Cream Legbars

[sol2go]

@mollybuck, thank you for the pics! And you have given us a great example of why we need to let our cockerels grow out as long as possible before choosing breeders. Grown in, that first cock does not look very much like a Legbar. I would guess that he is a cross since the barring is off and appears to only be showng like one set instead of two. Plus he may have been crossed with a silver meatier bird. Rusty definitely is closer to standard, in fact he looks pretty close color rise in those pics. For pairings, I would look for hens with long bodies, low tail sets, and deep breasts (long keels). If you would like to pursue cream, definitely look for hens with gray barred bodies. If you would like to pursue a more golden crele, then look for hens with reddish gray brown ( is that taupe?) bodies and darker golden hackles. Looks like your gut was right on! Sorry for any confusion and thank you again for taking pics. Best wishes!

Thanks for that.
Do you have any examples of really dark barring in the CL?

 

[KPenley]

Thanks KPenley.  Yes, I was asking about their apparent phenotype and possible coloring genetics.  I also thought the first rooster looked more correct for double cream than Rusty.  I'm not sure if @mollybuck
 realized that, as the post referenced a long thread for the crele variety of the cream leg bar (maybe the Alternative SOP discussion?).  

The first rooster also has amazing barring, similar to some of the differences @ChicKat
 posted regarding light and dark barred Plymouth Rocks.  I also have a Cream Legbar rooster that didn't get a smidgeon of cream, but has that incredible dark barring.

I agree, @mollybuck
 has some substantial looking boys there!  

KPenley, would you mind discussing the differences between 
[COLOR=A52A2A]large amounts of red suggest a lack of gold inhibitor or an over abundance of Autosomal red[/COLOR]
I can see that these two cases would be pluses for breeders of the more colorful crele variety (hello @KendyF
 ).
And I have seen how cream roosters become more monochromatic.

When you refer to a gold inhibitor are you referring to Cream or another type of Dilute?  I'm thinking of a recent post by @dretd (that I can't find quickly) and a thread that I have also read in an old "classroom" discussion of CL's.  Is there a problem with another Dilute in the Cream genotype? 

This is all opinion and guesswork. Sure, in the first younger Rusty pic, there was a good deal of red showing through the saddle, secondary flight feathers and shoulder. They greatly faded in his older pics. Inhibitor of gold (ig) fades gold. So reds, golds, and browns will be greatly lightened to cream colors when a bird has two copies of this recessive gene. These colors can be somewhat lightened if the gold exsists alongside wildtype pattern, and who knows what else, in a bird who is split for cream (Ig/ig). Why? Not sure. Maybe mutant genes? Maybe just the way the particular set of genes express themselves?
Lots of brown showing up in the flight feathers in an indication that a bird could be lacking at least one copy of ig. At least two scientists here have agreed that any golden brown colors showing up in the flight feathers are gold, so their suggestion was to look at the flight feathers to determine if you were seeing brownish reds or cream. Alongside the gray barring, Brownish reds would indicate a gold (Ig/Ig) or a split gold/cream (Ig/ig) bird, cream and/or white would indicate a cream (ig/ig) bird.
Having a much darker saddle area than hackles could also be an indicator of one copy of ig. Autosomal Red is a red that is very confusing. No one seems to agree on exactly what it is, but scientists do agree that ig is not strong enough to dilute it, especially if it contains mahogany. But it can produce red coloring practically anywhere, other than flight feathers, which can be confusing when trying to determine a birds genetics.
Now adding in barring adds in another diluter. And the double pair of barring that roosters should receive means that their creams can range from almost white to buttery shades. I find it funny that some breeders think cream birds are monochromatic, or black and white, but perhaps my eye is different. My birds are not just gray and white. Or perhaps the cameras just make the birds appear so in pictures.
Di should not exist in our breed. This doesn't mean that it can not be there, as random crosses have been made. But it should not be there.

 

[KPenley]

Thanks for that.  
Do you have any examples of really dark barring in the CL?

Like too much melanin? Fuzzy pic, but here are some birds I culled after a bad pairing. Sometimes interesting things pop up when you cross strains.

 

[ChicKat]

This is all opinion and guesswork. Sure, in the first younger Rusty pic, there was a good deal of red showing through the saddle, secondary flight feathers and shoulder. They greatly faded in his older pics. Inhibitor of gold (ig) fades gold. So reds, golds, and browns will be greatly lightened to cream colors when a bird has two copies of this recessive gene. These colors can be somewhat lightened if the gold exsists alongside wildtype pattern, and who knows what else, in a bird who is split for cream (Ig/ig). Why? Not sure. Maybe mutant genes? Maybe just the way the particular set of genes express themselves?
Lots of brown showing up in the flight feathers in an indication that a bird could be lacking at least one copy of ig. At least two scientists here have agreed that any golden brown colors showing up in the flight feathers are gold, so their suggestion was to look at the flight feathers to determine if you were seeing brownish reds or cream. Alongside the gray barring, Brownish reds would indicate a gold (Ig/Ig) or a split gold/cream (Ig/ig) bird, cream and/or white would indicate a cream (ig/ig) bird.
Having a much darker saddle area than hackles could also be an indicator of one copy of ig. Autosomal Red is a red that is very confusing. No one seems to agree on exactly what it is, but scientists do agree that ig is not strong enough to dilute it, especially if it contains mahogany. But it can produce red coloring practically anywhere, other than flight feathers, which can be confusing when trying to determine a birds genetics.
Now adding in barring adds in another diluter. And the double pair of barring that roosters should receive means that their creams can range from almost white to buttery shades. I find it funny that some breeders think cream birds are monochromatic, or black and white, but perhaps my eye is different. My birds are not just gray and white. Or perhaps the cameras just make the birds appear so in pictures.
Di should not exist in our breed. This doesn't mean that it can not be there, as random crosses have been made. But it should not be there.

KPenley,
this is so Cool - that you have scientists addressing CL genetics. Ask them if they know of a source I could get the DNA sequenced on one of my flock - it would probably save me a few zillion dollars and 2-3 years as opposed to going to Red Jungle Fowl and parsing out all the mutations, hatching and growing out the generations needed to find the answers to my split for Silver dilemma in my Flock sire!!!

Also I haven't found anyone who could explain how a RIR had cream chicks of both sexes
Here is a cut and paste that referenced Punnett's work:

1. Genetics and the Cream Gene - We had thought that the only way to achieve a 'cream' colored chicken was two recessive gold-inhibitor genes - that would be ig/ig. In his paper for the genetics journal Punnett talks about a hen crossed with a RIR cock-bird that produced cream offspring.

Here is a quote from the article Punnett wrote:
"...By happy chance a silver Light Sussex [female] was found which on mating with a cream [male] gave only silver [males] and cream [females]. Such [males] must be silver on cream, and one of them mated back to cream [females] gave silvers and creams of both sexes. A silver hen from this mating (i.e. silver on cream) was mated with a gold Rhode Island Red [male]. If silver, gold and cream form an alleomorphic series in the sex chromosome the [males] from this mating should receive silver from their mother and gold from their father, i.e. cream from neither parent. Hence such [males] mated to cream [females] should give silvers and golds of both sexes but no creams. Actually this mating gave 13 silvers, 9 golds and 8 creams, both sexes being represented in each colour class. Clearly this disproves the hypothesis of an alleomorphoc series in the sex chromosome. But the figures accord reasonably well with the assumption of two independent alleomorphic pairs where expectations would be silvers, golds, and creams in the ratio 2:1:1. * "

Punnett's asterisk pertains to this:
"* While this experiment was in progress I learned from Mr. M.S.Pease that he had obtained the following evidence telling against the supposition of a multiple alleomorphic series. A gold hen hen mated with a cream cock gave golds and creams of both sexes. On the supposition of multiple alleomorphs one would have expected all the male chicks to be gold and the females to be cream. "

extra long for completeness -- but the part about a RIR in the mating mix - would eliminate any chance for ANY offspring to be cream since he would not pass a recessive cream gene to his offspring. OR we really do not have the complete picture/formula details about Cream - as the simple recessive that we think that it is.OR - the research was flawed or RIR cock-bird DID have recessive cream? A zillion speculations could sprout - but IMO it shows one area where not enough is known about Cream. One of the reasons to not split out the more colorful birds as non-cream or less cream - etc. So we don't have enough information to start another variety based on genetics. ETA - this is not the case for Rose Comb and for White Recessive - they both have genetic variation that is not ambiguous.

The above is lifted from the summary in post 448 of this thread:
https://www.backyardchickens.com/t/...on-for-alternative-legbars-sop-discussion/440

There are a couple of other questions I would love the scientists to answer! And just to verify if I am understanding correctly that they are saying that one copy of the recessive dilution gene will become visible, and behave unlike other recessives such as the recessive white gene - which is only found when two copies of the recessives are present.

I have been wondering about the Punnett ability to get Cream from RIR for quite awhile now - and have yet to find someone who can shed light on it. If it is too much trouble to run these concepts past them - ask them if I could have their contact information - and I will pose the questions! Thanks - this may be very clarifying.

 

[KPenley]

I was referring to T. Adkerson and Marvin, who sometimes agree with Punnett

In terms of the nature of recessive cream ig, it does not have the power to be expressed with one copy as it is recessive. The in between colors we see are most likely (totally a guess here) due to the combination of autosomal alleles (perhaps a mutant incomplete dominant version of Ig, combined with wild type pattern, and perhaps even Autosomal red or barring genes, or who knows what else) that allow the gold color to lighten a Ig/ig bird somewhere between where you would expect an Ig/Ig bird and an ig/ig to be colorwise. Dr. E has suggested this combination of genes acting differently than you would expect as a form of epistasis. Perhaps that even explains the RIR, but I don't have a good grasp of that concept yet.

I had hoped that a local university would allow us to use their facilities, but they are still booked up in terms of assignments the students are working on and equipment. I will keep asking, and will let you know if some lab time/room opens up!

 

[Scatterknit]

Paula takes exception to being discussed without her input. She took a selfie she wanted me to post, to express her displeasure...

 

[sol2go]

Like too much melanin? Fuzzy pic, but here are some birds I culled after a bad pairing. Sometimes interesting things pop up when you cross strains.

I was thinking of a rooster with darker chest barring. I will try to get a pic of mine and post; I hatched him from another breeder's stock. His sisters have dark hackles, but not overly melanized like some I've had. Sounds like you were surprised to see the results of your pictured cross.

 

[KPenley]

I was thinking of a rooster with darker chest barring.  I will try to get a pic of mine and post; I hatched him from another breeder's stock.  His sisters have dark hackles, but not overly melanized like some I've had.  Sounds like you were surprised to see the results of your pictured cross.

Ok, sorry that I misunderstood. Yes, I was surprised that those dark ones were only two generations later from my first birds. You have to be careful when breeding and really pay attention to what pops up if you line breed. In this case the daughter of the birds pictured was bred back to her father.
Grey and Lucy

Grey had pretty dark barring across his chest, but it wasn't very even.

The girl on the right was their daughter Goldilocks

I know...Jack again...but I really like his darker barring across the breast.

 

[sol2go]

Ok, sorry that I misunderstood. Yes, I was surprised that those dark ones were only two generations later from my first birds. You have to be careful when breeding and really pay attention to what pops up if you line breed. In this case the daughter of the birds pictured was bred back to her father.
Grey and Lucy

Grey had pretty dark barring across his chest, but it wasn't very even.

The girl on the right was their daughter Goldilocks

That's what I'm talking about! Look how much darker Grey is than his father! And there is no way I would have guessed that looking at your pairing. They sure had great white earlobes to work with =) One thing I've noticed when the males have a nice overall shape, is that their head and neck arch reminds me of a pretty horse.
So Goldilocks has some reinforced genetics that you couldn't know where there...

Do you have some examples of barring that you prefer on a rooster?

 

[caychris]

The newest additions only 3 hatched out of 14 eggs 7 made it to lockdown


Shows the interesting color variations


Looks like 1 girl and 2 boys