Australorp x Lav Orp

[Gary Mc]

I've recently added 6 Black Australorp hens to my flock. I have a pair of Lavendar Orpingtons and would like to know if anyone has any knowledge of what type of birds I could expect from this pairing?

 

[BlueBaby]

My guess would be future chicks being 50/50 Blacks and Blues.

 

[donrae]

You'll get black birds.

Lavender is not part of the black/blue/splash genes, so no blue.

Lavender is a double recessive gene that works on black. So, your lavender birds are genetically black. Since they have two copies of the lavender gene, they express as lavender. When you breed them to something that's not lavender, you lose that expression.

Breeding a lavender to a black will give you all black birds. They'll all have black from the Aussie parent, and a copy of lavender from the Orp parent. But, with only one copy of lavender, it won't express and the bird will be colored black. It will carry that recessive lavender gene, we often refer to this as "split" for lavender. If you breed that F1 generation to each other, you'll have 25% lavender offspring, 25% pure black, and 50% that are black split to lavender.

So, unless you want black mixed breed birds, not much "fun" reasons to do that cross.

 

[QueenMisha]

@donrae is correct.

 

[Turk Raphael]

These should be quite attractive and potentially very productive...black birds.