Duckwing Leghorns

[Egghead_Jr]

You are wanting to lighten what I call Partridge here is way to go about it (I'd go about it)-

Put original Gold male over Silver. This will give you S/G cockerels and lighter gold pullets.

Put that S/G cockerel over the lighter gold pullets and you'd get 50% "golden" pullets, 50% silver and cockerels will be 50% S/G and 50% G/G.

To test the cockerels, take the best two and separate in different pens with any gold hens (G/-). Ensure they are not laying fertile eggs first. Hatch what comes from each, separately so as not be confused what's what. If the bird is S/G there will be 50% silver pullets. Any silver bird at hatch shows the sire was S/G. If the sire is carrying G/G then all the pullets will be gold and in turn all the cockerels will carry G/G. All golden and able to breed true cockerels.

I said take the best two as that's what you want to breed but you could work down in succession to find the best cockerel with G/G. Or mate the best (your test showed both carried S/G) and try again over the golden pullets (by now hens). Each mating of S/G over Gold will produce 50/50 pullets and 50/50 cockerels with the one half being G/G. So your continuing to lighten and at same time trying to get best type.

 

[Miami Leghorn]

You are wanting to lighten what I call Partridge here is way to go about it (I'd go about it)-

Put original Gold male over Silver. This will give you S/G cockerels and lighter gold pullets.

Put that S/G cockerel over the lighter gold pullets and you'd get 50% "golden" pullets, 50% silver and cockerels will be 50% S/G and 50% G/G.

To test the cockerels, take the best two and separate in different pens with any gold hens (G/-). Ensure they are not laying fertile eggs first. Hatch what comes from each, separately so as not be confused what's what. If the bird is S/G there will be 50% silver pullets. Any silver bird at hatch shows the sire was S/G. If the sire is carrying G/G then all the pullets will be gold and in turn all the cockerels will carry G/G. All golden and able to breed true cockerels.

I said take the best two as that's what you want to breed but you could work down in succession to find the best cockerel with G/G. Or mate the best (your test showed both carried S/G) and try again over the golden pullets (by now hens). Each mating of S/G over Gold will produce 50/50 pullets and 50/50 cockerels with the one half being G/G. So your continuing to lighten and at same time trying to get best type.

Awesome thank you so much

 

[The Moonshiner]

Anytime you breed a partridge to silver it lightens the deep gold. Do that enough and you'll end with a "golden" that breeds true. It's not done here in the states as light gold is not accepted for partridge color. Varieties are crossed to enhance some lacking attribute of body then put back to a dark gold bird to bring back into the fold of true color.

So the yellow (S/G) in first cross can be gotten down the line visually with (G/G) if you keep going back to Silver and then the S/G cockerel. I imagine you'd have to perform test matings in the end to find which cockerels were G/G and S/G as they'd look nearly identical. But it can be done and you'd have golden G/G Cocks to breed true with the golden pullets.

You are wanting to lighten what I call Partridge here is way to go about it (I'd go about it)-

Put original Gold male over Silver. This will give you S/G cockerels and lighter gold pullets.

Put that S/G cockerel over the lighter gold pullets and you'd get 50% "golden" pullets, 50% silver and cockerels will be 50% S/G and 50% G/G.

To test the cockerels, take the best two and separate in different pens with any gold hens (G/-). Ensure they are not laying fertile eggs first. Hatch what comes from each, separately so as not be confused what's what. If the bird is S/G there will be 50% silver pullets. Any silver bird at hatch shows the sire was S/G. If the sire is carrying G/G then all the pullets will be gold and in turn all the cockerels will carry G/G. All golden and able to breed true cockerels.

I said take the best two as that's what you want to breed but you could work down in succession to find the best cockerel with G/G. Or mate the best (your test showed both carried S/G) and try again over the golden pullets (by now hens). Each mating of S/G over Gold will produce 50/50 pullets and 50/50 cockerels with the one half being G/G. So your continuing to lighten and at same time trying to get best type.

I can't see how any of this would be true.

 

[Egghead_Jr]

It's true with Partridge and Silver Plymouth Rocks. Lightning of gold when crossed is from long time Partridge breeder, Norman advised me the need to go back with dark to correct. I don't see why it wouldn't hold true with Silver and Brown Leghorn. Silver birds can throw a few with brown hue, not smutty but not clean bright silver in pullets. I'd not use those. There is more going on with Silver birds than that one loci and assume these inhibitors in other locations are what's happening. But that's just my novice guess. My stating the lighter gold arrived from crossing is from 70 year old breeder with hands on experience of it.

The second part I know you see how it holds. That's just genetics. S/G over G/- produces S/G and G/G cockerels; S/- and G/- pullets.

 

[Miami Leghorn]

Found this ....

https://articles.extension.org/page...or-small-and-backyard-flocks:-an-introduction

Genetics of Feather Color
To understand the genetics of feather color, it is necessary to understand how the different colors of poultry are achieved. In poultry, there are secondary and primary color patterns. A secondary pattern is a color pattern that appears on individual feathers. Single and double lacing, mottled, and so on are secondary patterns. Primary patterns are color patterns that involve the entire body of the chicken. An example is the Silver Columbian pattern. The Silver Columbian is a white chicken with some black in the neck, wing, and tail areas. Because the pattern does not manifest on individual feathers, it is referred to as a primary pattern.

To breed a chicken having a particular color scheme, one begins with the background color, which is controlled by the E-locus gene. The other color and (secondary) pattern genes essentially modify this background. Several different genes interact to determine feather colors and patterns. Considering white and black to be colors, there are three basic feather colors: black, white, and red (gold). (Technically, white and black are not colors: white is actually the result of all the colors combined, and black is the lack of reflection of light in the visible range.) The colors of chicken feathers are achieved by diluting and enhancing or masking black and red. For example, Rhode Island Reds have the gold gene with the dominant mahogany (red-enhancing) gene. A blue feathering is produced when a black-feathered chicken has the blue gene, which dilutes the black color. Two copies of the blue gene result in the splash effect. A white chicken can be achieved in a number of ways by inhibiting black and red pigmentation with combinations of genes (such as dominant white, recessive white, silver, Columbian, and Cuckoo barring).

Some perceived feather colors actually are due to the structure of the feather rather than to pigmentation. That is, the purple and beetle green sheens seen in some poultry are due to the way the feather structures reflect light rather than to the presence of pigments.

 

[Miami Leghorn]

Genetics of chicken colors...


https://kippenjungle.nl/basisEN.htm

 

[Miami Leghorn]

THE INHERITANCE OF SHANK COLOR IN CHICKENS

www.genetics.org/content/genetics/20/6/529.full.pdf

 

[Miami Leghorn]

If you can get past the cheesy graphics there are some good things in here...


http://www.chickencolours.com/Chicken Colour Genetics Basics.pdf

 

[sylviethecochin]

I can't see how any of this would be true.

I can see some of it happening due to quantitative genetics. (Height, being affected by many genes, is quantitative.) Some of the modifier genetics don't show up in lists, but they still affect appearance. Not as much as the listed ones, but they do.

Now, if silver has been bred to get the lightest, purest silver, then the unlisted modifier genes are going to lighten the pale colouring. Similarly, if gold has been bred to get the brightest colour, then the modifier genes are going to colour-enhance.

So if you cross silver with gold, theoretically, some of those modifier genes for pale silver should make the gold offspring paler, and vis a vis.

That's just me theorising out my butt, mind you.

EDT: However, my S/G cockerels look silver, almost completely, so I don't see where the g/g looks like s/g is coming from. Might just be the strain of silver in my inbred little flock, but...

 

[Miami Leghorn]

These are not about Duckwing colors but nevertheless they are about genetics and colors...

https://briarwoodpoultry.weebly.com/poultry-colour-genetic-info.html

https://poultrykeeper.com/poultry-breeding/the-lavender-gene/