Marans Thread - breed discussion & pictures are welcome!

[Arielle]

I have a little experience with adding feathering using a rooster who has stubs on his middle toe. I have gotten better feathering and yes I do get some with middle toe feathering at hatch I cull them so I'm not tempted later to use them....I live close to a zoo they love my eggs and chicks and it makes a charitable deduction as they are a non profit.

A rooster with stubs on middle toe was bred to what kind of leg feathering on the hens??

 

[BarnGoddess01]

Quote:

I'll post it again (with some preliminary stuff he had said to me as well this time) since it still seems to be coming up a lot .... from VillageChicken:

"Genes can be seen as cars occupying a parking lot. Each gene has its assigned parking space. Most parking spaces have just two options - the dominant car is parked there or the recessive car is parked there.
For example - skin color. White skin is the dominant variation, yellow is the recessive. For chickens, there are two parking spaces for each "trait", with the exception of some of the sex-linked genes, where hens only get one parking space. So for the skin color trait, there are two spaces, and you can have two yellow cars, one white car and one yellow, or two white cars. Because white is dominant, when there is one white gene and one yellow gene, the bird has white skin.

Okay, enough of the car and parking lot analogy. The parking space in the genetic world is called a locus, or loci when you're talking about more than one. The cars that can park in any one given parking space are called alleles. Yellow skin and white skin are alleles of the same locus.

The feathered shanks have two loci. Technically they are called pti-1 and pti-2. Marans shank feathering is found at the pti-1 allele. pti-2 is for cochin type feathering and is an additional gene that gets added to pti-1 for the heavy cochin feathers. It gets confusing because at the pti-1 locus there are THREE alleles. So it would be like if at the skin color locus, there were a third variation for pink skin.

At pti-1 there is the recessive (no feathers) gene, a Langshan type gene and a Brahma type gene. Langshan - outer toe feathered, Brahma - adds middle toe feathered. So any one of these 3 genes can be present at this allele. Actually since almost all genes are in pairs, you can have any TWO of these 3 genes at the pti-1 allele.

So you can have the recessive clean shank gene paired up with a Lanshan type - that would be heterozygous for Langshan type feathering. Or clean shank gene with the Brahma type - heterozygous for Brahma type feathering. You can even have the Langshan paired up with the Brahma type.

The phenotype (what it looks like) is not always predictable or consistent. The heterozygous Langshan could have very light feathering. The heterozygous Brahma type actually LOOKS like the homozygous Langshan type. This confuses many folks in the Marans world. In other words, if your bird carries one clean shank gene, and one feathered shank with middle toe feathers gene, it might have perfect Marans lightly feathered shanks. But paired with a genetically correct marans that has two Langshan type feathering genes, you will produce sparsely feathered shanks, and middle toe feathers from two "correctly" feathered parents.

Add to this mix the fact that there are known recessive inhibitors that suppress feathered shanks even when the feathering genes are present. So you may have parent birds with correct pti-1 Langshan genes, but if they each have one recessive inhibitor gene (you need two recessives for them to work) you will find offspring that are clean shanked.

This fall I single mated my wheatens and BC's and will never use a rooster with anything on his middle toes. I crossed a middle toe feathered roo with a very lightly feathered hen, and got almost all middle toe feathered offspring. Some that had fuzz on the toes at hatch aren't showing feathers now, but I know the messed up genes are in there.

I also paired two correctly feathered wheatens, and got middle toe feathers on about 1/3rd of the chicks.

Feathered shanks can be a big challenge to get right, to get it to breed true, without tons of culling.

One more thing that makes these Marans one tough bird to get right."

 

[Arielle]

barnGoddess, thanks for reposting this. Now I totally get it. Mixing heavy feathering with no feathering is not likely to work. Always need the light feathered birds as they might have the genes needed but won't know until a few test crosses reveal the genotype.

Maybe we need to start a list of people who have the light feathering.

 

[culler]

Just some observations from someone that has bred a few BC and several other colors of Marans. The middle toe Gene has nothing to do with the Marans having stubs on the middle and a little fuzz on the web. Thinking this just muddles up the whole breeding process. Until something is proven please don't just believe everything that is written on here.

How many have ever seen a Marans with stubs that did not have heavy feathering on the shanks and toe /

If you have Marans with little or no feathering on the shanks and toe it would hurt nothing to use a male with a little middle toe stubs over the non feathered or lightly feathered.

Please lets not make it harder than it really is to get the feathered legs. Just ask someone that saw my Marans last year and the year before, all of my Marans had very nice feathering.

We can only beat this subject so long and everything falls apart, Must be some other faults that need some work. Don

edited by staff

 

[pinkchick]

Yes they do and it's not something that they can advertise for really and I can only eat so much chicken myself.....I sell to the ethnic market but with the price of feed I try to only grow out worthy ones. Most of the breeders in my chicken club cull pretty hard at hatch and they mostly show bantams and take all the culls there I thought it's nice not to waste them.

I also take some of my culls to a neighbor that has exotic animals such as bobcats, a cougar, wolves and Herman the aligator. I will not go in the pens with the big cats to give them the culls (because I have seen them make many culls disappear in no time....no way am I getting in there that close) but I can and do go in with the wolves (they are big sweeties, however, they do know what you are bringing them and they get pretty ancy), I have also feed Herman the aligator several times...one must be very quick when feeding Herman. I stand in awe everytime I see how fast that bugger snaps.
I like taking the culls over to her because it means that I don't have do it and her animals sorta get a live meal like nature intended.

 

[DMRippy]

I have to agree with Don. I hatched over 30 chicks. My Marans have heavily feathered to lightly feathered legs. I have NONE with middle toe feathering. Some chicks hatched with clean legs and some with middle toe feathers. Not many of them but some. It is like breeding a pullet with fewer points on her comb with a roo with too many points. It should average out. That seems to be common chicken breeding mentality. You are looking for averages. Too high a tail set, breed to a low tail set and so on and so on. But like Vicki said, each breeder will have an opinion. You would really need to see what works with your birds and not just assume your Marans have the Brahma type genes.

 

[BarnGoddess01]

I believe VillageChicken has hatched more than just a handful of Marans. In fact, he lost more than just a handful in a fire this winter. In addition to having a background in science, he keeps extensive notes and tries LOTS of combinations. He clearly knows what he is doing. I'm pretty comfortable trusting his advice - as are many in the Marans Chicken Club - the bunch that actually managed to get Marans approved last year.

 

[pinkchick]

I'll post it again (with some preliminary stuff he had said to me as well this time) since it still seems to be coming up a lot .... from VillageChicken:

"Genes can be seen as cars occupying a parking lot. Each gene has its assigned parking space. Most parking spaces have just two options - the dominant car is parked there or the recessive car is parked there.
For example - skin color. White skin is the dominant variation, yellow is the recessive. For chickens, there are two parking spaces for each "trait", with the exception of some of the sex-linked genes, where hens only get one parking space. So for the skin color trait, there are two spaces, and you can have two yellow cars, one white car and one yellow, or two white cars. Because white is dominant, when there is one white gene and one yellow gene, the bird has white skin.

Okay, enough of the car and parking lot analogy. The parking space in the genetic world is called a locus, or loci when you're talking about more than one. The cars that can park in any one given parking space are called alleles. Yellow skin and white skin are alleles of the same locus.

The feathered shanks have two loci. Technically they are called pti-1 and pti-2. Marans shank feathering is found at the pti-1 allele. pti-2 is for cochin type feathering and is an additional gene that gets added to pti-1 for the heavy cochin feathers. It gets confusing because at the pti-1 locus there are THREE alleles. So it would be like if at the skin color locus, there were a third variation for pink skin.

At pti-1 there is the recessive (no feathers) gene, a Langshan type gene and a Brahma type gene. Langshan - outer toe feathered, Brahma - adds middle toe feathered. So any one of these 3 genes can be present at this allele. Actually since almost all genes are in pairs, you can have any TWO of these 3 genes at the pti-1 allele.

So you can have the recessive clean shank gene paired up with a Lanshan type - that would be heterozygous for Langshan type feathering. Or clean shank gene with the Brahma type - heterozygous for Brahma type feathering. You can even have the Langshan paired up with the Brahma type.

The phenotype (what it looks like) is not always predictable or consistent. ( Love this statement!!!!! So true and encompasses everything, not just the shank feathering aspect.) The heterozygous Langshan could have very light feathering. The heterozygous Brahma type actually LOOKS like the homozygous Langshan type. This confuses many folks in the Marans world. In other words, if your bird carries one clean shank gene, and one feathered shank with middle toe feathers gene, it might have perfect Marans lightly feathered shanks. But paired with a genetically correct marans that has two Langshan type feathering genes, you will produce sparsely feathered shanks, and middle toe feathers from two "correctly" feathered parents.

Add to this mix the fact that there are known recessive inhibitors that suppress feathered shanks even when the feathering genes are present. So you may have parent birds with correct pti-1 Langshan genes, but if they each have one recessive inhibitor gene (you need two recessives for them to work) you will find offspring that are clean shanked.

This fall I single mated my wheatens and BC's and will never use a rooster with anything on his middle toes. I crossed a middle toe feathered roo with a very lightly feathered hen, and got almost all middle toe feathered offspring. Some that had fuzz on the toes at hatch aren't showing feathers now, but I know the messed up genes are in there.

I also paired two correctly feathered wheatens, and got middle toe feathers on about 1/3rd of the chicks. ( I have made this pairng too and had the same results )

Feathered shanks can be a big challenge to get right, to get it to breed true, without tons of culling.

One more thing that makes these Marans one tough bird to get right."

 

[pinkchick]

I appreciate this forum. I learn so much from everyone who shares here on this site. Things do not always have to be as one person sees it as we all know.....what's important here is that we can all learn from each other and hopefully help each other and new comers in the process.... no matter if we have been chickening for 2 days or our entire lives. Everyone brings something to the table.

edited by staff

 

[gilavina]

Mornin Kim! Is this your weekend for hatching? I can't remember....
how's your job going?