Lavender patterned Isabel duckwing barred - lavender brown cuckoo barred - project and genetic dis

[ChicKat]

These little cockerels are just so adorable to me....

They are moved outside, long overdue--- and tonight with the temps set to sink to 19-degrees, I'll bring them in for an overnight in their watering trough/brooder -- then back to the world of the big kids.

They are in that awkward teenage phase, still have some of the sweetness of their chick days and showing some of what their adult appearance will be.

Of their plumage changes, most notable to me is that the autosomal red is starting to put patches of color on their plumage, they are getting their 'pointy' male adult hackles in the neck. Their neck plumage shows a tighter smaller barring than their single-barred counterparts at the same age. Really I am eager to see what their adult 'look' will be!!

Awkward stage for cockrels looking like baby dinosauers with their funky combs and big eyes. This guy has more of the lightest fluffiest feathering, compared to the others that have a tighter and more hard-feathered plumage. Seems like the Leghorn side of the family would have passed the hard-feathering and the Legbar side would pass along soft-feathering -- and he leans toward the Legbar plumage texture. Also, his comb takes a turn at the end.... so he has a couple of 'strikes' against being the one (or one of the ones) used for breeding the next generation.

Growing in pointy neck feathers.

Strongest barring pattern, and the beginning indications of red (diluted to that peaches-and-cream color) showing in their plumage. The background cockerel has the best barring I think. Foreground left -- is the photo-bomber. He has the blue leg band and is the friendliest. He was the last to hatch and at 24-hours younger than the other young ones, was behind for the first few days. He was nearly stuck to his shell -- I don't really know how he made it out, and because some of that gunky stuff from the shell was glued to his chick down--it took more handling to get it off -- and he has been 'handled' more than the others and is more confident with humans.

Even one of the guys with more subtle barring has nice definite barring in his neck-hackles. You may also see the faintest warm tone in gray of the breast feathers on this guy -- to mimic the salmon on the females breast.

Two cockerels at the feeder side-by-side. The one in front has more 'saturation'. Does that mean that his lavender gene is less strong to suppress the black?

Another comparison between the 'darker' and the 'lighter' versions of lavender showing up.

This shot gives you an idea of their size. Threw one on a scale and it was about 2#.
Never really got a 'beauty shot' like you would use for a magazine article or a calendar.... Just note-taking kind of bits and pieces. Love it when they dig in at meal time and act like they like their feed...

 

[RiverOtter]

Do you think the white feathers are a spontaneous mutation or that they're from something else but a bird with them would be more likely to have a spontaneous mutation?

I don't know, but they way they were colored, combined with the color pattern of the rooster (not a pattern with white marks, like a spangle) and the fact that he had known genetics made them look to me as if they were likely to be either something new, or perhaps something environmental - a minor injury that disrupted the pigmentation as the feathers were developing.

That's why I asked if he still had them after molting.

If it was a bird of a color that I would expect to have some degree of white in the feathers - like your cuckoo - I'd also be likely to assume it was just bad patterning - and who knows!! Perhaps the pied mutation has popped up and been lost a hundred times in exactly that way! We know it's common enough in everything else, nearly every domestic species ... I've seen pied deer, sparrows and once, a robin, it's a rather common mutation... except in chickens!

Perhaps in chickens it's a mutation that doesn't breed true, like brindle in horses. But there's no way to know without trying.

I've always had a fascination with genetics, and for a long time it's struck me as odd that one of the most common mutations is just not seen in one of the most abundant domestic creatures!
So when I saw a splash of white on a bird that shouldn't have had so much of a hint or fleck of white on him, I couldn't contain my excitement.

 

[The Moonshiner]

Ya I'm with you on the fascination of genetics. Hence the questions.
I've seen it but never thought to bred towards it and see what happens.
I love crossing colors and making new pattern/color combinations but nothing more exciting then when something strange pops up.
I have a pullet that came out of a black pen that for some reason has a birchen pattern. I believe there's another one that has a few silver streaks.
Come spring I'm going to do a little experimenting with her/them.

 

[campingshaws]

One of Jim’s sons has dark blue in the wings, but not the dilute. It’s the prettiest thing I’ve ever seen.

 

[The Moonshiner]

@ChicKat
I'll have to look and see if I have much worth taking pics of.
If you remember my project for this thread was cuckoo Xs Isabella.
I crossed an Isabella rooster over cuckoo hens. Got black pullets and cuckoo cockerel. Bunch going on with them. Father is gold based, wildtype, lavender. Mothers are silver based, extended black and barred.
That makes the pullet chicks gold, extended black/wild type split to lavender.
Cockerel chicks are silver/gold, extended black/wild type, single barred and split to lavender.
Thinking I need to hatch a ton just to get any single barred lavender gold duckwing.
Think possible chicks can be...
Pullets
Lav Isabel duckwing
Lav Isabel duckwing barred
Lav silver duckwing
Lav silver duckwing barred
Solid lav
Barred lav
Gold duckwing
Gold duckwing barred
Silver duckwing
Silver duckwing barred
Solid black
Barred

Cockerels
Lav silver/gold duckwing
Lav silver/gold duckwing barred
Isabella
Isabella barred
Solid Lav
Barred lavender
Silver/gold duckwing
Silver/gold duckwing barred
Gold duckwing
Gold duckwing barred
Black
Barred
Hatched two chicks couple weeks ago. One is barred and the other is a keeper. I'll see about pics of it.
Looking to keep and work on....
Lav gold duckwing barred
Lav silver duckwing
Lav silver duckwing barred
Lav
Barred Lav
Gold duckwing barred
Silver duckwing barred
Of course that's going to be more work then it sounds.
Some will be homozygous and some heterozygous for different things.
Its cool though. Take two patterns cross them then spin it into 7 different projects.

 

[The Moonshiner]

My first ever Lavender leghorn chick

 

[campingshaws]

I realized by accident that the nonbarred cockerel looks nearly like a brown leghorn cock. Im sure this isn’t surprising to you at all.

 

[The Moonshiner]

Could you please explain splits to me and how it works? I’ve heard the term before but I’m unfamiliar with what it is.

With recessive genes it takes two copies to show. One copy gets carried sight unseen.
When a bird is carrying one copy sight unseen it is said to be split for.
Like lavender. If you breed a lavender to a black we know the offspring will all get one copy of lavender but will be black. They are called black split for lavender.

 

[The Moonshiner]

A DQ fault isn't a huge deal to most people - most folks don't show. I'd rather have fertile, productive chickens than 100% rose combed ones. And after all, people who do show don't show their entire flock. Keeping fertility up means you have a better chance of getting that lovely, SOP-perfect trio into the show ring.

What use is a perfect bird if it can't reproduce?

Of course, I am not the one to talk to. To me, most SOPs are the epitome of "first world problems". I don't care if a comb is slightly crooked, I want the judge to get their hands on the bird and figure out if this "dual purpose" breed would be worth cooking, or if they lost that.
I'm a lot more likely to take livestock standards seriously when they weigh production in. Infertile birds aren't productive, so to me, a rose comb is a cute trick, not the end-all and be-all of a breeding program.

A lot of factors involved depending what the person was breeding for.
Also depends on just how much fertility was affected.
When I had the rose combs I had the same breed in single comb variety and rose comb variety.
Two different colors of rose combs. One was pure (as far as I found) for rose combs and the other had single comb genes in the line.
I never saw any difference myself in fertility rate between any I was breeding but I sure noticed more then a couple per hatch that ended up with wrong comb type.
My experience and my program goals makes the decision easy for me.

 

[ChicKat]

Seems like in my brain things get done faster than in 'real life' --- here's the current stage of progress:

• Both houses for the breeders are cleaned out as of yesterday.
• They are all wormed. What I use is Cydectin, a cattle pour on. The application rate I use is about 1 drop per pound of chicken. This would drive a scientifically minded medicalally oriented person crazy -- because a drop can vary in size.
• To introduce the cockerel, I confine him in the pen with the females for a day, put him in the house on the roost with them overnight, and the next morning, they wake up as roommates.

So in the first "breeding pen" - the Twin line, if you have been following this thread from

the beginning, and "Iris", who is the only one of these 5 that lays a tinted egg is in that pen. She's the one that is my "ideal" look. This is based on type, small comb that doesn't flop, and a good barring indication plus a cream color in the neck hackles. She has a pink leg band. In future I would select for her type, comb, coloration and seek a clear cream hackle, and any chicken that has the deepest light salmon on the breast feathers.

He's safe from them, and they are safe from him -- in his little pen. Notice that the females ARE curious though.

Now the next day, he's free to roam the pen

This one is the more saturated of the two cockerels that are breeders, and you can see his duckwing band is very straight across the bottom, and his wing triangle is definite.

Remember way back when we first started this thread, we were concerned that multiple generations of lavender bred to lavender would fade the colors to look like an off white color.

So here they are going about their chicken business in a very nonchalant way. All good.

Now pen two -- remember pink band = the Twin line, and blue band = the Jackson line....
So when the females went to roost last night, I pulled the Jackson line and put them in the other pen, that I had just cleaned the house that day.... The other male is on - be in the show cage day of his new residency:

The second cockerel has a better tail, and is a tad larger, although the little one weighed 5-pounds (hence 5-drops of wormer)

So I will give them a week, and that will allow the cydectin to work through their systems, and the roosters to fertilize the hens...and then start collecting eggs for the incubator.