Hmmm, I guess I should have taken a photo of the dark brown, double tufted, rumpless chick that hatched last week. It died of pastiness and I had no idea it was so rare in Araucana or I would have. I can however continue stud mating to the same black hen who produced it but she's gone broody of course.
I do have a friend who works with dun and assists me with genetic projects...she said:
"Technically, they are not chocolate; that is another gene altogether, at a different locus, on a different chromosome. To use the term "chocolate" on non chocolate bird is, in fact, misleading, though some people do use that inaccurate term.
By no means do all dun (I^D/i+) birds express as "chocolate" in colour. There is a great variability of expression; for instance, some could almost be mistaken for khaki unless you know that they are, in fact, dun."
What about my patchy looking chick? What color would you say it is? It isn't blue.
I'll be working on some more test hatches soon. So...I'm not dun...pun intended!
Also, after looking over my chicks my friend also said:
"The only thing I can think of, that would explain your results, would be that that Sigi is right about the dominance of dun over dominant white & that your male is dun carrying dominant white, i.e. I^D/I, but most of the dun chicks are of the darkest expression probably due to melanisers from the mother. That could be supported by the larger black leakage in the apparently white chicks."
What she's refering to here are white chicks with black spots which are produced from a BLACK hen mating ... I get lots of these and they feather out white with black spots.
Go Bud Light!
I do have a friend who works with dun and assists me with genetic projects...she said:
"Technically, they are not chocolate; that is another gene altogether, at a different locus, on a different chromosome. To use the term "chocolate" on non chocolate bird is, in fact, misleading, though some people do use that inaccurate term.
By no means do all dun (I^D/i+) birds express as "chocolate" in colour. There is a great variability of expression; for instance, some could almost be mistaken for khaki unless you know that they are, in fact, dun."
What about my patchy looking chick? What color would you say it is? It isn't blue.
I'll be working on some more test hatches soon. So...I'm not dun...pun intended!
Also, after looking over my chicks my friend also said:
"The only thing I can think of, that would explain your results, would be that that Sigi is right about the dominance of dun over dominant white & that your male is dun carrying dominant white, i.e. I^D/I, but most of the dun chicks are of the darkest expression probably due to melanisers from the mother. That could be supported by the larger black leakage in the apparently white chicks."
What she's refering to here are white chicks with black spots which are produced from a BLACK hen mating ... I get lots of these and they feather out white with black spots.
Go Bud Light!
