Kionra
Hatching
- Jan 30, 2017
- 7
- 0
- 7
Part of the content of this is being pulled from https://www.backyardchickens.com/t/...stions-part-general-faq-cemanis-silkies-other this thread that I made loaded with questions (and, while I'm approaching serious breeders, a "PLEASE BE GENTLE" explanation on there).
TLDR version: I'm new to specialties. Production chickens is one thing, specialty flock is another. And we recently came by a steal on lineaged (with papers) cemanis, as well as some silkies. So, extracting from my above thread's questions:
Preliminary question: The Silkie
(At the risk of being shot dead by strict breeders) would it be some kind of sacrilege, in the distant future, to breed our Cemanis (? Question mark? More on them below) to our silkies for diversification of genetics in the hopes of maintaining strong melanism? Am I going to be hunted down by some sort of Cemanilluminati? What could I expect out of that in the future? (Our silkie roo is black.)
Ayam Cemani...?
First I've read that cemanis are never really phenotypically the same as their parents, so is it possible for a Cemani to have a Kedu as a child, or something similar? I saw the parents, they're black as night, but the chicks have some white floof - or more of a powdering, mostly on the belly; and the older one that's feathering out has a lot of crazy marks on it. Is that normal? How can I tell if they're going to be true ayam cemanis? Is this some "wait and find out" kind of thing? I read something about feathering rate sometimes being an indicator? Can I get some clarification on that?
We really do intend to get into specialties and breeding, but this was something that came up as a question. I admittedly joked about making poofy Cemanis, and then happened to stumble on silkie melanism traits, then started wondering about the genetics of it and while at a CORE it seems like it's a genetically sound path to take, I'm neither a biologist nor a breeding expert and I'd like to know from people who actually know what they're doing. From what I've seen, the FM value of a silkie is actually several times stronger than a cemani, which interested me.
TLDR version: I'm new to specialties. Production chickens is one thing, specialty flock is another. And we recently came by a steal on lineaged (with papers) cemanis, as well as some silkies. So, extracting from my above thread's questions:
Preliminary question: The Silkie
(At the risk of being shot dead by strict breeders) would it be some kind of sacrilege, in the distant future, to breed our Cemanis (? Question mark? More on them below) to our silkies for diversification of genetics in the hopes of maintaining strong melanism? Am I going to be hunted down by some sort of Cemanilluminati? What could I expect out of that in the future? (Our silkie roo is black.)
Ayam Cemani...?
First I've read that cemanis are never really phenotypically the same as their parents, so is it possible for a Cemani to have a Kedu as a child, or something similar? I saw the parents, they're black as night, but the chicks have some white floof - or more of a powdering, mostly on the belly; and the older one that's feathering out has a lot of crazy marks on it. Is that normal? How can I tell if they're going to be true ayam cemanis? Is this some "wait and find out" kind of thing? I read something about feathering rate sometimes being an indicator? Can I get some clarification on that?
We really do intend to get into specialties and breeding, but this was something that came up as a question. I admittedly joked about making poofy Cemanis, and then happened to stumble on silkie melanism traits, then started wondering about the genetics of it and while at a CORE it seems like it's a genetically sound path to take, I'm neither a biologist nor a breeding expert and I'd like to know from people who actually know what they're doing. From what I've seen, the FM value of a silkie is actually several times stronger than a cemani, which interested me.
Last edited: