Bielefelder mix chicks- auto sexing?

[NatJ]

So… I know that crossing a solid rooster to a barred (Bielefelder) hen makes a chick with sex-linked barring. But… what if the barred parent isn’t purebred, or only has 1 barred parent and not very distinct barring? Does that make a difference?

For example, will a solid rooster (black copper Marans) and a mixed breed barred hen (Bielefelder rooster x Wyandotte/BCM hen) produce barred males and not barred females? I’m in the process of moving a few more hens into my flock with my BCM rooster, and am wondering if I move this (or a similar) barred girl if they’ll produce chicks with sex-linked coloring?

Here is Abbey, my Biele/wyandotte/Marans pullet who is one I’m considering swapping flocks.

If the hen has the barring gene and the rooster does not, then the color-sexing should work, no matter whether the hen was a purebred or a mix. She just needs to have the barring gene, which the one in your photos does.

If you want a more involved explanation of how it works:
Male chickens have sex chromosomes ZZ. They inherit one Z from each parent, and give one to each of their chicks.
Female chickens have sex chromosomes ZW. A hen inherits Z from her father and W from her mother. She gives Z to each of her sons and W to each of her daughters.

The genes used for creating sexlinks are on the Z sex chromosome.

With barring, barred hen gives a Z chromosome to her sons (with the barring gene) and a W chromosome to her daughters (makes them female, does not give them barring.) The un-barred father gives all chicks a Z chromosome with no barring on it. This means sons show barring and daughters do not.

A nice thing about the sexlink traits in chickens is that you can usually pick the breeding stock just by looking at them: the hen needs a dominant trait on the only Z chromosome she has. If you can see it, she has it. Because she only has one Z chromosome, there is no way for her to carry a recessive gene without you seeing it. The rooster needs to show the recessive trait. That means he has that recessive gene on both of his Z chromosomes.

Examples of genes that can be used to sex chicks:
Dominant gene (mother/son): barring, silver, not-chocolate
recessive gene (father/daughters): not-barring, gold, chocolate

The daughters get only the recessive gene from their father. The sons get the dominant gene from their mother so that is what they show, and they also carry the recessive gene inherited from their father.

Of course there is always the problem of recognizing which chicks have which genes. Depending on what other colors and patterns the chicks are showing, they can be easy or hard or impossible to sex. The commercially produced sexlink chicks are selected to have colors and patterns that make the sexing easy. Sexing some of the home-bred ones can be much more difficult, as you saw with your first batch.

I’m reviving my old post to provide an update as well as ask more questions about sex-linked barring.

First off, if you’re familiar with this thread, I was 6 out of 6 with the color sexing. All the male chicks had the same down color and the females had the same.

The only Biele mix I kept was MJ. View attachment 4244769
He was living the good life in the bachelor pad and recently got to live the even better life as head rooster in my big flock. He’s a nice boy.

Thank you for updating! It's nice to know what the results were, and if anyone else makes this cross they can use your pictures to figure out the sexing earlier.

 

[Fluster Cluck Acres]

If the hen has the barring gene and the rooster does not, then the color-sexing should work, no matter whether the hen was a purebred or a mix. She just needs to have the barring gene, which the one in your photos does.

If you want a more involved explanation of how it works:
Male chickens have sex chromosomes ZZ. They inherit one Z from each parent, and give one to each of their chicks.
Female chickens have sex chromosomes ZW. A hen inherits Z from her father and W from her mother. She gives Z to each of her sons and W to each of her daughters.

The genes used for creating sexlinks are on the Z sex chromosome.

With barring, barred hen gives a Z chromosome to her sons (with the barring gene) and a W chromosome to her daughters (makes them female, does not give them barring.) The un-barred father gives all chicks a Z chromosome with no barring on it. This means sons show barring and daughters do not.

A nice thing about the sexlink traits in chickens is that you can usually pick the breeding stock just by looking at them: the hen needs a dominant trait on the only Z chromosome she has. If you can see it, she has it. Because she only has one Z chromosome, there is no way for her to carry a recessive gene without you seeing it. The rooster needs to show the recessive trait. That means he has that recessive gene on both of his Z chromosomes.

Examples of genes that can be used to sex chicks:
Dominant gene (mother/son): barring, silver, not-chocolate
recessive gene (father/daughters): not-barring, gold, chocolate

The daughters get only the recessive gene from their father. The sons get the dominant gene from their mother so that is what they show, and they also carry the recessive gene inherited from their father.

Of course there is always the problem of recognizing which chicks have which genes. Depending on what other colors and patterns the chicks are showing, they can be easy or hard or impossible to sex. The commercially produced sexlink chicks are selected to have colors and patterns that make the sexing easy. Sexing some of the home-bred ones can be much more difficult, as you saw with your first batch.


Thank you for updating! It's nice to know what the results were, and if anyone else makes this cross they can use your pictures to figure out the sexing earlier.

Thanks. This is all great information!