Genetics of Spangled Orloffs?

[Sicilianu]

I’m also seeing photos of baby spangled orloff chicks- some of which look wheaten and some that look wildtype/partridge based. I’m guessing different lines might have one or the other?

 

[Amer]

I’m also seeing photos of baby spangled orloff chicks- some of which look wheaten and some that look wildtype/partridge based. I’m guessing different lines might have one or the other?

View attachment 2033545View attachment 2033546View attachment 2033547

Strange! I've never seen duckwing based Orloff chicks before.

 

[flowerfaeiry]

I’ve been looking online and it seems like many pics have a black breast:

View attachment 2033541

but every once in a while I see one with a red breasts. Could this be a result of crosses with the “mahogany” orloff variety?:

View attachment 2033542

The breed standard, according to the Russian Orloff Society of USA and Canada, calls for the rooster’s breast to be black with white tips. Perhaps the UK allows for red breast.

The chicks can hatch light or dark, but I see mostly lighter colored down.

 

[Gray Farms]

Boy was I wrong lol. When you see birds every say you can forget some specific details I reckin. They are black tipped with white. Some of my males.

 

[flowerfaeiry]

 

[Sicilianu]

So based on what I've seen, it seems like most Spangled Orloffs (of the correct coloration- black-breasted males) are eb or eWh (partridge or Wheaten-based) with mo (mottling) and Mh (Mahogany).

I was thinking e+ (duckwing/wildtype) was a possibility as well based on chick down color but I think it might be eb (partridge) because e+ would make salmon-breasted females and they definitely are not.

The thing I still don't understand is how a (proposed) eb-based female without Co (columbian) or Db (dark brown) has such a homogeneous base color.

 

[Sicilianu]

Hatched some eggs from seller appylover20nmc on eBay in May. Here are pictures of the breeder's parent stock:

Here are the ones that hatched!

Most of them seem wheaten-based but there is one which seems to be partridge-based and a couple that have faint dark markings on their back (maybe eWh/eb split?)

Here is the partridge-looking one:

Here are a couple of the wheaten-looking ones:

One thing I noticed was that the partridge-looking chick as well as another that had partial stripes seemed to have less white splotchiness at the 5 to 8 week stage and were overall more red. Not sure if this translates to differing amount of mottling in adulthood or not. Also the red at this age seems more stippled with black on the partridge-looking chick whereas the wheaten-looking chicks have more fully-red feathers without stippling (or at least a lot less).

 

[Sicilianu]

It's also interesting to browse this Russian thread (google translate if you would like). The chicks seem like they are both wheaten and partridge-based depending on the person posting. Lots of great photos of Orloffs on there. Also I notice that some of the Spangled Orloff roosters have red-based chests (not black) which means they have Db or Co in the mix as well. I honestly like some of those better than the black-chested ones.

Here is the website: https://fermer.ru/forum/ptitsevodstvo/kury/porody-i-krossy-kur/182772?page=9

 

[Sicilianu]

It's also interesting to browse this Russian thread (google translate if you would like). The chicks seem like they are both wheaten and partridge-based depending on the person posting. Lots of great photos of Orloffs on there. Also I notice that some of the Spangled Orloff roosters have red-based chests (not black) which means they have Db or Co in the mix as well. I honestly like some of those better than the black-chested ones.

Here is the website: https://fermer.ru/forum/ptitsevodstvo/kury/porody-i-krossy-kur/182772?page=9

Here is a photo of a red-based rooster from that website: