

[KonQuail]

i have just had an albino quail hatch yesterday morning

that is awesome! keep us updated! I've never seen an adult albino quail before...most of the posters stop taking pics of the quails after 2 weeks.