Lavender Wyandottes-Frayed Tails?

[bramblefir]

Good luck splitting the fray gene out. Even crossing out to black will probably not do it. If it were that simple there would no longer be any fraying in lavenders. Frankly, I do not know if anyone has correctly determined if there really is a fray allele or if the lavender gene is responsible depending upon modifiers. The thing with fraying, the pehnotype can act dominant and recessive depending on other genetic factors. The one given is that a heterozygous lavender will not show any fraying of feathers. That is a clue if somebody wants to test-breed a thousand birds and figure it out. I worked with lavender and It was not a pleasant experience. I ate more lavenders than any other color. It was a shame to have to cull an otherwise beautiful bird.

I've often found myself wondering if the fraying is linked to black pigment. Most of the lavender patterned birds I've seen (in person and in pictures) don't seem to have any visible fraying even when the color has just been stabilized. The colors I'm thinking of are Porcelain, Lavender Laced Isabel, and Lavender Laced Silver. All 3 of those have limited areas of "black" pigmentation on their patterns. The solid "black" birds seem to be the most effected. That could be a fun (and expensive) test: does lavender fraying work the same on all the E locus genes.

 

[SeneyMaker]

You can save the money for testing. The fray gene acts the same on other extended locus alleles. I know from experience.





Edited by Staff

 

[Wappoke]

I've often found myself wondering if the fraying is linked to black pigment. Most of the lavender patterned birds I've seen (in person and in pictures) don't seem to have any visible fraying even when the color has just been stabilized. The colors I'm thinking of are Porcelain, Lavender Laced Isabel, and Lavender Laced Silver. All 3 of those have limited areas of "black" pigmentation on their patterns. The solid "black" birds seem to be the most effected. That could be a fun (and expensive) test: does lavender fraying work the same on all the E locus genes.

The fray gene is found on the same chromosome as dominant white, crest and the frizzle gene. The fray allele is autosomal and recessive to the normal feathering allele. The fray gene is also characterized by variable expressivity. Some birds are more frayed than others.

If the problem is due to the fray gene, then when you cross a lavender frayed tail with a black normal tailed bird (homozygous FR*N/FR*N) none of the offspring will have frayed tail.

Doing an F1 cross would produce ( if you hatch enough) some black birds with frayed tails.

Most likely the feather fraying (my opinion) associated with phenotype lavender is due to the mutation in the melanophilin gene (lav gene).