Help Identify Mystery Marans Chick - UPDATED PHOTOS 11/11/09 Post #65

[tadkerson]

I have had a chick that looked like this-

and the bird feathered out like this-

I have been working with a marans breeder and I have been observing some of the phenotypes and possible genotypes.

The bird in the picture could turn black and look similar to a black copper. The bird could be birchen and wheaten. And like Krys said carry a pattern gene.

Tim

 

[Krys109uk]

Sorry to be a pain.....but I really doubt the OP's pic could be birchen (ER)& wheaten (eWh). I hatched masses of ER/eWh from my Marans messes this year but none have ever looked like brown (eb) down. Mine feathered up in a variety of ways but the chick down was reasonably consistently black or brown as often as not with a bit of colour on the face. Some had grey ventral down.

 

[cracking up]

I had the eact same problem and the seller said they must have grabbed a partridge penedesenca egg by mistake. my other chicks look just like yours too. Wonder if I had the same seller?

 

[tadkerson]

The people I have worked with have had wheaten chicks segregate from their black coppers. Birchen is not always dominant over wheaten. Could be brown- the down actually look like it is butter cup. If you take a close look at the down closest to the body of the chick it appears to be black to me. So you have a black down with brown tips on the feathers.



Tim

 

[blackdotte]

The last chick shown has Birchen hatch down, but is lacking some melanisers, consequent black feathering is expectable BUT the yellow legs are a dead give away - it is NOT a Marans.
The first two are Brown based, and no Marans varieties are based on this gene. They are too young to make a definite call on the shank colour but if they are yellow at 12-14 weeks the above comments apply.
Also if they are supposed to be Copper Black Marans, were is the shank/foot feathering?
David

 

[tadkerson]

David,

The Marans breeders are working on the recognition of the breed by the APA (American Poultry Association). The Marans breed in the USA is a work in progress. You will find feather footed and non feather footed birds. The egg color is a big issue and difficult to obtain in new varieties. Until a standard is accepted you will find feather footed and non feather footed varieties. If Marans breeders read this they will add to this string.

Tim

 

[WestKnollAmy]

The chicks remind me of my Barnevelder chicks.

 

[amazondoc]

Let's not get too confused here. The bird in **Tim's** pic has yellow legs, but the chicks in the **OP's** pic do not. I know you basically said that, David -- but I had to read your post three times before I realized what you were saying, so I thought I'd state it again a little more clearly.

There seems to be a lot of Marans running around in the US that lack sufficient melanizing genes. I don't know enough genetics to know what a black copper without melanizers would look like at hatch, but that is one possibility here. (Although I still think they look like Barnevelder chicks. )

But what's this about birchen not always being dominant to wheaten? Huh? Isn't wheaten a simple recessive trait??

 

[Krys109uk]

David was sying the two which look like barnevelders are brown (eb) based there are no marans based on eb. The chick in Tim's photo however, is birchen (ER) based, but lacking in melanisers.

Wheaten isn't a simple recessive. From my experience ER/eWh usually hatch looking more or less like the melanised ER of copper blacks, though I may have spotted a few differences, but, at least in my Marans messes, I can usally tell pretty quickly once they start to feather up & they usually seem to look pretty obviously heterozygous when grown. If ER was completely dominant to eWh I'd expect that one wouldn't be able to spot the heterozygote from the homozygote.
Also under certain circs eWh down will be dominant or incompletely dominant to e+, same with eb. At one time there were thought to be two genes, dominant wheaten (eWh), & recessve wheaten (ey). They were found to be the same gene behaving differently due to the interaction of certain other genes.

 

[amazondoc]

Quote:
If it were easy to tell the difference between pure ER and het for E(Wh), then we wouldn't have such a mess in Marans with so many black coppers throwing wheatens all over the place.

Also under certain circs eWh down will be dominant or incompletely dominant to e+, same with eb. At one time there were thought to be two genes, dominant wheaten (eWh), & recessve wheaten (ey). They were found to be the same gene behaving differently due to the interaction of certain other genes.

Now this is very interesting. Which other genes?​