Is this a Buff? Also what will this other baby look like?

Goosebaby

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Nov 10, 2019
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It looks like a Buff, I’ve had enough Buff geese to recognize one but the mere existence of this baby blows my mind and changes what I thought about the parentage of one of my ganders so I need someone else to tell me if this is a Buff or I’m not sure I can completly believe it. (First pic)

I think it’s female but I’m new to sexing goslings so who knows.

The backstory is that I started with two American Buffs from McMurray hatchery, my Buff gander Ferdinand died so we got two French Toulouse from Metzer to keep Izzy “my Buff” company.
The difference between Toulouse and French Toulouse is that Metzer imported their French Toulouse and the stock tend to not be exhibition quality compared to American Toulouse because they sometimes have white or dark feathers “at least that’s what I’ve heard.”

Leo my French Toulouse had a number of goslings with our other French Toulouse Lavender who had white wing tips.” Two of those goslings are Parsnip and Thor. Thor inherited a white wingtip from his mom so it was obvious he was Lavender’s son, and Parsnip looks so much like Thor “other than the wing tip” and has a heavy build so I assumed they were full brothers.
Leo only had one gosling “Darby” with our Buff Izzy.

Four goslings were just hatched out of eggs from my newest female geese Apricot “female American Buff” and Delphi “Classic Roman.” Both also came from Metzer. They have had no contact with any ganders but Leo and Parsnip throughout their lives.

From what little I understand of color genetics both parents have to carry the recessive gene responsible for Buff so I can’t think of any reason this gosling could be Buff unless Parsnip is the dad and he is actually Izzy’s son.
Parsnip has liver damage so I’m surprised that he is able to have goslings, he still gets frisky in the pool with the girls but I figured it was just wishful thinking that he could be a dad.


This second gosling is I’m pretty sure is Delphi’s baby. I don’t know if Parsnip or Leo is the dad.
I think it’s another girl but I may be wrong.
She is smaller than the others, “she came from a small egg” has almost black down, her yellow is more extreme than the babies that look like Toulouse, she has orange tipped feet and her jaw is half yellow, she also has tipped wings, I’m guessing those will be white?
Honestly I have no idea what she'll look like as an adult, does anyone else have any ideas? I don’t know enough about color genetics to know what happens when you cross a white female with a grey male, or with a grey male that’s possibly half buff?
 

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I cannot tell a buff goose from any other one, so I cannot help you there. But thinking about genetics I can do :)

From what little I understand of color genetics both parents have to carry the recessive gene responsible for Buff so I can’t think of any reason this gosling could be Buff unless Parsnip is the dad and he is actually Izzy’s son.

Using this as my source:
https://www.backyardchickens.com/threads/our-guide-to-colour-and-pattern-genetics-in-geese.561779/

It has the following list of genes:
Dilution Gene coded Sd (partially dominant sex linked gene)
Spotting Gene coded Sp (recessive sex linked gene)
Blue Gene coded Bl (partially dominant gene)
Buff Gene coded G (recessive sex linked gene)

All of the genes above are sex linked except the Blue gene. This means the genes for dilution, spotting and buff are all carried by the Z chromosome and the Blue gene is carried independently of the sex chromosomes.

So it looks like there are only four (known) genes to figure out.

Buff is both sexlinked and recessive.
So for a male to be buff, yes he must get it from both parents.
A female gets it only from her father.
Either way does require that your male have the gene.

Maybe Leo had the buff gene? Although you'd probably have noticed by now if he was producing buff daughters. Otherwise, I think you are right that Parsnip must be both Izzy's son and the gosling's father.

I don’t know enough about color genetics to know what happens when you cross a white female with a grey male, or with a grey male that’s possibly half buff?

Daughters get their Z chromosome only from their father. If he's gray, they can be gray. If he carries spotting or buff, his daughters could be one (or both) of those. (If he was dilute he would not look properly gray, so he doesn't have that.)

Sons get one Z chromosome from their father and one from their mother.
The white mother has both spotting and dilution on her Z chromosome, so the sons should be dilute (like a Pilgrim female). They will not show spotting unless the father also passed on the spotting gene (which he probably does not have). The white mother could also have the buff gene (hidden by the white), in which case her sons could be buff if they also inherited the buff gene from their father.

The only other gene I'm seeing listed is blue. It could exist in a white female and be invisible, but none of your other geese should be able to hide it. So if you start seeing blue goslings (either gender), then suspect your white goose.
 
I cannot tell a buff goose from any other one, so I cannot help you there. But thinking about genetics I can do :)



Using this as my source:
https://www.backyardchickens.com/threads/our-guide-to-colour-and-pattern-genetics-in-geese.561779/

It has the following list of genes:


So it looks like there are only four (known) genes to figure out.

Buff is both sexlinked and recessive.
So for a male to be buff, yes he must get it from both parents.
A female gets it only from her father.
Either way does require that your male have the gene.

Maybe Leo had the buff gene? Although you'd probably have noticed by now if he was producing buff daughters. Otherwise, I think you are right that Parsnip must be both Izzy's son and the gosling's father.



Daughters get their Z chromosome only from their father. If he's gray, they can be gray. If he carries spotting or buff, his daughters could be one (or both) of those. (If he was dilute he would not look properly gray, so he doesn't have that.)

Sons get one Z chromosome from their father and one from their mother.
The white mother has both spotting and dilution on her Z chromosome, so the sons should be dilute (like a Pilgrim female). They will not show spotting unless the father also passed on the spotting gene (which he probably does not have). The white mother could also have the buff gene (hidden by the white), in which case her sons could be buff if they also inherited the buff gene from their father.

The only other gene I'm seeing listed is blue. It could exist in a white female and be invisible, but none of your other geese should be able to hide it. So if you start seeing blue goslings (either gender), then suspect your white goose.
Thank you!!
 
Update:

Dandelion, the yellow baby appears to have blue eyes.
So that says he is a he, he is not a Buff, and he is Delphi’s baby “Classic Roman” and not Apricot’s “my Buff.”

Now from what I understand for him to be the way he is he has to have a dad who caries Dillution, but as of yet I have no guesses as to wether that is Parsnip or Leo.

This also puts to question again who Parsnip’s mom really is?

I’m going to start looking around to see if there are labs that test for color genetics in birds because this is a fascinating conundrum.

Here’s a picture of Leo “naughtily poking the car,” Parsnip, and Delphi.
 

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Update: As it turns out Dandelion is Buff like I thought originally....but Dandelion does have blue eyes for sure which adds some more confusion.
 

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