Genetic questions!

[Amer]

Isn't it true that when different genetics are crossed there's a chance if creating something entirely new? Genetic recombination and all?

No
Mutations are totally random so they could happen whether crossing or inbreeding.
Also just so you all know Rr means the rose comb gene. I've been trying to ignore it but I can't anymore.

 

[NatJ]

Isn't it true that when different genetics are crossed there's a chance if creating something entirely new? Genetic recombination and all?

Yes and no.

A case where you get something that seems entirely new:
Rooster, Rhode Island Red or New Hampshire (red with a black tail)
Hen, Barred Rock (black with white barring)

Chicks: Black Sexlinks, where sons are black with white barring and daughters are black with no white barring.
So you get some solid black chickens out of that mix, a color that was not seen in either parent.

Black Sexlink x Black Sexlink, you get chicks in lots of colors:
--solid black (Black)
--black with white barring (Barred)
--red with black tail & black hackles (Red Columbian)
--red with black tail and white barring (Barred Red Columbian)
--white with black tail (Silver Columbian)
--white with black tail and white barring (Barred Silver Columbian)

That is actually how the Delaware breed was developed. Someone picked out the chicks that were Barred Silver Columbian and worked with them to develope an actual breed.

This looked like something entirely new, but genetically it makes sense. The Delawares have the basic pattern that you see in Rhode Island Reds or New Hampshires (black tail and some black in the hackle feathers). The red is replaced by Silver, which came from the Barred Rock ancestor (you don't see it in the actual Barred Rocks because the black and the white barring are covering all the areas that would otherwise show silver.) And of course the white barring comes from the Barred Rock.

That kind of re-arrangement can be fairly common, where it looks like you have something entirely new, but it can be explained by the genes that we already know about.


But if "entirely new" means a new mutation that has never been seen before, that causes effects that have never been seen before, it is equally likely in purebreds and in mixed breeds. Mutations do happen, but they aren't very common. When they do happen, of course people deliberately breed the ones they find attractive. A fairly recent example is the chocolate gene (sex-linked recessive gene, turns black into dark brown.) From what I can find online, that gene was first discovered in the early 1990s. Since then, people have been busy developing chocolate varieties of one breed after another. But new mutations like that are quite rare, and crossing breeds does not make them any more likely than if you were breeding purebreds.

 

[Gigachad poultry]

No
Mutations are totally random so they could happen whether crossing or inbreeding.

Fascinating! So at any point their could be some rando mutation? Can you increase the chances somehow?

Also just so you all know Rr means the rose comb gene. I've been trying to ignore it but I can't anymore.

I was wondering about that

 

[Gigachad poultry]

Soooo... What genetics might this hen have? She's a 3rd generation mix breed but her past generations had breeds Legbar, Amrock, Buff Piemonte, Rhode Island Red, and a few others

 

[Amer]

Fascinating! So at any point their could be some rando mutation? Can you increase the chances somehow?

Yes there could and I've seen many de novo mutations in the wild, but in plants only.
You can increase the chances with mutagens but that's not something you want to do because harmful mutations are a lot more common than harmless color mutations. But a lot of times they induce mutations in the lab using x-rays... A lot of mouse colors have origins in the lab.

Soooo... What genetics might this hen have? She's a 3rd generation mix breed but her past generations had breeds Legbar, Amrock, Buff Piemonte, Rhode Island Red, and a few others
View attachment 4131112

I had a hen just like that and I know what she was because she was a cross between a Wheaten Ameraucana and Welsummer.
My hen was e+/e^WhMh/mh+ and yours probably is too.

 

[Gigachad poultry]

Yes there could and I've seen many de novo mutations in the wild, but in plants only.
You can increase the chances with mutagens but that's not something you want to do because harmful mutations are a lot more common than harmless color mutations. But a lot of times they induce mutations in the lab using x-rays... A lot of mouse colors have origins in the lab.

That's so cool! I've been studying how to introduce new genetic mutations on tissue cultured Monstera Deliciosas!

I had a hen just like that and I know what she was because she was a cross between a Wheaten Ameraucana and Welsummer.
My hen was e+/e^WhMh/mh+ and yours probably is too.

Interesting!!! So would there be Duckwing?

 

[Gigachad poultry]

Soooo... What genetics might this hen have? She's a 3rd generation mix breed but her past generations had breeds Legbar, Amrock, Buff Piemonte, Rhode Island Red, and a few others
View attachment 4131112

She's the mother to roughly 85% of all the babies

 

[Amer]

That's so cool! I've been studying how to introduce new genetic mutations on tissue cultured Monstera Deliciosas!

Interesting!!! So would there be Duckwing?

Oooh! How do you do that?
Yeah
e+ means duckwing, e^Wh means wheaten, Mh means Mahogany...