Lav./Lav. Split Chicks No Fluff!

[BayChicks]

Last batch of Ams from our lav. split pen hatched one lav. with very little fluff on it's back. It has sort of a bare shaped U and little on the back of it's legs. This hatch, I see two black that look similar. Google searches have come up with one study on the barred gene that can cause this. Is this where it's coming from? Do we have bad genes going on here? I did see other conversations in various forums about lavs being slow to feather and one where the chick never feathered out (well, in 3 months anyway).
Can some Lav. people help me out?
Thanks!
Kim

 

[hinkjc]

In all the lav birds I have grown out, I have never seen one with bareness like you describe. There is a slow feathering gene (Kk, I believe) that can cause this if both parents have a copy. It doesn't matter what color the plumage is - it can happen to any bird that has this gene from my understanding. If it hatched missing chick down or with really short chick down, it can also be caused by improper humidity during a certain stage of incubation.

 

[sonew123]

Quote:
Is this due to the chick rubbing it off inside the shell as it rotates to get out??? In my head Im think low humidty ? I had some hatch that way 3 months ago -nakes as Jbirds-Now they have feathered in nicely-took a while though

 

[hinkjc]

It's been a while since I read about this issue, but if I recall correctly it is due to the down follicle development. A portion of the chick develops each day of incubation. During the down development, things must be proper for this event to happen correctly. I'll see if I can find where I had read this and provide more details.

 

[sonew123]

Quote:
thank you so much

 

[BayChicks]

Interesting.
The first batch - let's see...there were about 36 chicks I think. About a third of those were black or lav. split and then 3 were lav. The only chick that was nakey was the last lav to hatch and it came about 24 hrs after the first. Humidity around 47% most of the time as usual, (except for when we have thunderstorms - the humidity will sometimes go up but here on the coast I can't do much about that) and at hatch was about 60% until chicks started hatching. The first few hatched nice and clean and then they really started looking wet so I took the plug out. We had a really good hatch with that one.

sonew123 - I thought that he had stuck so I checked the shell and it didn't appear that he had stuck to it, but that was my first thought for sure. That's really good to hear that yours did eventually feather out. I was getting worried.

I'm thinking that you guys might be right on with the humidity issue though, sometime during development, but I don't know how to fix it. I am doing the usual %'s that I usually do, with the exception like I said of thunderstorms sort of making the hum. go up and we've had lots of rain and storms.

So far with this hatch there are 6 black/lav. split ams in there and at least 2 look a little bare. They were pretty wet when they hatched, but there again, we had storms all day yesterday and last night so it could have gone up overnight.
I think the lav from the first hatch looks smaller than the others, but it might just be because he has so little fluff. I'll try to get a pic of these guys.
Thanks for your help hinkjc. I would love to hear if you find out anything on the humidity issues.
Thanks!!
Kim

Oh, ps....year before last it was crooked toes, got that worked out. Last year it was crooked beaks - looks like we've overcome that this year. Now we're just bare!! Yikes!

 

[flgardengirl]

I had a similar thing with basically no fluff on the head of a blue copper marans chick recently. He hatched on day 25 after I had turned the incubator off thinking the hatch was over! It had probably been off several hours and I still hadn't got around to cleaning it out yet. Then heard cheep cheep. So then I plugged it back in and he eventually pipped his way out. He was born really tiny with abnormally long fuzz on his neck and none on his head. He still has none on his head and lost the fuzz on his neck and feathered out on his wings and is barely growing tail feathers. He is about 3 weeks old now. He is so much smaller than his hatch mates but eating and drinking normally. He can't get to the feeder because he is so tiny and the others are crowding around it, so he takes a running jump and lands in the middle of the feeder and stands there and eats out of the middle lol.

Anyhow I am sure the temp and humidity was low in his case but not sure if that is what caused his problem or not.

 

[BayChicks]

Anyone figured this out? A second batch, everything just the way I've done with all of my good hatches, yielded several more of these bare-backed chicks. Humidity at hatching was high enough - they're not sticking, they're just not developing the fluff in the first place. I keep googling but I can't seem to find the problem.

Kim

 

[flgardengirl]

My blue copper marans chick has finally developed feathers on his head. He was bald headed for the longest time. His feathers are short but they are there. I'm hoping they will get longer.

 

[Three Cedars Silkies]

My understanding from those hatching lavender silkies is that they will typically have 3 different types of chicks hatch. Large, fluffy lavs with even coloring all over; smaller, almost bare or very short downed even colored lavs; fluffy chicks with the pale chipmunk stripes on their backs.

Ultimately, all the chicks grow up to look alike. The short-downed chicks (and small ones) eventually catch up to their larger hatchmates.