imacowgirl2
Songster
Question for the genetics expert out there...based on his phenotype, is there any chance of this guy ever throwing a steel blue/grey chick?
Reason I'm asking is because broody just hatched out 3 chicks...we THOUGHT we had stuck 3 New Hampshire eggs under her, but when the eggs hatched, two of the babies are steel grey/dark grey and one is clearly a NH. I also thought that this guy and our NH roosters were the only ones that had been with the hens in the three weeks prior to setting eggs (it was supposed to be just the NH roos, but this guy escaped for a couple hours one day)...but I never expected him to have steel grey chicks -- I expected his to always be black. Reason I'm wondering is because he's a Whiting True Blue...so if these two little steel grey chicks happen to be his, they would be olive eggers, which I want. If they're not his, the only other option is that our barnyard mix rooster (NH/blue australorp cross) somehow accessed one of the hens in those three weeks as well -- in which case, I don't want/need to keep these chicks, and would prefer to sell them as chicks vs raising them to laying age to see what color egg they lay.
Here are the chicks in question: Chick 1 -- doesn't look as grey as I thought before, but doesn't look the same level of black as his known chicks -- almost looks like this chick has a dark brown undertone...
Chick 2: the steel grey one with very dark eyes on the top of this picture
The other three black ones in this last picture are known Whiting True Blue chicks of roughly the same age as these chicks -- they were collected from his WTB hen and I know they were hers and he was the only rooster with her; and they look identical to every other chick this pair has thrown (10+ now at this point).
If it helps any at all with assumptions about his genotype, here are a few more pictures of his other chicks with his WTB hen, and a picture of his WTB hen (she's the black hen):
Potential mothers of the chicks in question (the brown egg laying breeds we have in our flock right now): Buff Orpington, New Hampshire, Red Laced Wyandotte, Silver Laced Wyandotte. Thank you for any insight you can give me!
Reason I'm asking is because broody just hatched out 3 chicks...we THOUGHT we had stuck 3 New Hampshire eggs under her, but when the eggs hatched, two of the babies are steel grey/dark grey and one is clearly a NH. I also thought that this guy and our NH roosters were the only ones that had been with the hens in the three weeks prior to setting eggs (it was supposed to be just the NH roos, but this guy escaped for a couple hours one day)...but I never expected him to have steel grey chicks -- I expected his to always be black. Reason I'm wondering is because he's a Whiting True Blue...so if these two little steel grey chicks happen to be his, they would be olive eggers, which I want. If they're not his, the only other option is that our barnyard mix rooster (NH/blue australorp cross) somehow accessed one of the hens in those three weeks as well -- in which case, I don't want/need to keep these chicks, and would prefer to sell them as chicks vs raising them to laying age to see what color egg they lay.
Here are the chicks in question: Chick 1 -- doesn't look as grey as I thought before, but doesn't look the same level of black as his known chicks -- almost looks like this chick has a dark brown undertone...
Chick 2: the steel grey one with very dark eyes on the top of this picture
The other three black ones in this last picture are known Whiting True Blue chicks of roughly the same age as these chicks -- they were collected from his WTB hen and I know they were hers and he was the only rooster with her; and they look identical to every other chick this pair has thrown (10+ now at this point).
If it helps any at all with assumptions about his genotype, here are a few more pictures of his other chicks with his WTB hen, and a picture of his WTB hen (she's the black hen):
Potential mothers of the chicks in question (the brown egg laying breeds we have in our flock right now): Buff Orpington, New Hampshire, Red Laced Wyandotte, Silver Laced Wyandotte. Thank you for any insight you can give me!
