Crested Cream Legbar Rooster without a crest?

[Happy Hill Farmstead]

Hi, this is my second year raising Crested Cream Legbar chickens and all three of my hens have beautiful crests and every chick that I have hatched out using this rooster has been autosexing with no problems, but after seeing some pictures of roosters with very prominent crowns online I am now questioning Roy's lack of crest/crown...He is a great rooster, but is he an acceptable rooster for breeding Crested Cream Legbar chickens? fingers crossed that you tell me he is beautiful and to quit worrying

 

[nuthatched]

Where did you get him?

 

[Happy Hill Farmstead]

From a local breeder in Western NC

 

[Shadrach]

Hi, this is my second year raising Crested Cream Legbar chickens and all three of my hens have beautiful crests and every chick that I have hatched out using this rooster has been autosexing with no problems, but after seeing some pictures of roosters with very prominent crowns online I am now questioning Roy's lack of crest/crown...He is a great rooster, but is he an acceptable rooster for breeding Crested Cream Legbar chickens? fingers crossed that you tell me he is beautiful and to quit worrying

The males, here in the UK where the breed originates, tend to have tufts rather than a crests.
I think he looks fine but whether he's what the standard (SOP) where you live says he should be is another matter, if that standard is what you are after.

 

[Happy Hill Farmstead]

The males, here in the UK where the breed originates, tend to have tufts rather than a crests.
I think he looks fine but whether he's what the standard (SOP) where you live says he should be is another matter, if that standard is what you are after.

Does he look to you like he has a tuft? I want him to be a good representative of the breed. He is a good boy

 

[Shadrach]

Does he look to you like he has a tuft? I want him to be a good representative of the breed. He is a good boy

Got to cut the chap some slack here. He's sort of a bit tuffty right at the base of his comb.

 

[Happy Hill Farmstead]

Got to cut the chap some slack here. He's sort of a bit tuffty right at the base of his comb.

Ok I will give him some slack. Thank you!

 

[NatJ]

I am now questioning Roy's lack of crest

If you want to know for sure whether he has the gene for crest or not, you could test-mate him to see.

Breed him to some hens that have no crests at all (any of the common breeds or mixes that have no crest or tuft.)

If he produces any crested chicks with those hens, then he does have the crest gene, whic means he also has a crest (just so small it's not obvious.)

If you hatch more than about 6-8 chicks, and every chick has a crest, then the rooster has two genes for crest, because he gave one to every chick. That is the way a Cream Legbar rooster is supposed to be.

If he produces 50% crested chicks and 50% not-crested chicks, then he has just one gene for crest and one for not-crest, which is not really what you want.

If he does not produce any crested chicks when bred to non-crested hens, then he does not have the crest gene. A rooster with no crest gene will give that to every one of his chicks, so they will all carry the gene for no crest, even if they show a crest themselves (crest gene from mom, no crest gene from dad, for this example.)

Regardless of what crest genes he has, if he is very good in other respects, it might be hard to find a good replacement for him, because you would want one that is just as good in all the other points (not sacrificing some other quality to try and get a better crest.)

 

[Happy Hill Farmstead]

I was just thinking back on the first chicks that I hatched from him last year. We had a non crested cream legbar hen that came from my pet chicken and one of their pullets was uncrested as well so that must mean that he either doesn’t have the crested gene or he has one crested gene because if he had two that pullet would have had to be crested, am I thinking about that correctly?

 

[NatJ]

I was just thinking back on the first chicks that I hatched from him last year. We had a non crested cream legbar hen that came from my pet chicken and one of their pullets was uncrested as well so that must mean that he either doesn’t have the crested gene or he has one crested gene because if he had two that pullet would have had to be crested, am I thinking about that correctly?

Yes, I agree with what the non-crested chick shows about the rooster.