Chicken incest

[itsajensen]

This is probably a dumb question to ask, but does incest affect chickens?

 

[Mrs. K]

no, it does not.

Many breeders trying to get consistent traits, breed related birds together, father to daughter is a common relationship.

 

[Zinniah]

Not really. Only if they have been doing it for many generations. You will know if you start getting birth deformities more frequently. Incest is very common in the chicken business, its called inter breeding or line breeding.

 

[123RedBeard]

I use the terms (right it wrong - I heard it was this way) that line breeding is father/daughter or grandfather/granddaughter type ... In-breeding is brother/sister ... Not as healthy, and more likely to have the negative traits show up strongly!

Most hatcheries get their eggs from large breeders ... From - http://www.backyardpoultrymag.com/breeding_the_home_flock/
In part it says:

Flock Mating is the breeding of a flock of chickens as one unit. For this system to be self-sustaining, 20 males and 180-200 females should be used. The chickens work out who mates with whom. This is the type of system most commonly practiced by commercial hatcheries, which frequently add the twist of culling the parent flock each year and using only young birds as breeders

So most chicks you get from a hatchery are sorta related, but not necessarily brother & sisters! As in the example above ... If you ordered 15 chicks ... They could all have different fathers & mothers, however ... They also could be some that have the same fathers and or mothers, but the flock is related, most likely cousins or second cousins ...

It is highly unlikely that only one cock bred with the single hen, and they collected her eggs, and kept them seperate, and sent you 15 chickens from only that one hen ... While multiple hens (even with the same cock) gives diversity (offspring are half - brother/sister) with using a larger number of breeders ... The possibilities are highly unlikely to have full brother and sister ... From the 1000 they hatch.

 

[aart]

I use the terms (right it wrong - I heard it was this way) that line breeding is father/daughter or grandfather/granddaughter type ... In-breeding is brother/sister ... Not as healthy, and more likely to have the negative traits show up strongly!

Not sure if those terms are correct either...but the gist is correct.
Parent-child breeding is common and unlikely to cause problems for several generations, just get a new unrelated cockbird every 3-4 years.
But sibling breeding will cause problems much sooner and is avoided.