breed question curiosity sake

[Ariesmom]

our duck was supposed to be a swedish blue and when he grew his adult feathers he looks more like a cayuga. He's all black with a grey beak, white chest and he has that irridescent sheen of blue/purple around his wings. Anyone know if the blues come in this variety?

 

[the duck whisperer]

He could be a black swedish, or a dark blue swedish. Pics would be helpful.

 

[FenDruadin]

The blue color, genetically speaking, is just black with a blue dilution gene. The blue is highly variable in expression, so that most blue ducks will have at least a little black "bleed through" called "ink spots." Of course, for show standards, it's generally preferred to have less rather than more bleed through, but for other purposes the ink spots mean nothing but pretty (personally I LOVE ink spots on a blue bird). In some birds, there may be so much bleed through that hardly any blue is visible at all. In this case, a "blue" bird might look more "black" (and iridescent because black is always iridescent in ducks) than blue.

Or it might be a black swedish, lol. Hard to tell.

Either way, he sounds pretty.

 

[aduckstolemyheart]

Quote:
My Blue runner duckling now has black spots showing up around his back, at first I thought he was dirty, but they're definitely black spots. Nice to know what this called!!


Ariesmom,

I am sure we'd all LOVE to see some pics. Hint hint.