Black chick with yellow head + lavender question

[Ylva]

What do you think the genotype to this chick is, and how do you think it will end up looking?

The mother is a lavender English Araucana and the father is a buff silkie. I bred them to find out whether the lavender araucana was breeding true (I bought English araucana hatching eggs and some of her siblings turned out blue, so I was a bit worried about her as well). I expected only black chicks, but some of them turned out light grey. I guess the araucana is actually blue, not lavender. Or blue AND lavender? What do you think?

Some of their chicks turned out yellow. How is this possible? I don’t know anything about the mothers lineage, but all her siblings were black, blue or lavender.
The buff rooster is from a pure buff (black tailed) line.

 

[Ylva]

Here is more pictures of the mother:

 

[pipdzipdnreadytogo]

That chick has a very striking chick down coloration! That looks similar to chicks I've seen from crossing a solid black bird with a self-buff bird, except for your chick has silver instead of gold so a whitish face instead of a reddish one. The father being Buff means that the Araucana has to carry silver, and since silver is a sexlinked gene and that chick appears to be silver, that means this chick would have to be a cockerel. I would expect a black-based coloration with heavy white and yellowish leakage from him when feathered. That's what I see, anyway!

My understanding is that it's very hard to tell if a bird has both lavender and blue expressing. I believe I've read that you can see some light lacing on such birds, however, so to my eye your Lavender Araucana just looks lavender. However, I also know from experience that it's very hard to tell blue from black in silkied feathering sometimes, so I'm wondering if it's possible that the Silkie is blue-tailed buff instead of black-tailed buff? One of the Silkies in your pictures sure looks bluish in the tail to me, anyway, and that would explain getting some more bluish chicks from that cross as well. Do you have any pictures of the father?

Here in the U.S. at least, it's fairly common for Silkies to be split to recessive white even if they are a colored variety. Other breeds that come in a white variety as a result of the recessive white gene also sometimes throw whites. I don't know off hand whether your Araucanas over there come in White or if your White Araucanas are recessive white, but if both parents happen to be carrying the gene for recessive white, then about one quarter of their chicks will be white even though their parents are not white. That could explain the yellow chicks. Keep an eye on them as the feather. If they feather in pure white, then that's your answer there.

 

[Ylva]

Thank you for your reply! That makes a lot of sense.

This is the buff silkie father:

 

[pipdzipdnreadytogo]

He's a cute little guy! That sure looks like black in his tail to me, though... But, I have seen some pretty dark silkied Blues that could be confused for Black. You may have to let the grayish chicks feather out a little bit and see what colors their feathers end up being to get definite answers on them.

 

[AusHen]

If you're getting grey chicks I would say she's a "blue based lavender" which means she's both blue and homozygous for lavender, this can be tricky to see on hens, easier on cockerels. She also has yellow since which suggests both of her parents have a little something extra in them (not pure), so it's not surprising other genes are popping up. If her yellow chicks feather in white both parents are carrying recessive white

 

[Ylva]

Thank you! This is some of the other chicks:

A black one, two of the yellow ones and a grey: