Iowa Blues - Breed thread and discussion

[IowaBlueCurt]

Candy,

That chick of yours does look like a charcoal, again like Kari mentioned, don't know how that happened.......that's been one of the funnest and at the same time most frustrating thing about the Iowa Blues. New variations seem to happen that cause us all to go, "huh, how'd that happend?". Then back to the drawing board and working the brain to figure out what is going on genetically.

Great times!

 

[WVDan44]

The problem is, Candy, I can't think how you would have hatched a Charcoal chick from the birds Jake raised out of the birds I had at the time.

uh oh, the pheasant strikes again!

 

[Candy442]

uh oh, the pheasant strikes again!

LOL Dan, well I know we have wild turkey around here, but I have yet to see a pheasant

. I am liking the way this one is feathering out though...I was reading this thread from the beginning when everyone was excited to hatch a lot of birds in the early 2013. It would have been nice to be a part of that excitement! I saw many photos of chicks plus a lot of great genetics discussions so that helps to review as it seemed there were some solids that burst into patterns or changed a lot by the time they were adults.

I think Kari will be able to assist us in determining what has made up our particular group as these are directly from her line. If we get a lot of these very dark brown solid black looking chicks that all of a sudden pop the laced feathers, I will definitely need everyone's help! Does anyone want to see any specific pictures of the older birds? The smokey pair that we hatched are looking a lot like Kari's birds in the photos she recently posted above. I like them too, but ours have dark eyes and more willow legs. The Delaware/Iowa crosses (we have one of each of those we think

!) look exactly like them except they have more yellow legs. The cockerel of the cross is feathering out very pretty and already getting a little red comb

I just found it funny we did not get any silvers out of the seven eggs but majority of smokey. The two black ones I thought were birchen were solid color, except flap did have that funny greenish yellow fluff and now a bib of lighter fluff. So far Flap has not popped the patterned feathers and has remained solid overall where (we are calling her/him Nat or Natalie) the mystery chick is patterning up very nice so far and has a great shape right now.

 

[WVDan44]

Would you please re-post the baby photos again of the solid color chicks. I've never seen one myself.

 

[Candy442]

Would you please re-post the baby photos again of the solid color chicks. I've never seen one myself.

Here is a top shot of when they were 2 days out of the brooder. Both were solid dark brown/almost black color:

"Flap"
One week old:





"Mystery Iowa" named "Nat"

One week old:




Now as "she" is at 1 month:


There has been little change in Flap's coloring, no barring or patterns like "Nat" has now. But Nat was all dark chick fluff and one week old the patterned feathers started. This one is out of our Silver cockerel over our three Iowa hens, not sure which egg either the silver girl or one of our birchens. Here is a group photo of them

 

[karimw]

I'm not sure I can help you, Candy. I can see different things in your collection that I have produced here. I can only suggest the birchen pullets Jake raised must have been hiding some genes unique to them. I haven't hatched any chicks out of the birchens of that generation my self, so I haven't seen it. They are all running with the flock with mothers and grandmothers. I also think your rooster could be a Smokey, which would account for all the yellow chicks

I can not account for that odd pullet you have though. Do you have another picture of her? What color are her legs? Jake said she was a Delaware? She doesn't look like it, but then those particular delawares are not an established lne. I know the woman he got them from recreated them "from scratch" Even though she looks like an Iowa Blue, she doesn't look like any I have raised, but more like the Sandhill line. Delawares do share some common genes with Iowa blues, including Columbian I think, and that might have an interesting effect on the Iowa Blues. Something similar to what I am finding in the Sandhill birds I hatched. This is also why I still have the Dellie roo I got from Jake. I might try out the cross and see what happens. Curt might have some ideas on that. Now don't misunderstand me, I am just guessing here. I can't know for sure what happened with Jake's flock.

 

[Candy442]

I'm not sure I can help you, Candy. I can see different things in your collection that I have produced here. I can only suggest the birchen pullets Jake raised must have been hiding some genes unique to them. I haven't hatched any chicks out of the birchens of that generation my self, so I haven't seen it. They are all running with the flock with mothers and grandmothers. I also think your rooster could be a Smokey, which would account for all the yellow chicks

I can not account for that odd pullet you have though. Do you have another picture of her? What color are her legs? Jake said she was a Delaware? She doesn't look like it, but then those particular delawares are not an established lne. I know the woman he got them from recreated them "from scratch" Even though she looks like an Iowa Blue, she doesn't look like any I have raised, but more like the Sandhill line. Delawares do share some common genes with Iowa blues, including Columbian I think, and that might have an interesting effect on the Iowa Blues. Something similar to what I am finding in the Sandhill birds I hatched. This is also why I still have the Dellie roo I got from Jake. I might try out the cross and see what happens. Curt might have some ideas on that. Now don't misunderstand me, I am just guessing here. I can't know for sure what happened with Jake's flock.

That's ok Kari. I think Jake feels Sweetie is a Delaware because he hatched some of them with the Iowa's and felt none of the Iowa's hatched. He was not very clear on the story, but he was darn sure Sweetie was a Delaware. She has slate legs and all the coloring/markings of a Iowa. Now whether she is silver is the question. She is starting to have very very slight beige in some of her wing feathers. Like I said, it could be just dirt? Not sure until the summer and maybe after she does a full molt. The other two are birchen. I have posted photos of Gandalf, who I thought was a silver cockerel, Jake called him a "birchen" when he gave the final three to us. Of the photo I posted of chicks in the green tub, the ones with the light grey back stripe are the DelaIowas, they look very similar to the smokeys except they have grey in between the back stripes or just grey stripes with yellow in between. We hatched other eggs from our EEs and RSL in that photo, just the four smokey and two solids in the middle are the Iowa's we hatched. The DIS Iowa was a smokey as well.

Here is the pictures of Sweetie, most recent:








Our cockerel:

 

[WVDan44]

do not discount the possibility that the mystery chick is a genetic throw back. It looks more "blue" than any I've seen. It will remain a mystery until further grown I suppose. Oh what fun, eh?

 

[karimw]

Gandalf is definitely not Birchen because of the white wings. Part of the problem is Jake never posted pictures, so we didn't get to see them as chicks

Anyway, she is lovely and I agree she could be a unique combination. I didn't discover the smokey color in y flock until the 6th generation. In the grand scheme of things it really only matters what they look like when they grow up and how they act. If you want to sell chicks eggs or chicks, you'll want to isolate what you have so you can predict the outcome. In the meantime, it wlil be a great deal of fun watching the babies grow up!

 

[Candy442]

Gandalf is definitely not Birchen because of the white wings. Part of the problem is Jake never posted pictures, so we didn't get to see them as chicks

Anyway, she is lovely and I agree she could be a unique combination. I didn't discover the smokey color in y flock until the 6th generation. In the grand scheme of things it really only matters what they look like when they grow up and how they act. If you want to sell chicks eggs or chicks, you'll want to isolate what you have so you can predict the outcome. In the meantime, it wlil be a great deal of fun watching the babies grow up!

I think so too, Kari The only reason why I thought we should try to pinpoint is if we continue to hatch these dark chicks that pop patterned feathers. I have to tell you, the smokey little cockerel is developing very light gray breast feathers too!! Now I am not sure how true to color the original photo on the website is, but the rooster pictured has what looks to be light grey breast feathers?
It is very exciting to see this smokey boy I have with his bluish feathers coming in on his breast. With him and the "mystery" Iowa Natalie they both should develop into beauties even if they are not true to standard. I am happy with my birds but really am documenting in case we wish to follow the genetics. If my birds do have throwbacks to Sandhill, then maybe we beat some sort of odds and two popped out from their ancestors

.

Would you all think it would be good to order some of the Sandhill Iowa's for my flock? I still plan on rolling breeding these four for awhile and introduce some new stock next year. However, if for some odd reason I get charcoals out of these four, I would be very happy to work with them or work with you all by donating birds for your flocks if you would like?

I would like to get a silver cockerel somewhere, but I am thinking I have more "smokey" in the birds and maybe no silvers at all...Jake did not take photos of the babies. These are the direct hatches from an order from Kari, so I know they have not been bred to any other birds.