Cochin cross with?????

[Vratnyjulez]

So I picked up three Cochin chicks from a friend of mine, and I have one that has cheeks and a mohawk trying to figure out what it may be crossed with or is it 100% Cochin??? I added a couple of all three.

 

[NatJ]

So I picked up three Cochin chicks from a friend of mine, and I have one that has cheeks and a mohawk trying to figure out what it may be crossed with or is it 100% Cochin???

Definitely not a pure Cochin. Cochins do not have a crest (the mohawk) or muffs (the cheek feathers)

Cochins should have single combs. I think one of your other chicks has a pea comb (the one sitting on someone's shoulder, with no crest or muffs).

I suspect that there have been several crosses with other breeds, probably over several generations. If I wanted to make chicks like that, I might mix a Silkie, a Mille Fleur d'Uccle, and several Cochins, over several generations. There are plenty of other breeds that could also be mixed to create chicks like these, so the ones I named are just a few of the many possibilities.

 

[JedJackson]

They are mixed but still very cute. I think Silkie is definitely in the parentage somewhere.

 

[ella2025]

I agree. Maybe silkie or a bearded Polish somewhere mixed in there.

 

[Whittni]

Agree, it's a silkie mix (not Polish) because of the feather footing

 

[ella2025]

Agree, it's a silkie mix (not Polish) because of the feather footing

Cochins have feathered feet so technically polish is possible if it is truly a Cochin mix? I'm not sure though, I'm not an expert.

 

[NatJ]

Cochins have feathered feet so technically polish is possible if it is truly a Cochin mix? I'm not sure though, I'm not an expert.

I think that would be possible, especially if it is a multi-generation mix. Maybe Polish x Cochin, crossed back to Cochin.

Silkie-mixes do seem to be more common than Polish-mixes, but I don't see any traits that force the crested chick to be one or the other. I can't see the comb type (Polish has V, Silkie has Walnut) or the number of toes (Polish has the normal 4, Silkie has 5). Either of those could point more strongly at one breed or another.

 

[redinator]

I'll throw in my very uneducated guess and say Polish or Cream Legbar because of the crest. I'd expect Silkie crosses to show darker skin on at least a few of the chicks, if not all (?)

I'm still learning about crosses and which traits are recessive and dominant, so I could be way off base.

 

[NatJ]

I'll throw in my very uneducated guess and say Polish or Cream Legbar because of the crest. I'd expect Silkie crosses to show darker skin on at least a few of the chicks, if not all (?)

I'm still learning about crosses and which traits are recessive and dominant, so I could be way off base.

When someone crosses a Silkie with a Cochin, the first generation chicks will generally have crest, maybe muff/beard, 5 toes, and walnut combs (genetically rose + pea). They will not show silkie-type feathers. If a Silkie is the father, the daughters should show dark skin but the sons should not. If a Cochin is the father, all chicks should have light skin.

If someone took a chick from that cross and bred it back to a Cochin, I would expect most chicks to have light skin, and I would expect a variety of traits in chicks: with crests or without, with or without muff/beard, with or without 5 toes, with rose comb or pea comb or walnut comb or single comb.

Given that I see crest and muff/beard on one chick, and a non-single comb on another chick (I think it's a pea comb), I think these chicks could come from one parent that is Silkie/Cochin mix and one parent that is a Cochin. If the Cochin was Calico or Mille Fleur colored, a backcross would also explain the coloring of the chicks. There are several recessive genes involved, so it is not likely to show up in a first-generation cross of the common colors of Silkie or Polish or most any other crested/muffed breed I can easily think of.

I suspect whoever called them Cochins is a bit mixed up (as in, the person the OP got the chicks from.) Or maybe the person knew they were mixes but said it in a confusing way (something like "These are the Cochin's chicks" could refer to just one parent being a Cochin, with the other one being something else.)