Cream Legbars

[Red Banks]

Cream is both a color description and a genetic term. In genetics, cream is diluted gold and a bird needs to get the cream genes (ig) from both parents to look cream. Some birds are lacking these diluting genes so they end up more gold colored than cream. Some have one set of cream genes and because Gold seems to act like an incomplete dominant gene when combined with lots of other genes, sometimes a bird will look like they are somewhere between gold and cream. 2 genetically cream parents will create 100% cream offspring.

I would encourage you to read the Cream Legbar Draft standard for a complete list of features for the cream variety of Legbars. There are also a lot of pictures and lots of information at the Cream Legbar Club site.

In short:
A cream hen will look like creamy off white to pale buttery yellow in the hackles and have lots of gray or grayish taupe in her body feathers. If she is carrying genes for lots of Autosomal red she could have bit of a reddish sheen over her wings, but this is not desirable. The breast is usually a pinky salmon.
A gold hen will look more yellow or even orange in the hackles, and have a brown body with an orange overtone to it. The standard is still being written for this color set but you may find it referred to as the crele or gold birds (even though both varieties are crele pattern, just one is cream crele and the other gold crele). The breast is usually a brighter darker orange salmon.

A cream cock will have creamy off white to pale buttery yellow hackles and saddle feathers, and their shoulder and back should have chestnut mixed with cream making the chestnut look like smudges. If you gently pull a wing out the flight feathers should be white, cream, and dark gray barred. Some birds are missing this barring, but it can be bred back in.
A gold cock will usually have yellow straw colored hackles and saddle (the saddle can also look bright orange if they have lots of red), a more solid red/chestnut shoulder and back, and golds and browns showing up undiluted in the flight feathers of the wing.

The in-between birds can show a mix of the features above, and any bird with excess autosomal red can totally break all the rules (since autosomal red can not be diluted by ig). There is still a lot that is being learned about this breed. We don't know it all! I hope that helps! Best wishes!


Cream pullet and light cream cock


In-betweener cock. He produced lots of gold birds but I did get a cream pullet from he and a cream hen proving he had one set of cream genes.


Gold cockerel, hard to see since he was just growing in and I culled his hatch so I don't have further pics, but you can start to see the golds and lots of red in the shoulder coming in.

This was very helpful. Thank you for making it so clear.

 

[OneMountainAcres]

She is very nice. My Luna looks just like Stormy. This is Celestia my favorite so far, she is so sweet & calm.

Beautiful! I hope my Luna grows up looking that good she's going to be 7 weeks old this weekend so she's still a bit behind your's. I think my little cockerel is going to be a little guy when he's full grown. He's about 11-12 weeks old now and is only a little bit bigger than the girls. Maybe he'll get a growth spurt soon? He still only has a couple little faint hints of coloring in his feathers. He's mostly just black and white and I'm hoping those couple tiny little feathers on his head are the start of a crest. I need to get an updated picture of him. He is a little sweetie though. He likes to come running over top see what I'm up to when I walk outside and on chilly days, he likes to be cuddled lol

 

[terrip824]

Beautiful! I hope my Luna grows up looking that good

she's going to be 7 weeks old this weekend so she's still a bit behind your's.

I think my little cockerel is going to be a little guy when he's full grown. He's about 11-12 weeks old now and is only a little bit bigger than the girls. Maybe he'll get a growth spurt soon? He still only has a couple little faint hints of coloring in his feathers. He's mostly just black and white and I'm hoping those couple tiny little feathers on his head are the start of a crest. I need to get an updated picture of him. He is a little sweetie though. He likes to come running over top see what I'm up to when I walk outside and on chilly days, he likes to be cuddled lol

I love those little feathers the males have.Almost like they are trying to imitate the girls. Yet they grow up to be impressive themselves. I noticed that too. Of my 3 little cockerels only one is bigger than the females. And they are also almost 12 weeks old.

 

[OneMountainAcres]

I managed to get a couple pictures of Sunny with the ladies this morning

 

[terrip824]

Cream is both a color description and a genetic term. In genetics, cream is diluted gold and a bird needs to get the cream genes (ig) from both parents to look cream. Some birds are lacking these diluting genes so they end up more gold colored than cream. Some have one set of cream genes and because Gold seems to act like an incomplete dominant gene when combined with lots of other genes, sometimes a bird will look like they are somewhere between gold and cream. 2 genetically cream parents will create 100% cream offspring.

I would encourage you to read the Cream Legbar Draft standard for a complete list of features for the cream variety of Legbars. There are also a lot of pictures and lots of information at the Cream Legbar Club site.

In short:
A cream hen will look like creamy off white to pale buttery yellow in the hackles and have lots of gray or grayish taupe in her body feathers. If she is carrying genes for lots of Autosomal red she could have bit of a reddish sheen over her wings, but this is not desirable. The breast is usually a pinky salmon.
A gold hen will look more yellow or even orange in the hackles, and have a brown body with an orange overtone to it. The standard is still being written for this color set but you may find it referred to as the crele or gold birds (even though both varieties are crele pattern, just one is cream crele and the other gold crele). The breast is usually a brighter darker orange salmon.

A cream cock will have creamy off white to pale buttery yellow hackles and saddle feathers, and their shoulder and back should have chestnut mixed with cream making the chestnut look like smudges. If you gently pull a wing out the flight feathers should be white, cream, and dark gray barred. Some birds are missing this barring, but it can be bred back in.
A gold cock will usually have yellow straw colored hackles and saddle (the saddle can also look bright orange if they have lots of red), a more solid red/chestnut shoulder and back, and golds and browns showing up undiluted in the flight feathers of the wing.

The in-between birds can show a mix of the features above, and any bird with excess autosomal red can totally break all the rules (since autosomal red can not be diluted by ig). There is still a lot that is being learned about this breed. We don't know it all! I hope that helps! Best wishes!


Cream pullet and light cream cock


In-betweener cock. He produced lots of gold birds but I did get a cream pullet from he and a cream hen proving he had one set of cream genes.


Gold cockerel, hard to see since he was just growing in and I culled his hatch so I don't have further pics, but you can start to see the golds and lots of red in the shoulder coming in

 

[terrip824]

So they are much older than mine. I like the silhouette. Very pretty. I don't understand the gold and the proper cream. Can you help me with that? I really want to learn more.

I think KPenley did a great job answering. As she said creamy neck hackles are most desirable. Here's a pic of 2 of mine that are different. Luna who has gold is on the left. Celestia & Alfie who have cream are on the right.

 

[KPenley]

Can you give him some more time to grow in? I'm not seeing anything that screams "undiluted color" yet, and he's so little still. It is possible that he is in-between or he may just be a darker cream too. The shoulders seem to be the easiest tell when the adult feathers come in. Solid or almost solid red/chestnut = gold or in-between, cream and chestnut = cream. When he gets a little bigger can you possibly get an open wing shot (it's easiest to have one person gently unfold the wing and another to take the pic)? He appears to have some lovely barring starting on those flight feathers!

 

[terrip824]

He has plenty of time But he is 1 of 3 so I will eventually have to make a choice. Can you tell me the difference between "salmon" & "chestnut" ? When I think salmon I think of a form of pink but I know that isn't correct. Chestnut is a light to mid brown if I understand it correctly.

 

[KPenley]

Salmon varies from pinky tan to orange and even orange red.

Chestnut is a reddish brown and many people interchange red with chestnut in conversation. It can get confusing

 

[Red Banks]

I think KPenley did a great job answering. As she said creamy neck hackles are most desirable. Here's a pic of 2 of mine that are different. Luna who has gold is on the left. Celestia & Alfie who have cream are on the right.

This is helpful too! I see the difference. Thank you!