Mottled or Barred?

[Ashleyboz]

Would these chicks be mottled or barred? Or too young to tell yet? Rooster is mottled and have a few Barred Rock hens! A good amount have the mottled more white heads and then some have the dark heads with the barred rock small white patch on top of head.

 

[NatJ]

Would these chicks be mottled or barred? Or too young to tell yet? Rooster is mottled and have a few Barred Rock hens! A good amount have the mottled more white heads and then some have the dark heads with the barred rock small white patch on top of head.

It looks like some of each.

Barred chicks have white lines across the feathers as they grow, and have a light spot on top of their head when they hatch. I can see the white lines on the chick in the first photo, and the front too in the last photo. I can see the light headspot on several chicks in various photos.

Mottling makes white tips on the feathers. I see some of that too, but it will probably disappear as the chicks grow older. That is what usually happens in a cross between a mottled and a not-mottled chicken: the adult offspring do not show mottling, but they may have a bit when young.

If your rooster is mottled but has no barring, and all the hens are Barred Rocks, then you have sex-linked chicks: males with barring, females without. That would mean all the ones with white lines across the feathers, and all the ones with light spots on top of their heads, are males. (If you have some hens with no barring, then you could also have some males with no barring. If the father has no barring, there will not be any barred daughters, no matter what mothers they may have.)

 

[JacinLarkwell]

Pretty sure all are barred. if the hens are barred rocks, they shouldn't have a Mottle gene, which then wouldn't be passed to the chick
They need 2 mottled genes to show it

 

[Amer]

Barred, mottling expresses far more white at that age.

 

[NatJ]

They need 2 mottled genes to show it

Chicks that are split for mottling can show some white tips in their chick feathers, especially if they are black. The white tips seem to disappear as they get older (molt those feathers, grow new ones without white tips.) This is in addition to the occasional white feathers that happen anyway in black chicks and disappear by adulthood.

(That's why one of the first people researching mottling thought it was dominant: he didn't grow the chicks out long enough. Then someone else found it to be recessive, and it took them a while to figure out they were dealing with the same gene.)

Pretty sure all are barred. if the hens are barred rocks, they shouldn't have a Mottle gene, which then wouldn't be passed to the chick

I agree that barring is definitely present. But since all chicks must carry mottling (mottled father), I think some of the white bits on feather tips might be caused by that.

 

[Ashleyboz]

It looks like some of each.

Barred chicks have white lines across the feathers as they grow, and have a light spot on top of their head when they hatch. I can see the white lines on the chick in the first photo, and the front too in the last photo. I can see the light headspot on several chicks in various photos.

Mottling makes white tips on the feathers. I see some of that too, but it will probably disappear as the chicks grow older. That is what usually happens in a cross between a mottled and a not-mottled chicken: the adult offspring do not show mottling, but they may have a bit when young.

If your rooster is mottled but has no barring, and all the hens are Barred Rocks, then you have sex-linked chicks: males with barring, females without. That would mean all the ones with white lines across the feathers, and all the ones with light spots on top of their heads, are males. (If you have some hens with no barring, then you could also have some males with no barring. If the father has no barring, there will not be any barred daughters, no matter what mothers they may have.)

I’m trying to find every way to figure out how to not call all of these chicks roosters! Thank you for the information. Another confirmation I hatched out a high number of males

So interesting about the barring and being able to sex. After dabbling into breeding we are going to do a better job of picking and choosing. First I need to get this stuff figured out. Thay was extremely helpful. I appreciate your information.

 

[GirlsHuntToo]

1, 4, 5,7,9,10 - They look like they are going to be barred - the rest look like mottled feathering to me

 

[Ashleyboz]

Chicks that are split for mottling can show some white tips in their chick feathers, especially if they are black. The white tips seem to disappear as they get older (molt those feathers, grow new ones without white tips.) This is in addition to the occasional white feathers that happen anyway in black chicks and disappear by adulthood.

(That's why one of the first people researching mottling thought it was dominant: he didn't grow the chicks out long enough. Then someone else found it to be recessive, and it took them a while to figure out they were dealing with the same gene.)



I agree that barring is definitely present. But since all chicks must carry mottling (mottled father), I think some of the white bits on feather tips might be caused by that.

Take this chick. It doesn’t have the barred white spot on top and it’s standing next to a prominent, for sure barred as comparison, we would assume it’s barred showing more mottling and will definitely be male since mom is barred and dad is mottled? Is this the normal for them to not have the pretty lines that are straight when crossing? Might be silly questions but this sex link info after having them has me wondering what I did here lol!

 

[NatJ]

Take this chick. It doesn’t have the barred white spot on top and it’s standing next to a prominent, for sure barred as comparison, we would assume it’s barred showing more mottling and will definitely be male since mom is barred and dad is mottled? Is this the normal for them to not have the pretty lines that are straight when crossing? Might be silly questions but this sex link info after having them has me wondering what I did here lol!

The barring gene does not always make the nice straight lines. Getting straight lines takes some extra genes (I'm not sure which ones), that can be missing in a cross. The messier type of barring is what you see in "Cuckoo" chicken varieties, but is caused by the same barring gene (without the other genes to tidy it up.)

I agree the front chick is definitely barred. The other one I'm not as sure about. It will probably become more clear as it grows, because barring should stay visible but white bits from mottling should go away (since it has just one copy of the mottling gene. A chicken with two mottling genes will tend to show more white each time it molts.)