Look what I just hatched!

[NYRIR]

I believe I got 2 restricted mallards out of 3 eggs that hatched! I have a female restricted mallard and a (regular colored)drake.I also have a female (regular coloring) mallard.These were the only ones mating at time of egg collection...My older restricted started out yellow as well but with lighter patch on the head and no eye striping(looked like a silver appleyard)...just thought this was cool and wanted to share

 

[BairleaFarm]

They are cute as can be. 2 out of 3 is a good hatch too.

 

[NYRIR]

Thank you, actually I had set 8 eggs...6 made it to lockdown but I don't think my humidity was high enough early enough so i only got 50% hatch rate...but man are they cute

 

[lovesgliders]

Did you vent sex them to know their genders this early?

They are adorable! Is a restricted mallard just a different color variation? Very cool.

 

[NYRIR]

Quote:
Thank you,I think they are really cool too No I have not vent sexed...not sure I do it right yet but I am going to try it...If you look at my page it shows the wings of my restricted.They have no striping(or very faint) on the face and the upper part of the wings has white in it.I heard that they are like 1 in 5,000 but with my hatch rate I think what happens is the "different" ones get culled instead of sold?
ETA: The restricted duckling is the yellow one in the photo on my page.Everyone kept telling me she was a silver appleyard but I got her from the mallard bin...she was the only one like that so I had to get her! I was pretty sure she was a mallard.(and she is)Notice she has no facial stripe(she still doesn't)and the wing shots are her as well.

 

[Maryallison]

Very cute!

 

[Senna95]

I'm going to take a gander at this..... I'm sure someone will correct me if I'm wrong, which happens a lot.

Restricted pattern is a variation of Wild pattern. It is sometimes dominant, and sometimes not, depending on some as-yet-unknown factors (probably having to do with dark/light/harlequin phase). If your restricted pattern hen is homozygous (2 restricted-patten genes) or even heterozygous (one restricted gene) it would make perfect sense that some of her offspring would show this too.

Also, your hen isn't silver appleyard. She'd be a lot lighter in color overall because she'd have light-phase genes. Yours looks like a dark phase mallard (regular mallard), but with one or two restricted mallard genes (though she could be a carrier of a recessive light-phase gene).

Restricted pattern is not a 1 in 5000 mutation, it is a known gene. Most likely somewhere in the histroy of your birds someone out-crossed to either silver appleyards or mini appleyards.

That said, your birds are beautiful, and the duckling adorable.

I'm fairly new to duck genetics too, and I'm reading everything I can get my hands on. It's like trying to figure out a real-life puzzle. And it seems like everytime you turn around there's another piece of information that complicates things even more. Who needs sudocu when you have duck genetics!!!???

 

[NYRIR]

Quote:
Lol...this is true! I knew she was a mallard....but I was on here quite a bit last year trying to figure out what pattern she was.I just thought it was cool because she was different.It's good to know it's a known gene as someone on here last year was the one who told me she was a 1 in 5,000 mutation.Anyway,regardless,I love the pattern...it's slightly different than normal and I am glad I can continue it

Thank you,yes,they are adorable and I cannot wait to see how the little ones feather out