I'll be posting pics later but I have a chick from my New Year's Day Hatch that doesn't have but just a few feathers.
I don't dare take it out of the brooder with the lamp for fear it will die from the cold. All of it's 4.5 week old hatchmates are almost fully feathered at this point.
It has maybe five or six underdeveloped primary wing feathers but that's it.
It was born with 'chocolate' looking baby fuzz but that's soon disappearing.
I've seen pics of NAKED chickens before, but now I'm wondering if they too are born with normal looking baby fluff, but then the feathers never develop?
If this is a recessive genetic defect, might I cross it with a "cornish X" and then take a resultant rooster and put it back over it's mother (assuming it's a pullet) to get 50% naked chicks?..... And I could also take the resultant pullets and cross them with a resultant roo to get somewhere between 25% & 50% naked offspring? I'm thinking this might be a good thing for chickens in Phoenix as long as I can keep them out of the Sun. Processing would be a breeze without plucking to do...
.... but I'd have to install some low roosts because they wouldn't be able to "fly up" to the normal ones.
It seems as if there was someone else here on BYC who had some naked chickens... does anyone know who that was?
Like I said, after church I'm going to bring it in with it's brooder buddy ( a SFH with curled toes) and take pics so you can see how many feathers it SHOULD have.
Any info anyone can give me about this genetic defect would be appreciated.
I don't dare take it out of the brooder with the lamp for fear it will die from the cold. All of it's 4.5 week old hatchmates are almost fully feathered at this point.
It has maybe five or six underdeveloped primary wing feathers but that's it.
It was born with 'chocolate' looking baby fuzz but that's soon disappearing.
I've seen pics of NAKED chickens before, but now I'm wondering if they too are born with normal looking baby fluff, but then the feathers never develop?
If this is a recessive genetic defect, might I cross it with a "cornish X" and then take a resultant rooster and put it back over it's mother (assuming it's a pullet) to get 50% naked chicks?..... And I could also take the resultant pullets and cross them with a resultant roo to get somewhere between 25% & 50% naked offspring? I'm thinking this might be a good thing for chickens in Phoenix as long as I can keep them out of the Sun. Processing would be a breeze without plucking to do...
.... but I'd have to install some low roosts because they wouldn't be able to "fly up" to the normal ones.
It seems as if there was someone else here on BYC who had some naked chickens... does anyone know who that was?
Like I said, after church I'm going to bring it in with it's brooder buddy ( a SFH with curled toes) and take pics so you can see how many feathers it SHOULD have.
Any info anyone can give me about this genetic defect would be appreciated.
