Delaware chicks with eyeliner

[seriousbill]

Quote:
I tend to agree, Tim. And according to the sources I've read, Delawares are supposed to be eb, although many are wheaten based--but this tends to give more washed out black markings than eb. Dels are not supposed to be wild type, which is why the chick looks odd.

 

[Krys109uk]

The eyeliner effect is odd. But if they were het eWh/e+ they would segregate out & not be consistently yellow with black markings.
I currently have some eWh/e+, S/S, Co/co+ (possibly also Db/db+) & probably Mh/mh+, Di/di+ chicks, they look like very pale e+ with slight orange in centre stripe.

Don't they state the desired undercolour in the stndard? This would most often be different depending upon whether eWh or eb.

 

[seriousbill]

Quote:
The standard specifies the undercolor as white. But I have very darkly marked birds with white undercolor (that had streaks of black on the head as chicks) that I have thought were eb. I'm going largely by the very different degree of black saturation and the way in which black manifests in the tails of the females. I don't think eb always produces grey undercolor, at least in this breed.

 

[Krys109uk]

I don't think eb always produces grey undercolor

I agree....I've seen eb birds with light undercolour on occasions.
It was just an idea as it can be a helpful indicator.​

 

[popcornpuppy]

I'm lost

are you talking about specific traits or genes?

 

[Goose and Fig]

I'm lost
are you talking about specific traits or genes?

Be careful what you wish for!

They like to go off like that.

 

[Krys109uk]

I'm lost
are you talking about specific traits or genes?

Sorry.

We're talking about genes & their effect.

If you want to follow this will help.

http://kippenjungle.nl/basisEN.htm​

 

[seriousbill]

Quote:

Be careful what you wish for!

They like to go off like that.

Quote:
Yes, as Kris says, we're talking about genes and effects. I'll give you a short version

We're discussing e locus base color (the color underneath the silver and barring on Delaware). Y'see, chickens are kind of like cakes. They have a deeper cake color underneath the frosting

So, a Delaware is like a chocolate cake (eb) with white frosting (Silver). And there are Delaware cakes that are milk chocolate (wheaten), dark chocolate (eb), and, er, say, bittersweet (e+ or wild type). Delawares, according to most of what I've seen, are supposed to be dark chocolate underneath the frosting. But a lot are milk chocolate. And the chick in the picture is probably bittersweet (e+). You can sometimes tell, as Kris was saying, what kind of chocolate the cake is by looking at the color bleeding through the frosting (base color usually affects undercolor and chick down). But this doesn't always happen in predictable ways. I hope this makes sense

 

[walkswithdog]

You all made me hungry!!!

I just had a broody hatch our first del crosses - del/partridge rock. They're yellow with chipmunk stripes and eye-liner! Very cute.

The pure dels have no eye-liner, pure yellow at hatch.

 

[popcornpuppy]

Makes perfect sense, once you get past all of the science-type terminology. If I understand what you are describing, this story is relevent:
I got RIR's from the hatchery and when they were fully feathered I saw alot of gray/black on the under feathers. I freaked out and thought I got the wrong birds. After alot of research, I found out this gray/black is smutt and is needed to keep the Reds...... well, red. With out the smutt they would fade over the generations and look more like New Hampshires or production reds. Smutt is a good thing in the RIR breed but you don't want too much and want to breed a smutty bird to a "clean" bird, free or mostly free of smutt.

To me, that sounds similar to what you are describing with the Delaware chicks in the photos. They have too much of one color and not enough of another. I am following along correctly?