Golden vs. Red Sex-Links? Sex-links vs. Buff Orps? Questions...

[lildinkem]

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If you are talking about color sex linked, no. The reason you can get sex links by colors is that the hen passed on certain traits to her son and not to her daughters. For example, a hen with a sex linked barred gene will give the barred gene to her sons but not her daughters. If you breed her to a rooster that does not have a barred gene, then the offspring will be sex linked. There are certain restrictions to this since you have to be able to see the barring in the male chicks and there are only certain color combinations that work.

So if "B" represents the dominant barred gene where if the bird has this gene the chick will be barred and "b" represents the recessive not barred gene where the chick will not be barred if it has this. The parent rooster has two genes, bb, so it is not barred. The hen has a single gene B, since it is a sex linked gene in the hen. The hen and rooster both give a gene to the male offspring, so the male chick has Bb. It will be barred since the B for barring is dominant. The female chick will not get a gene from its mother, so it will only get a b gene from the father and it will not be barred.

Now, if you cross the offspring, the Rooster has Bb and the hen has b. The rooster will give half his male offspring a B gene and the other half a b gene. He will also give half his female offspring a B gene and half a b gene. The hen will give a b to her male offspring and nothing to her female offspring since it is a sex linked gene. So half the male offspring will be Bb and barred and half the male offspring will be bb and not barred. Half the female offspring will get a B from the father and nothing from the hen and be barred. Half the female offspring will get a b from the rooster and nothing from the hen, so it will not be barred. The sex link is lost after the first generation.

Different genes are used but the principle is the same to get a red sex link. There the roosters are off-white and the female chicks are red.

Tadkerson does a better job explaining it in the link I gave in the previous post. Hope this helps.

BridgetC, it will be interesting to see what Belt crosses to get their red sex link.

Thank you rirdgerunner. I might need to reread this another time or two to get it all what you said. LOTS of GREAT info. thank you so much.

 

[BridgetC]

Thanks for checking Chickypoo!

I heard back from Belt, they cross a RIR to an RIW for their goldens.... it's tough, as I am new to this, and it is always exciting trying to choose breeds, and predict what your birds might look like.

If I knew that the sex-links I was getting would look like Chickypoo's, I would get all sex-links. But as it is, I am worried about getting a bunch of RIR hens with a few white feathers around their tails. Don't get me wrong, I like RIRs... I just LOVE the lighter buff color of Buff Orps... so Buff Orps it will probably be...

Thanks for all of the cool discussion re: sex-links all!

-Bridget

 

[lildinkem]

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I was the same way when I got into chickens 2 years ago. The one thing I know, you will eventually want a purebred bird. NOT sayin you won't do the sex link birds too. But, it does seem like most everyone eventually gravitates to one breed or another. There are alot of Buff breeds. Look them all over. Go to a show or two, then get a couple of different breeders stock of what ever breed you choose. Then your set for a long go at it. And take em to shows and have a blast. I am talkin myself into Exhibiting for the first time this April. I am not nervous in the least. I know I'll get slaughtered by the Legendary Doug Akers Orps, But, it will still be fun. I know Doug, he knows me, we're friends. And I am sure he'll get a kick of watchin me screw up. BUT, that is how you learn. Find a good mentor to help you in your area. You'll LOVE IT!

 

[Jack Speese]

Hi Bridget,

Tomorrow I'm getting some golden comets from our local field store. I've had buff Orpingtons in the past as well. I understand that there are several ways to produce a "red sex link", in all cases it's with either a Rhode Island Red or Hampshire Red rooster, but the hen can be a Rhode Island White, a Delaware, or a silver-factor (non-dominant white) Plymouth Rock. I believe a silver-laced Wyandotte will also work. In all cases the pullet chicks will have rust-colored down and the cockerel chicks will have yellow down. Depending on the exact cross used, the roosters will be white or mostly white, and the hens will be red or reddish brown with some white feathers. A buff sex link hen usually has some white feathers, especially around the tail, and generally light-colored down as well, whereas a pure Rhode Island Red or Hampshire Red also has reddish down. I think that using a Delaware, you'll get hens that look virtually identical to pure RIRs (or Hampshire Reds), and that's what they call a red sex link. Using one of the other breeds of hens, I think you get reddish brown hens with some white feathers (buff sex link, Golden Comets, Cinnamon Queens, Red Stars, etc.). Also, in breeding commercial golden comets, I think they use special production strains that are lighter in weight and therefore consume less feed than regular strains. A commercial golden comet isn't much heavier than a leghorn, lighter in weight than a regular RIR, Plymouth Rock, etc.
Buff Orpingtons are also very nice chickens, large, gentle, good layers of brown eggs, and will set. Oddly enough, though, the best setting hen I ever had was a black sex link, and I've been raising chickens all my life. And they're not even supposed to set!

 

[draye]

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Try Cackle's Golden Comets, they're big girls. Most of the sexlinks I've seen from Ideal are small leghorn type birds, not these from Cackle.