Making Lemonade [Selective Culling Project - very long term]

[U_Stormcrow]

Two more hatched overnight, another has externally pipped. That makes 10, once it escapes. 12 was an early quit, 11 has a huge air sack, but is too dark to see movement or signs of failed development. If there's still no apparent movement, and no forward progress, I will assisted hatch expecting to eggtopsy, most likely tomorrow morning.

Here we are so far - individual pictures and weights once its above 40 degrees. They don't need the stress, and I need more coffee.

 

[Cattle dog Mom]

AAAAH. So do the "head spots" vs no head spots indicate barring vs not?

 

[U_Stormcrow]

AAAAH. So do the "head spots" vs no head spots indicate barring vs not?

Still determining that. That's why I'm taking so many photos.

 

[Cattle dog Mom]

Still determining that. That's why I'm taking so many photos.

Do you remember if the 3 barred in the first hatch were black with a head spot?

 

[NatJ]

AAAAH. So do the "head spots" vs no head spots indicate barring vs not?

I think the head spots should indicate barring. (But every time I get too sure of something, an exception pops up, so I'll be waiting to see if that gets confirmed.)

 

[U_Stormcrow]

Thing One, Thing Two, Grumpy, and Dopey all had head spots, all developed pronounced barring. I need to recheck hatchling pics on P01-02 to see if any others had head spots, who did not develop barring.

Also, I see the file I'm keeping offline did not preserve the pixel density on the photos, so I need to replace them all, full sized. Time to make a merged PowerPoint/Excel/Word Document, I think. BLEH. No time soon, its not in the schedule, but it needs doing

 

[Molpet]

I have had headspots that ended up black and some barred.
CX mix cockerels over BR, bjg or CX mixed hens

 

[U_Stormcrow]

This was my concern, particularly with what appears to be the presence of the E+ gene in some of the offspring, that I might have birds whose barring was hidden under extra Black.

But I don't understand Genetics at all, and may have operation of E+ all wrong.

E+ meaning Self Black, not the e+ (wild type) that means something else. They could have picked better letters, you know???

 

[sjango]

This was my concern, particularly with what appears to be the presence of the E+ gene in some of the offspring, that I might have birds whose barring was hidden under extra Black.

But I don't understand Genetics at all, and may have operation of E+ all wrong.

E+ meaning Self Black, not the e+ (wild type) that means something else. They could have picked better letters, you know???

You almost have it. E is extended black, and is EE in its homozygous form. There's never a + on the capital E. They both use the letter E or e because they all control pattern. Most genes are named after their dominant form, in this case E stands for Extended in Extended black.
Here is the order of dominance for pattern genes:

E > ER >ER-Fay > eWh > e+ > eb > es > ebc > ey > eq

So E/e+ will still give you extended black, but so will E/ER or E/eWH and many others.
E (extended black) is the most dominant of any pattern gens.
e+ is the wildtype and is intermediate in the rank of dominance.

E = extended black
ER = birchen
ER-Fay = Fayoumi
eWh = Wheaten
e+ = wild type
eb = Brown
es = Male modifier
ebc = Female Buttercup modifie
ey = Female recessive Wheaten
eq = Queen Silvia

 

[NatJ]

E+ meaning Self Black, not the e+ (wild type) that means something else. They could have picked better letters, you know???

There is a reason they picked those letters.

E is Extended Black (or Self Black)
e+ is wild type

The + shows that it is the wild-type gene (found in the wild jungle fowl), so + only goes on the plain lowercase e.

E and e+ and several others are alleles (genes that hang out at the same place on the chicken's chromosome.) Each chicken gets one from the mother and one from the father, so no chicken can have all the options, but all of the possibilities have abbreviations that start with the letter e. That helps people remember that they all go at the same plce.

Capital or lowercase letters tell you something about what is dominant (E) and what is recessive (e), and when there are more than two options, they get a ^ and some extra letters to tell what they are, like E^Wh (usually called Wheaten), or e^b (called brown or partridge.)

A lot of the genetics stuff does have a reason, but it is horribly confusing when you first encounter it!