Genetics for dummies?!

[Siler]

I came upon this thread in a search on genetics for dummies. Many good links which will keep me busy with study for quite some time.

 

[soulsong]

I have a slight mystery (to me anyway lol)
I will state that I only kow the colors of the parents and know nothing of the grandparents colors.
I have a Buff bantam Cochin Roo that I bred to White Bantam cochin Hens.
I just hatched out 4 (with 4 more in the hatcher due today)
and I have 3 blues (of varying shades - one is very silvery the others are darker) and one yellow chick.
I have been looking at the various links on color genetics and oh my god...huh??
So I thought I would post here and see if anyone could possibly explain this so I can understand it.
Who is hiding the blue gene?


I will post the chicks once I get them uploaded.
THANKS!!!

 

[soulsong]

the chicks

the lightest one

 

[Sonoran Silkies]

Well, it could be either, as neither of the parents show any black pigment, but my guess is Mama White.

 

[Doug the Chicken Man]

If you want more on D'Uccle Genetics below you will find the page for that. Again it has some interesting info.

https://www.backyardchickens.com/forum/viewtopic.php?id=331764

 

[HenThymes]

We experimented with some eggs from our Orpingtons earlier this year and got the same result. We had a white rooster over a buff hen both from good stock. Some chicks had bluish down and one was yellow. All resulted in various shades of the picture below except one pullet who is now 99.9% white with just one or two feathers that have a dark color to them. When they feathered white seem to be the dominant color, somewhere in the background there must have been a dark bird behind the white or the buff resulting a blue/gray color?? You can see that he also has a hint of buff expressing in his wings and one or two on his back.

 

[soulsong]

Thanks everyone!
I looked at that thread link Doug posted and the post #6 by turtlefeathers helped clear up some of my confusion.
Color and Pattern are two different genes!
So it behooves me to ask, after thinking about this all afternoon,
can we make a chart that helps us "dummies" figure this out just a tad better?
example:

Colors:
Buff
Black
Blue
White
Splash
Red

Patterns:
mille fluer
mottled
?

and maybe have one of the geneticists on here tell us which are recessive, dominant, color blockers, diluters, and even if say: Buff is dominant over blue but is recessive to black. And make it semi easier for those of us not able to keep up with all the e- alleles and loci scientific terms that boggle the mind.

anyway just an idea ....

Thanks again everyone!!

 

[Sonoran Silkies]

Quote:
The only colours are red and black.

Then there are genes that dilute one or both, or enhance one or both.

There are also genes that "move" pigment from it's normal area of the body or within the feather.

All of these genes work together to create the different varieties.

A gene is never dominant over a different gene, only over various alternatives of the same gene.

I don't know of any way to make it simpler; you can look at the Chicken Calculator or read Genetics of Chicken Colours, but those are the simplest I can think of as far as explanations go. You don't have to learn it all at once. Take a step or two, hold on for awhile as you get comfortable and more confident, then take another step.

 

[PremierSilkies]

For once I understand, lol Where do I find this book?
Thanks
Connie



Quote:
The only colours are red and black.

Then there are genes that dilute one or both, or enhance one or both.

There are also genes that "move" pigment from it's normal area of the body or within the feather.

All of these genes work together to create the different varieties.

A gene is never dominant over a different gene, only over various alternatives of the same gene.

I don't know of any way to make it simpler; you can look at the Chicken Calculator or read Genetics of Chicken Colours, but those are the simplest I can think of as far as explanations go. You don't have to learn it all at once. Take a step or two, hold on for awhile as you get comfortable and more confident, then take another step.

 

[TurtleFeathers]

Quote:
The only colours are red and black.

Then there are genes that dilute one or both, or enhance one or both.

There are also genes that "move" pigment from it's normal area of the body or within the feather.

All of these genes work together to create the different varieties.

A gene is never dominant over a different gene, only over various alternatives of the same gene.

I don't know of any way to make it simpler; you can look at the Chicken Calculator or read Genetics of Chicken Colours, but those are the simplest I can think of as far as explanations go. You don't have to learn it all at once. Take a step or two, hold on for awhile as you get comfortable and more confident, then take another step.

Soulsong - Sonoran is right. Poultry genetics are just WAY more information than any one person can put into one simple chart. I've only been doing this a couple years, and I don't think I've so much as scratched the surface with the little bit that I've learned - the possibilities seem almost endless, and I really believe a chart like that could go on forever!!! It seems that as things stand right now, the only way to learn what you're asking is to research, research, research.

Henk did the best online "chart" that I'm aware of so far with his Chicken Calculator (http://kippenjungle.nl/kruising.html), which even has pictures in a drop down menu for ease of use. If you play with it a while, you will learn that you can tweak it a bit to suit your needs (example: for a blue mille fleur, click on the pic of the mille fleur, which will give you the genetic "recipe" for MF, and then go down and change the blue gene to "Bl/bl+ blue andalusian" to add that ingredient).

But learning to use the calculator requires some research, too. You need to know what gene combinations give the recipes behind the mixed varieties - maybe THAT is the type of chart we need in a sticky, like:

Crele = black breasted red + barring
Gold neck = mille fleur + dominant white *OR* mille fleur + splash
Porcelain = mille fleur + lavender
Isabel = lavender + buff

etc., etc., etc...

That could be pretty lengthy, too, I suppose, because sometimes its not that easy. But personally, the basics of that is the type of thing would have helped me out tremendously in the beginning - when I'd ask a question about a certain color/variety, and the answer was given in "genetic code", or when it spoke of alleles and loci, or when it just pointed me in the direction of the calculator with no explanation on how to use it, it just confused me further. I mean, I appreciated the effort behind the answers I received, but I think what I really needed was just quick recipe for the variety in question, and to learn how to tweak the calculator to include all the ingredients I needed in order to get the desired results. I see the same thing quite often here on BYC, and I would imagine many others feel like I did in the beginning. And *I* wasn't a total noob to avian genetics when I got into poultry - I already understood a bit of "what to what equals what", but couldn't tell you the why's and where's of how it all related to poultry - so as confused as *I* was (and sometimes STILL am), I can't imagine how other people feel when they don't have the advantage I had when I started.