Breeding back to parent peafowl?

[Rosa moschata]

Whoa. Inbreeding, and linebreeding are NOT the same thing. Do NOT confuse the two.

Inbreeding is the umbrella term, under which linebreeding is one form. Inbreeding is defined as any breeding between close relatives. Generally, linebreeding specifically refers to breeding an individual to its ancestor, rather than a member of the same generation. But in the end, it's all still inbreeding. Sure, some people think otherwise, but if you actually google their definitions, you'll see that linebreeding is simply one form of inbreeding.

 

[Rosa moschata]

It's linebreeding when it works, and inbreeding when it doesn't, lol

Guess I should edit to add that I do know there is an actual difference. For instance, breeding siblings to one another is more an example of inbreeding. Mindful and deliberate breeding back to a parent or other non-sibling relative, to produce or solidify traits that both parents share, is linebreeding. Breeding siblings together reduces the gene pool greatly and that is where the problems begin.

From a degree of similarity standpoint, individuals generally share about the same amount of genetic material with their siblings as they do with their parents -- 50%. And that's how inbreeding is defined -- degree of similarity between members of a breeding pair, though it's less than 50%, since even first-cousin pairs are still considered inbreeding, just to a lesser degree. The reason breeding back to an ancestor is "less harmful" than breeding to a sibling is generally about the chances of negative recessives coming together in the offspring. When you breed an individual to its parent, you're increasing the odds of the negative recessives of that individual's parent coming through in the next generation, since its offspring/mate has a 50% chance of sharing each recessive. With siblings, however, you run the risk of bringing forth negative recessives from BOTH parents.

Linebreeding is basically done when you have "ideal specimens" whose characteristics you want to reproduce. Father/daughter results in offspring that are 75% Father. Keep using that male with each generation's best female and you'll have offspring that continue to approach becoming identical to that original father. Same with mother/son. Serious breeders will often start their lines with a few unrelated pairs, then select the best male and female from each generation to breed back to its parent, and keep going, creating separate lines that approach sort of "cloning" the original ideal founders but removing (by ruthless culling) any negative recessive traits that pop up. As the original founders age-out, you select their "best" replacements from the linebred offspring, and let them take their places. In effect, you're "optimizing" the founders by concentrating their strengths and eliminating their faults. Periodic outcrossing between those lines but then resuming the linebreeding is typically what happens. When you do this, it's almost like repeating the original cross, but hopefully with at least some of the original negative recessives the founders had being purged.

So, yeah, linebreeding can be useful -- if you're trying to fix a line. But it's still inbreeding. And you should be aware that you're increasing the odds of negative recessive traits being had homozygously, i.e. "showing", in offspring. And thus the need to cull ruthlessly.

 

[getaclue]

I am not finding any Standard of Perfection for peafowl. I would suggest that the best place to start, is not trying to mix types yet. Breed true. Pick your best looking 2 peahens, and your best peacock, and hatch out about 50 - 75 eggs. Start raising them up. Weigh them. Those that are a bit bigger, stronger, healthier, that thrive, keep those, cull or sell those that are inferior. Keep going this way, and narrow your choice down to 2 peacocks, and 4-6 peahens. Take the daddy, and put him over the new peahens. Take the best 1 of the two peacocks, and put him over the original 2 peahens. The other peacock is your back-up, just in case.

Hatch out the resulting eggs from both groups. Again, raise them, culling or selling those that are not the bigger, stronger, healthier, that thrive, while culling or selling those that are inferior. Your stock should now be looking slightly better than the original parents, so you may continue without using them again, however, there may be a quality in one or more of the original grandparents that you want to heighten. For example: grandpa has more iridescence, grandma 1 has the best personality. Choose the best of the grandchildren to put with them. If the newer stock has surpassed the originals, continue putting the best males, over the best females from the next generation. Does that peahen have a fuller breast, and this peacock isn't quite as broad breasted? Pair them. Improve your line with the way you pair them. With the subsequent generation, you will have enough biodiversity to keep your line going for a long time. Do this for a few generations with each type of peafowl you have. When they are looking really good, and are fairly consistent with good offspring, that is when you may consider mixing two breeds.

 

[Rosa moschata]

Yup, that's chicken-breeding mentality, for which linebreeding works well. You're even using examples of traits for selection that chicken breeders would seek.

I'm not sure peafowl breeders, however, really want to get into linebreeding like that. For one thing, peafowl don't breed until they're two or three years old, sometimes later. For a second thing, not nearly as many chicks are produced per peahen as one chicken hen produces. For a third thing, there isn't a ready market for peafowl meat, so dealing with culls will be something to consider -- perhaps selling for taxidermy is an option. You wouldn't want to sell culls because that's a great way to earn a negative reputation as a breeder from your customers. As a fourth thing, peafowl can live a long time. That means that as well as figuring out what to do with your culls, you'll also be holding onto your breeding birds for 20-30 years -- unless you cull them earlier.

Personally, I think that with peafowl, any form of inbreeding should be seen as a negative, even if it's sometimes necessary. That doesn't mean you should never do it. Just realize that when you do, you should have an unrelated outcross planned to "undo" it quickly. And before you do it, think of how many people out there already do "a little inbreeding" to make the breeder birds you bought, which you assume are unrelated, and then further inbreed. People here keep saying "it's ok to do it for one generation", but do you know for sure it didn't already happen repeatedly in your birds' ancestry? If I was breeding peafowl, I'd probably aim to have some as unrelated as possible "normal" IB peafowl around for outcrossing -- maybe allow a free-roaming flock on the property for harvesting periodically. Throw some food for them, but otherwise let them be subject to natural selection. That'll be your source for "infusing vigor" by outcrossing.

These are, after all, enjoyed for their exotic appearance. Beyond the "peafowl world", other potential customers for breeders would be people looking for birds to grace their acreages. If you undergo so much inbreeding, you could very well end up with birds that simply can't make it outside of breeding pens. That limits your customers to other breeders, or those who keep their peas in pens. Something to think about.

 

[Midnightman14]

I think that's something that many of the smaller peafowl breeders don't think about or don't care about. Breeding brother to sister or close relatives to each other over multiple generations seems to be rampant. With my own birds it's going to take me years to undue some of that damage in just my own birds.
In my own opinion the peafowl world is going to get rocked pretty hard in the not so distant future. Right now we are in a pretty precarious situation with only about half a dozen breeders holding 90% or more of the genetic diversity for many varieties. This is not good at all because what happens when these breeders liquidate their collections? Those birds disappear into the void of backyard breeders and are lost forever. I am hopeful that a solution presents itself before that happens.

 

[getaclue]

Thank you for this post!! You very effectively explained some of the pitfalls of linebreeding. People need to remember that when you linebreed like this, you get the good traits along with the bad. And the unwanted traits become much more difficult to breed out of that line. This is exactly why it's so important to breed only the best to the best. A single negative trait that is allowed to reproduce can become a major problem later down the line. It's much easier to add good qualities later, than it is to subtract unwanted qualities.

When you linebreed, you can more easily control, and breed out most of the bad traits. When you introduce a new bloodline, you get all the bad traits too, and have to once again, work at breeding them out. It's not like you only get the good qualities when you introduce a new bloodline.

As to me mentioning things that chicken breeders look for, I mentioned general qualities that chicken, duck, turkey, parrot, and/or most other types of fowl that breeders look for.

 

[Rosa moschata]

I understand the benefit of linebreeding. However, its merits aren't as easily achieved when working with species that don't breed until their second, third, or fourth year, and don't produce as many offspring. It does work well with species like domesticated poultry, which have been selected for increased production, and which mature early enough to reproduce at younger ages. I mean, it's still possible, but it takes much longer.

That's why the parrot species undergoing linebreeding are those that are basically domesticated and bred for show -- budgerigars, cockatiels, perhaps some Agapornis species, maybe a Psittacula species or two. My Sammy is a double-yellow headed amazon (Amazona oratrix), and they don't reach sexual maturity until they're at least five years old, then often take a couple of years before bonding and setting about making babies. When they do breed, clutches are no more than four or five, if you're lucky. And they don't necessarily breed every year. This works for them because they live a long time -- they don't need to churn out a lot of babies each year because they have decades' worth of opportunities to succeed. Sammy is already almost 28, and he's not old. I do know one breeder who has been selectively-breeding for increased yellow markings in two different subspecies of Sammy's species, and he has some impressive results. But in about 30 years, he's achieved four or five generations. That's not an efficient time-frame for linebreeding success within one person's lifetime.

Monkey-Boy, my budgerigar I found outside almost four years ago, is another story. His species can breed in their first year, having multiple clutches per year. It wouldn't take long to produce enough offspring with his species to have a nice-sized group from which to choose "the best" to continue linebreeding. And budgerigar breeders have done this extensively -- show-quality budgerigars are very different-looking from average pet-store birds like Monkey-Boy, and even more-so from the original wild budgerigars.

I dunno, though, about selecting for production-qualities in peafowl. It seems to me that that would take away some of what makes them special, and turn them into just another domesticated species of poultry. It's been my perception that people enjoy peafowl because they bring a bit of exotic beauty to the land. They're wild-enough to live free-range and roost in trees. When you select for production, or size, or confirmation to some arbitrary standard some people decided upon, you start turning them into chickens. And that's not a knock on chickens -- they're pretty interesting as well. But we already have chickens.

 

[Rosa moschata]

And, just to reiterate something important going back to the OP -- inbreeding is ok when you're doing it with a goal, and when you're culling "sub-parr" offspring and keeping just the best for breeding further. That's not what's happening with peafowl. People get something rare and expensive, and can't afford enough unrelated birds, so they resort to breeding together parent/offspring or siblings to produce more birds for sale. They're not culling "sub-parr" offspring -- they're selling them all. Then another new peafowl breeder buys a few from this breeder, comes here and asks "is it ok to breed siblings?" or "can I breed a bird to its offspring?" and gets told "it's ok for one generation, but then get some new blood for outbreeding." The person asking the question hears just "it's ok" and puts together related birds from related parents, and sells the offspring to someone who starts it all over again. I guess it all comes down to there being two different goals out there -- some want to make better birds, while others just want to make more birds. If you're of the former group, be aware you may be buying birds from people of the latter group.

 

[Midnightman14]

Exactly and it drives me crazy. The longer I keep peafowl the more tight fisted I get with my birds because alot of people will take those birds you put generations of work into an just straight up ruin them.

 

[Dany12]

I
In my own opinion the peafowl world is going to get rocked pretty hard in the not so distant future. Right now we are in a pretty precarious situation with only about half a dozen breeders holding 90% or more of the genetic diversity for many varieties. This is not good at all because what happens when these breeders liquidate their collections? Those birds disappear into the void of backyard breeders and are lost forever. I am hopeful that a solution presents itself before that happens.

Especially, where are the breeding 'notes' ... there are no traces! Who did what ... and how!
That would be the role of the UPA ... but they love to post pictures of photoshopped peacocks ! ...