Jest Another Day in Pear-A-Dice - Higgins Rat Ranch Conservation Farm in Alberta

[Akrnaf2]

You two have my eye's spinning around in squares.
Have a good night the both of you!!
Scott

Sleep well my friend!

 

[CanuckBock]

Heel low:

I understand, I will be very careful before I use your name again.
Thank You for being gracious about it.
Scott

"Make love, not war...have a flower!"...unhinges them EVERY time!

Yup, you know you are a friend and I'd do what you ask.

- Indira Gandhi

You can't shake hands with a clenched fist.

I live in such a different world than most Scott. An example of this was in our faces last night...

- George Bird Evans

I think we are drawn to dogs because they are the uninhibited creatures we might be if we weren't certain we knew better.

Running the dogs, putting the animals away in the barns in the Ram Pasture...Rick is tossing the ball for the girls and I am heading over to shut gates, give the beasties a good night snack and there is a vehicle that pulls up to our front gates and parks. People lost, needing directions, it happens?

Man gets out, says, "Hi, we are from Calgary. May we come in and have a look around?"

Huh? It is eight o'clock at night, Rick and I's supper is in the oven on warm...still got other animals to tuck in, so our dinner, dog's dinner, lunch, some more company book work to complete (my mind is literally dancing with jumbled numbers these days)...AND you and your company want to come inside and "have a look around?"

Huh?

I politely said that we are a biosecure farm and it's nice they want to see the place but NO humans...thank you though. And off they drove.

I remember one husband & wife came for a visit back when we did do tours and they stood at the goose pens (pear-a-dice) for an entire hour. I finally said something because the reality is that a walking "tour" here takes at minimum four hours to circumnavigate the place...at a brisk walking pace and even then there is still stuff never seen. It would take one days to survey. LOL

- Haile Selassie

It is much easier to show compassions to animals. They are never wicked.

We've had persons drive in circles in their vehicle, then come back and ride their bike around the place because circling the place in a car was too fast...Rick and I laughed because the guy that returned on the bike, had to get off his bike and walk because the bike was even too fast to see in here and absorb whatever it is they needed to snoop about? It gets a tad unnerving.

​

Rick's father, who lived in Calgary had a saying, "What the eyes can't see, the mind can't steal." And to ignore that concept is to open yourself up to be robbed. I don't prefer to be a victim eh.

- James Mattis

Be polite, be professional, but have a plant to kill everyone you meet.

Here is an example on how different I live...

OK...buy some office supplies at a city store, I pay cash and get a receipt, put the stuff all in one bag...keep the business stuff separate so I can track it. Some how, some where, overly tired I guess, between the store and the truck, I lose the receipt. GACK!

I put the other items in the truck and say to Rick, "I've lost the cash receipt for these office supplies and I need a receipt for the company's books to claim it! I doubt they can but I will go back and see if the cashier can call up the receipt and reprint it for me."

Boy am I mad at myself for flubbing up...it is going to cost me in time and bother a bunch of persons...I hate that! Butter fingers!

STOP...how do I fix this problem IF the cashier is unable to reprint this receipt?

Instantly before I could even blink...Rick solved the problem. SO HOW?

I went back, line up to see the cashier I paid cash to, but she could not re-print the receipt because they are not authorized to do that. I go to the line for customer service, and the employee there can but has to go upstairs into the main office to retrieve the receipt and re-print...which she does. Here I am bothering persons & wasting time. My flub up has cost 25 minutes of extra time because I lost the receipt...no idea where it got to!

SOOO....what was Rick's suggestion that would have allowed the original cashier to get me a receipt for these items in under five minutes, not bothered others with my error, and on our way we could have been quicker to solve this?

The cashier knows me, easily remembers what I did because I mentioned I was paying cash for these items for the business. I have all the items I just paid cash for in a bag with me...what did Rick tell me to do, instantly figuring out how to solve the problem with less fuss and no muss?

He's my Hero every day because he thinks outside the box...I married the smartest, most handsome, caring, loving, watches my back for me, Man on the planet! Saves my sorry butt all the time!

- Mohandas Gandhi

If I had no sense of humor, I would long ago have committed suicide.

His logic blows my own mind to shreds; his simplicity in solving problems usually floors me! He makes total sense to me in a world that runs on chaos and I have to remember, when I spend too much time here in Pear-A-Dice...MY world is not everyone else's world. I chalk it up to cabin fever but better to call it too much time spent in the sanctuary. I don't have to dog eat dog, keep my defences up, watch what I say or do...steer clear of stepping in the poo (got my own piles here but they are mostly contained!). Time once again soon...to don the Kevlar undies bloomers and slap on the insane grin..."I'm OK, and you?"

- Emily Dickinson

Dogs are better than human beings because they know but do not tell.

All my social skills, mannerisms, methods to function in the outside world get lost and I am like a babe in the woods, out and about and going to get BIT by something predative.

You know those theatre masks we put on to function in the outside world...mines a tad cracked, unused and non-functioning and probably got painted some cammo scheme theme so nobody would see me! Too much time on the Ranch enjoying my own lil' world, eh. September soon, bus meeting this week, time to get your "game face on" or be eaten, swallowed up in the system? Been a GREAT summer break but time to get it together so I can function and be part of the system out there once again...

Bwa ha ha...don't wanna but it is what it is?

- Mohandas Gandhi

The weak can never forgive. Forgiveness is the attribute of the strong.

I forgive persons that are off because I am off. Bad day, bad attitude, grey matter don't function at a higher level. Seems persons that do not understand OR are incapable of higher thought capacities, greet new concepts with nastiness...maybe hoping it just all goes away. Bite it--seems to drive many away. Act like a mad dog and even Ghandi has a violent response!

- Mary Ann Shaffer

People don't know how chickens can turn on you, but they can -- just like mad dogs.

I recall someone once made an observation about Rick and it comes to mind...he says out loud, what everyone is thinking. Not a good social skill but an honest summarization that helps me, make sense of a sometimes illogical and confusing world. That talent (or fault to some) makes my life easier because he calls it as we all see it. Leave it to Rick to be the "P" is silent fella saying what we are all thinking...OUT LOUD and has us laughing (some nervously!). He can use the F-bomb in front of proper little old ladies and even has them laughing hysterically at the situation. And then there are persons that can say a perfectly acceptable word and it cuts to the bone like a knife. He's charming I guess...in the worst way possible. Poison!

He is never unkind and in a way to say to someone, "Yes, you look fat in that outfit." He's plain mean in that he'd hide it and say, "Here's a chocolate covered almond...it clashes with that dress, go put on a different one. I'll wait but hurry up, we're gonna be late!" So you do feel a bit better he caught the fact you're looking like a pup-tent...and you are laughing at his comments.

So the challenge I will leave you with ... what solution did Rick have for solving the missing receipt for a bag full of items, paid cash, cashier will remember me paying $ so we can get on with our day and not waste near a half hour doing it my way...

Doggone & Chicken UP!

Tara Lee Higgins
Higgins Rat Ranch Conservation Farm, Alberta, Canada

 

[CanuckBock]

Heel low:

Tara

I am not familiar with the presentation of c+?

CC - color
Cc-color
cc-white
c+=?

Anoter thing the dispersing level of the melanin is dependent on another gene, the E (extention ) gene.

No worries Benny. My brains (what is left of them over the summer) have gone to utter mush.

The "+" represents wild type, the non-mutation type of expression of the allele--ah but I have managed in my haste to post, gotten the mutated form of the gene switched and for some reasons, cannot edit my post with the MDF hens on it. No matter, mush I say!

I should have said, C"+"/c NOT C/c"+"...ah well, switched and done in haste and tiredness and now I have confused you...I am sorry for doing that! Nothing good comes from hurry hurry, eh!

Not sure what good I am, tired mentally and physically. I always seem to burn the candle at both ends and near end of August...dripping hot candle wax hurts more than usual!

Nothing a little more time sitting, taking photos of my dogs and the growing sheep won't cure.


As usual Benny, you are absolutely quite correct.

The Extension series plays a huge role in expression of eumelanin in poultry. It is what I have called the "soup broth" and when making a genetic soup recipe...beef, fish, chicken, vegetable, pork...the bone broth for the soup changes how all the other mutations and non-mutations are expressed.

Zonal distribution of melanin

Extended Black - E (beef?)
Birchen - ER (fish?)
Duckwing - e"+" (chicken...has to be chicken soup it is wild type!)
Brown - eb (pork)
Wheaten - eWh (vegetable broth?)


The Booted Bantams I have, at first I believed the Mille de Fleur (French translation is "thousands of flowers") colour pattern was based upon ONLY eb as listed in recipes for this colour pattern. Also listed with eWh but a less precise pattern is made on that e-series allele.

MDF is a very mysterious variety (I waited years to get my pick in the birds...nothing practical past plenty of tasty eggs--sets on own eggs, nothing cuter than a poofy momma MDF hen clucking her soul's worth!) and many persons have been afraid in the past to commit to the genetic recipe...for fear of being WRONG!

If one never tries you are never wrong...safe but what fun is there in always being right? I make errors all the time but at least...I AM TRYING MY BEST!! Being human means I apologize alot, but I also get to LEARN MORE and the best way to learn is to solidly plant your FOOT IN YOUR FACE...

So the recipe I got for MDF is:

eb s"+" Db/Db (Co/Co) Pg/Pg Ml/Ml (Mh/Mh) mo/mo
Wheaten recipe is same but with eWh, but no suggestion of Co/Co

Determine what e-series--is it eb Brown?
Look for the grey colour in the down...
the GREY fluff screams at you...eb BROWN!
And NOTE...see the white in the wing primaries?
She is C"+"/c impure for recessive white!!!!!​

I was steadfast the MDF in my Booteds was based upon eb Brown...ah that is until I kept taking photos of the day old chicks.

Dark skinned MDF BOOTEDs -
eb on the left...but what the Hay is on the right???​

Funny there...I had the eb Brown chick down...but there was the Egyptian eye liner staring me full in the face.

eb Brown below and at the top??
NOT the same colour pattern...not eb!!!

The V shaped patch of colour top of head​

Pan of day old Booteds...I get MDF and Whites...skin colour in dark, light and then both.

There...day old Booteds...
far left is eb brown
middle front is eb brown
middle left and middle right ARE e"+" Duckwing!!​

All I had to do was put aside what humans were saying and look at my birds to know the truth....look! The v-shaped patch on head, the egyptain stroke of eyeliner...the non fuzzy expression of more precise markings on chick down. DUCKWING!

I bothered the great Dr. Roy Crawford on this
Why when I bred my MDF Booteds...
Did I get the occasional WHITE birds male and female
WHY???​

The master breeder Gordon Ridler, told me that the oldtimers wanted to see a white sport pop out of their MDF breedings. That the occasional appearance of white Booteds meant they had all the right stuff in their lines. Mr. Ridler used the term "stuff" to cover the term genetics. At his ancient age, why would he have the lingo for genetic inheritance...he had the understanding for genetics, they just called it STUFF.

Mr. Ridler and I, we shared this love of the Booteds in Mille de Fluers--passing at 93 years young...the last type of birds Mr. Ridler kept were his and my beloved BOOTED BANTAMS!

May 28 2012 - Another hen hiding a single dose of recessive white​

Later on, I read Dr. Carefoot's writings that in Partridge AND MDF...one dose of recessive white (c) would cause the top coat to POP in these varieties. You wanted a single dose (supposedly hidden, but in some lines like mine and Dr. Carefoot's, not hidden showing white in primaries of the wing feathers).

Another chicken, this one a male...hiding recessive white​

I was blind because I once again trusted and believed, the recipe give to be chiselled in stone...but to be blind as to what the birds tell me (birds, beasts...they NEVER lie...we humans have only to L00K with true unclouded eyes at what they are saying...SCREAMING at you to SEE the truth and nothing but the truth, so help us God!).

All these hens are hetro for recessive white (C"+"/c)
Bred to the above male or a white male
you are going to get White birds popping out
WHITE SPORTS from coloured birds
​

I love my Booted Bantams...purely an egg layer...not even enough meat and bone to make a soup broth. So for me, pure fun in a genetic sense. Inbred like no tomorrow which screams at me EVER so wrong. I have had the same line of Booteds for decades now without adding new blood...that is WRONG to my science mind...but you cannot shirk the reality that if you have lines that are healthy, pure for good traits...there is not stopping the purity of good to good makes more good. I have not added new blood because I wanted this research to fail miserably. You are NOT suppose to inbreed to this degree...ah but I suppose my failing grace in this line...the fact that the recessive white and the MDF colour patterns, are just enough diversity to keep the lines going.

An experiment I expect to fail, but it has not...which has allowed me at home, to play chicken chicken breeding to degrees I thought unimaginable. Not suppose to do this...laws of inheritance, hybrid vigour...say you should not. But then I think about the fruit fly populations replicated with no new genetics...the lab rats for generations bred on and one with no new blood.

One must keep an open mind...to things that make your hair stand on end...because the creatures...they can NEVER LIE!

This experiment has helped me understand breeding. If you have a line, inbred but with some factors (like white versus MDF colour pattern) that differ...you may play for generations and still have health, longevity, reproduction, etc...that you are told you should not be able to do.

When or if my Booteds can no longer lay eggs to replicate progeny, then I guess my experiment with inbreeding will cease...with extinction of this line. Until then, I continue to play with my chickens. Against my thoughts on sensible outcrosses, adding new blood and inbreeding depression!

I hate and abhor severe inbreeding (line breeding under 6% inbreeding coefficents, seems wise!)...all the literature tells you it is WRONG...but my Booteds, they say otherwise! One does of recessive white enough to keep them up and up on hybrid vigour? Perhaps enough? The study continues for me.

Doggone & Chicken UP!

Tara Lee Higgins
Higgins Rat Ranch Conservation Farm, Alberta, Canada

 

[Akrnaf2]

Tara thanks for reminding me why I hate genetics so much!

 

[CanuckBock]

Heel low:

PLEASE NOTE...GROSS PHOTO at the end of my post...insides of dead bird dissected...so do not scroll down if you dislike looking at gory dead bird...otherwise, go ahead!

Colour of melanin (or no pigment) is pushed around, pulled, shaped to patterns, extended, expressed or not expressed by the command of genetics. A white bird (no pigment) can merely be a black, red or red and black bird not allowed to express colour pigment. A partridge chicken is told by its genetics how to express pigments in their feathers...much to delight our eyes!

We do not just have pigment in feathers in poultry...we also have skin colour.

My inbred line of Booted Bantams also revealed what severe inbreeding does...things that might not otherwise line up to be expressed pop out.

July 14 2014 - What you don't know is my hands are shaking
WT???​

An incredible learning event for me was the male MDF Booted Half/Half...

Nov 2014...see his feets??​

I got day old photos of him...so the learning was from DAY one with him.

One foot, and the other...attached to the same bird! ​

I love when your creatures TEACH you!

Nov 30 2014 -
The whole DANG group!!!

On the left...we have the to Standard expression of MDF with the DARK skin
Second on left, we have the to Standard expression of White with the LIGHT skin
in the middle, my half and half MDF boy...dark on side on foot, light on the other foot
Next is a MDF boy with light skin
Last far right...White boy with dark skin!
​

What amazing fun. The Booteds DO NOT care what skin colour they have, but the Standard for the colour varieties does. White feathered Booteds are to have light skin. The MDF Booteds to have dark skin.

My passion was to keep the one dose of recessive white in my MDF Booteds so...because the skin colour in the MDF was to be dark...you see this coming? That required I have WHITE feathered birds with DARK skin (not to Standard for the Breed Variety) to breed to the MDF feathered birds with DARK skin.

Hen on left is wrong skin colour to Standard (note the dark eye!!)
Hen on right is correct skin colour for Standard​

What I also learned was that this DARK Skin...was like the Silkies in that the Booted line I have is dark skin...and DARK to the bones and organs.

Hen that died of old age,
Froze her so I could later see how deep this dark colour went??​

\\\\GROSS PHOTO////​

Spoiler: Gross Photo

\\\\GROSS PHOTO////​

I hope using the spoiler function it hid it so you don't have to look at insides of chicken if you don't want too.

I guess no better than making chicken for dinner...yucky!

Doggone & Chicken UP!

Tara Lee Higgins
Higgins Rat Ranch Conservation Farm, Alberta, Canada

 

[CanuckBock]

Heel low:

Tara thanks for reminding me why I hate genetics so much!

Well it could be worse...the little letters, big ones, the superscripts half the time I forget to use...the wild type "+" notation and then gender linked where some italic it and others use a dash (0r a z or a w and I keep forgetting what gender these represent) which also can be used when inheritance is simple recessive/dominant (C/-)

Good GACK!!!

One slip up of the fingers, one reversal of the "+" and the whole readership thinks you are daft! I know I am daft but revealing it in text to others is dang near criminal!

Be ever so glad we do not have to type out...

2895481 TAAAATTAAG ACACGGAGCT ... <sequence continues onwards and "I" have already lost interest AND finger powers>

​

Think I ran out of space for files last post...see if this one will load...giving me hiccups...like normal...hates my photos...hates me...whatever...here we go...

Still won't let me upload last photo...gack. So I ACTUALLY read error...file name too long...duh! Hee hee...too long...I was just getting to the real descriptions...never mind...

Mar 20 2014 - Booted Bantams (yes, there are three in that mess of legs)
Shanks of Pintos half/half white female left
Shanks of White male middle and
MDF male right​

Because I play around with inbreeding in the Booteds and I know now to look carefully, I have some that are what I call PINTOS!

Skin colour variations on MDF feathered birds and White ones too... Got light skin in areas on the body...from leg shanks to places on the body...just a mish mash of light or dark skin...

It is interesting how you get into a breed and then you GET INTO a breed... Variations in genetic expressions to where the men in white coats should come for you...tie you up, put you in a padded cell.

At this point in the year...sounds like a GREAT idea...rest, meals someone else made, yes, crazy talk...

Doggone & Chicken UP!

Tara Lee Higgins
Higgins Rat Ranch Conservation Farm, Alberta, Canada

 

[Akrnaf2]

It is a mutation that happened in the middle of the embryo development , whas it black also in its body?

 

[CanuckBock]

Heel low:

It is a mutation that happened in the middle of the embryo development , whas it black also in its body?

Only the left foot was light coloured, rest of male chicken was dark coloured skin wise. I figured he might have been from a double yolked egg (never seen any here...ever...I would cull a female bird for that trait!) that hatched.


Bazillion years ago, as a child we hatched a four legged chicken (backyard mutt chickens) that lived two days. Was a monster and we kids thought, half a bird attached to a whole bird.

I like when persons thought, CHIMERA!

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chimera_(genetics)

A genetic chimerism or chimera (also spelled chimaera) is a single organism composed of cells from different zygotes. This can result in male and female organs, two blood types, or subtle variations in form. Animal chimeras are produced by the merger of multiple fertilized eggs. In plant chimeras, however, the distinct types of tissue may originate from the same zygote, and the difference is often due to mutation during ordinary cell division. Normally, genetic chimerism is not visible on casual inspection; however, it has been detected in the course of proving parentage.

Another way that chimerism can occur in animals is by organ transplantation, giving one individual tissues that developed from two genomes. For example, a bone marrow transplant can change someone's blood type.

Chimera cat
​

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chimera_(genetics)

Animals
An animal chimera is a single organism that is composed of two or more different populations of genetically distinct cells that originated from different zygotes involved in sexual reproduction. If the different cells have emerged from the same zygote, the organism is called a mosaic. Chimeras are formed from at least four parent cells (two fertilised eggs or early embryos fused together). Each population of cells keeps its own character and the resulting organism is a mixture of tissues. There are some reports of human chimerism.

This condition is either inherited or it is acquired through the infusion of allogeneic hematopoietic cells during transplantation or transfusion. In nonidentical twins, chimerism occurs by means of blood-vessel anastomoses. The likelihood of offspring being a chimera is increased if it is created via in vitro fertilisation. Chimeras can often breed, but the fertility and type of offspring depends on which cell line gave rise to the ovaries or testes; varying degrees of intersex differences may result if one set of cells is genetically female and another genetically male.

Way way more fun to think my Booted Bantams will make me this...

Lookit all the beasts I have in ONE!!

​

Or as you say Benny...there can be issues during development...so many things have to go right to create and grow life. A hiccup like spike or drop in temperature. We get black outs in summer here and it has happened my incubator (before we got the GENERATOR! Yah!) was incubating and power was off. Even with natural hatched by the chicken eggs...she could move one egg off to the side and it gets less heat...

I say TEMERATURE because some lovely examples exist where hot and cold areas on a body show either no pigment or dark pigment.

Siamese c@ts have coloured points on their bodies show up where less body heat exists. I had a Siamese cat growing up and she would change coat colours during the seasons.

Cows are another example of coloured parts versus temperature. But their colour expression acts opposite to what we see in the Siamese cat. Extremities are white (no pigment).

Pustertaler Sprinzen are a rare breed of colour sided cows. No pigment on the extremities (so needs to be warmer to produce pigment?).

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Colour-sided

Colour-sided is a colour pattern of domesticated cattle. It is sometimes called lineback

It consists of a dark body colour, with white finching along the spine, white under the belly, and often white also over the tail, head and legs. The ears, nose and feet are generally dark. The pattern may occur in many breeds, but some breeds are consistently colour-sided, including English Longhorn cattle, Irish Moiled cattle, Randall cattle, Riggit Galloway cattle and Lineback cattle. The dark colour may be any solid colour such as black, red or brindle.

An extreme pale form of the colour-sided pattern is where the darker colour is restricted to the ears, nose and feet, leaving most of the animal white. This is found for example in White Park, British White, and some Irish Moiled cattle.

There is just as much FUN to be had in lots of species...cows, horses, rodents of all sorts...colour our world, eh!

http://homepage.usask.ca/~schmutz/colors.html

Coat color was very variable in early domesticated stocks. In many breeds, color became one of the traits under intense selection and ultimately color became part of the identity of many breeds. However in some older breeds, such as Highland and Longhorn, color has remained varied. The painting above hangs in the Department of Animal and Poultry Science in the Agriculture Building at the University of Saskatchewan in Saskatoon. We are proud to display this important documentation of our cattle heritage. It is entitled "Highland Cattle - By the Sea" and was painted by William Smellie Watson of Scotland in 1872, before the Highland cattle registry began. It was donated by Al Ewen, who retired as Head of the Department of Animal Husbandry in 1952 when he returned to Aberdeernshire, Scotland.

​

My most favourite colour genetics painting...Highland Cattle by the Sea picture hangs in the U of Saskatoon...Schmutz has great genetic colour info!

Then there is Gynandromorph...half gender...

Chicken - this one is half female and half male
note the size of the wattles
Gynandromorph chicken​

Doggone & Chicken UP!

Tara Lee Higgins
Higgins Rat Ranch Conservation Farm, Alberta, Canada

 

[Akrnaf2]

Tara read this, this was a classic in basic genetics.

https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Himalayan_rabbit

And this shows that sometimes it needs to be COLD to have a pigment......

 

[CanuckBock]

Heel low:

Tara read this, this was a classic in basic genetics.

View attachment 1117861
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Himalayan_rabbit

And this shows that sometimes it needs to be COLD to have a pigment......

Quite right...extremes of both temperatures for colour! I mentioned that in Siamese cats (why I posted the picture of one) are point sided which is the opposite to what we see in some cow breeds like the rare Pustertaler Sprinzen which is colour sided.

Heat = colour or pigment expression
Cold = colour or pigment expression

The link you posted says this:

Markings
The Himalayan rabbit is well known for its markings, which are similar to the Himalayan cats'. They have dark ears, front feet (socks), hind feet (boots), a dark tail, and a dark spot on nose (egg). The markings change with age and environment. The colder weather may darken markings, enlarge markings,

My Siamese cat Snoopy was like the Himalayan rabbit... the Himalayan CAT...the Himalaya cat is a man made breed made by crossing my cat breed the Siamese with Persians.

The Himalayan (a.k.a. Himalayan Persian, or Colourpoint Persian as it is commonly referred to in Europe), is a breed or sub-breed of long-haired cat identical in type to the Persian, with the exception of its blue eyes and its point colouration, which were derived from crossing the Persian with the Siamese.

Doggone & Chicken UP!

Tara Lee Higgins
Higgins Rat Ranch Conservation Farm, Alberta, Canada