Embden goose genetics---again

[shelleyd2008]

I say 'again', but it has been quite a while since these birds had me stumped.

Background: 4 years ago, I had 4 Embden ganders and 1 Embden goose. The 4 ganders were supposed to be 2 pair--each 'pair' coming from a different source. I also had a gray toulouse gander, but re-homed him in May of '11. I kept several babies that year and sold the ones that were obviously mixed (random gray or black feathers throughout the body rather than just on the wings/rump). I also sold 2 of the 4 ganders--I believe it was 1 from each source. I also purchased 2 female goslings from another farm.

I don't normally keep many goslings from them. Last year, I kept 3, 1 the year before, and 3 the year before. Currently, I have 13 geese, having lost 3 females and selling 1 male this year. Unless I kept more babies from previous years, I apparently kept 5 of the babies from 4 years ago.

My genetics question is this: I have white geese with blue eyes. ALL of them are white with blue eyes. The goslings are auto-sexing, meaning they can be sexed at hatch by their color (darker females, lighter males). The issue I'm having is I occasionally get some pure gray goslings from my geese--and they are always female. I sold some goslings to a friend in VA this year and 2 of his females are solid gray. I also sold some to another friend in FL and I suspect one of hers will also be solid gray. 2 years ago, I sold some to a local friend and both of her females ended up being solid gray.

So I guess I don't really know what my question is, other than how am I getting solid gray goslings from solid white-with-blue-eyed parents?

 

[Miss Lydia]

I say 'again', but it has been quite a while since these birds had me stumped.

Background: 4 years ago, I had 4 Embden ganders and 1 Embden goose. The 4 ganders were supposed to be 2 pair--each 'pair' coming from a different source. I also had a gray toulouse gander, but re-homed him in May of '11. I kept several babies that year and sold the ones that were obviously mixed (random gray or black feathers throughout the body rather than just on the wings/rump). I also sold 2 of the 4 ganders--I believe it was 1 from each source. I also purchased 2 female goslings from another farm.

I don't normally keep many goslings from them. Last year, I kept 3, 1 the year before, and 3 the year before. Currently, I have 13 geese, having lost 3 females and selling 1 male this year. Unless I kept more babies from previous years, I apparently kept 5 of the babies from 4 years ago.

My genetics question is this: I have white geese with blue eyes. ALL of them are white with blue eyes. The goslings are auto-sexing, meaning they can be sexed at hatch by their color (darker females, lighter males). The issue I'm having is I occasionally get some pure gray goslings from my geese--and they are always female. I sold some goslings to a friend in VA this year and 2 of his females are solid gray. I also sold some to another friend in FL and I suspect one of hers will also be solid gray. 2 years ago, I sold some to a local friend and both of her females ended up being solid gray.

So I guess I don't really know what my question is, other than how am I getting solid gray goslings from solid white-with-blue-eyed parents?

Seems like maybe somewhere in the family line there was another breed that got mingled in? just a guess but to be pure Embden they need to be solid white with blue eyes, so seems great great grandaddy may have had a girl friend on the side?? Joking of course it would be interesting to know how this is happening though.

 

[shelleyd2008]

It has me stumped because all of my geese are solid white with blue eyes. The females usually have some gray on them for their first year--usually on the flight feathers, but they always lose it. I'm thinking it has to be one (or more) ganders that is passing the gray? My adult females wouldn't have it without showing it, yes? I don't know how to 'get rid of' the gray color gene, other than weighing all the ganders and only keeping the biggest ones? That might weed out any that are possibly a mix of different breed, such as Pilgrim, but no guarantees. I didn't get any gray ones last year but I also didn't hatch many of them either. I mostly let them set their own eggs and they didn't do such a great job with that, so I took most all of the eggs this year.

 

[Miss Lydia]

It has me stumped because all of my geese are solid white with blue eyes. The females usually have some gray on them for their first year--usually on the flight feathers, but they always lose it. I'm thinking it has to be one (or more) ganders that is passing the gray? My adult females wouldn't have it without showing it, yes? I don't know how to 'get rid of' the gray color gene, other than weighing all the ganders and only keeping the biggest ones? That might weed out any that are possibly a mix of different breed, such as Pilgrim, but no guarantees. I didn't get any gray ones last year but I also didn't hatch many of them either. I mostly let them set their own eggs and they didn't do such a great job with that, so I took most all of the eggs this year.

Well if you figure it out let us know. I only have 1 Embden and a gander so far he hasn't had any off spring but then again it wouldn't matter since my other geese are Buff and Toulouse.