Araucana Tufts

[Nocila]

So I recently bought an entire flock from a nearby araucana bantam breeder because he was getting out of the bantam business, and a few of the birds have single tufts. I was wondering how single tufts bred, and whether I could get double tufted birds from single tufted parents.

Also, one of the roosters has a single comb (and a single tuft), and I was wondering what would happen if I bred him to a pea-combed girl. Should I just sell him? I know I will probably need to sell at least one of them (I ended up with four roosters and four hens, because the breeder didn't know how to sex araucanas. I was told I'd be getting two roosters and four hens, and I already had two hens at home).

Any thoughts?

I don't know much about araucana genetics, so any information would be helpful!

Also, I'm assuming that, because they are all rumpless, I won't get any tailed birds later on, right?

 

[Cyan Night]

I'm no expert with araucanas or their genetics, but I have heard that they are a hard bird to breed. The tufts are hard to perfect, and as I've heard (not 100% sure if it's all true), two double tufted parents may have children with no tufts, one, or maybe even two, which is why they are such a rare bird. Hopefully an expert will pop in to give you specifics, but maybe I'll be able to help a little with what I've read.

 

[Nocila]

The stuff about the tufts is true. From what I've read, the tufts are a lethal gene, so if an egg has two tuft genes, they end up dying before they hatch. Roughly a quarter of the fertile eggs won't hatch, due to the extra tuft gene, one half will have single or double tufts, and a quarter will have clean faces, but I'm not sure how the single tuft vs double tuft works, what causes single tufts, and whether it makes a difference in breeding...

I plan to breed tufted to clean-faced so that I can have 50% tufted, 50% clean-faced, and not have to worry about the lethal gene causing issues, but I'm wondering if I can breed single-tufted birds to single tufted, clean-faced, or double tufted, and how it would affect the ratio of clean-faced, double tufted, single tufted, and dead chicks, if that makes sense...

Really, I'd just love for someone to explain how the tuft gene works in general, but breeding single tufts is my main concern with the tuft gene...

 

[Griffinsong]

Tufts are hard to breed because it is a lethal gene, that means that if a chicken has two copies of the tufting gene then it will die during incubation. Breeding a tufted to a tufted will give 50% heterozygous tufted chicks, 25% homozygous lethal dead chicks, and 25% non tufted, It also means all tufted birds only have one copy of the gene, and thus might express that gene differently, depending on other genetics. Which means the single-tufted girls may have other genetics that are hampering the growth of proper double tufts.

Pea combs are dominant over singles, but the resulting peacombs will likely look weird, because they tend to not express quite right when not all the genes are there.