Color ID

[KsKingBee]

Oh goodness. It acts just like a male strutting itself around. How can you tell sex?

I would be thrilled if it were a hen.

I will have to read up on all this split business. I don’t understand it at all.

If you look above on the top of the Peafowl page there are a list of 'Stickies' that will take you to the general information on housing, care and genetics, it is a great place to start learning.

Splits are references to hidden genetics that you can not always see. When splits to sex-linked colors pop up like your chick did then you know that it is a hen because a hen can not be split to a sex-linked color. It does not matter what color hen your cock breeds, half of the hen chicks will be Cameo, if the hen is Cameo then you will also get both Cameo cocks and hens.

 

[Kirkland1610]

If you look above on the top of the Peafowl page there are a list of 'Stickies' that will take you to the general information on housing, care and genetics, it is a great place to start learning.

Splits are references to hidden genetics that you can not always see. When splits to sex-linked colors pop up like your chick did then you know that it is a hen because a hen can not be split to a sex-linked color. It does not matter what color hen your cock breeds, half of the hen chicks will be Cameo, if the hen is Cameo then you will also get both Cameo cocks and hens.

 

[Kirkland1610]

This is so good to know. i haven’t had peacocks in years but I used to have about 20 that free ranged my property. I only had Blues so I thought but we had white babies each breeding season. The three that I was able to raise were all white males.

These birds I’m referencing now belong to a relative. She wants more hens but they are had to find. I think she is going to get a couple of more pair. She just has them for her own pleasure, not for selling.

Thank you and I will look at links.

 

[Kirkland1610]

Are y’all SURE this is a hen? See photos

 

[KsKingBee]

Are y’all SURE this is a hen? See photos

It is not possible to be a cock unless the mother is Cameo.

 

[Kirkland1610]

It is not possible to be a cock unless the mother is Cameo.

The mother is white.

 

[KsKingBee]

The mother is white.

That confirms the chick is a hen.

 

[casportpony]

Doesn't white just cover up the color underneath? If so, couldn't the hen be white over cameo?

 

[KsKingBee]

Doesn't white just cover up the color underneath? If so, couldn't the hen be white over cameo?

A hen can not be split to a sex-linked color. A White cock could be.

 

[Pyxis]

A hen can not be split to a sex-linked color. A White cock could be.

I think what Kathy means is, is it possible that the hen is cameo, but is also white, and the white is 'covering' the cameo?

So like in ducks, which I'll use because I know the genetics there, lol. Chocolate is a sex linked color. It's also recessive. So it's analogous to cameo in that way. A hen can't be split to chocolate. So if you had, say, a black drake and a black duck and you hatched chocolate ducklings, that would mean the Drake was split to chocolate, and that all the chocolate babies are female.

BUT, white is recessive in ducks and it's epistatic to all other colors - no matter what color a duck would have been, if it inherits two copies of white, it's white instead.

So if you took that same black drake and bred him to a white duck and some babies came out chocolate, he's definitely split to chocolate, BUT it is also possible that in reality the female duck is also chocolate and it's just 'covered' by the white. So the chocolate ducklings could be both male and female.

So what Kathy is asking is if this is something that could also be happening with these peafowl - could the hen genetically be cameo, but the white is 'covering' it?

I've no idea how white works in peafowl so I don't know if that could actually happen or not. But that's what Kathy is asking.