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- #31
If I understand you, I had a pen of IB birds that were all split to midnight. None were actually midnight. They produced midnight birds regularly and at about the 25% rate you would expect.
Peafowl Genetics for Dummies (in other words us)
- Thread starter AugeredIn
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- Thread starter
- #32
Bingo! You are exactly right. It is actually highly likely that other mutations exist that are not sex linked but they never were bred in a closed group to get split offspring bred to each other or the parent.
Ancestry.com and the family tree, this is what I would like to see with peafowl, starting with India Blue bred to say white,, then place the offspring on the graph and next show possibilities of these offspring bred to different colors,,and percentages of each breeding. Then do the same with Purples,Bronze,Opal,Cameo,Peach,White,BSSP,Silver Pied,Dark Pied,Midnight,Taupe,Violetta,ect,,,,a detailed example of using one color then bred to each other color. Or a spreadsheet capable of allowing you to put both colored parents in the box,then it would show the possibilities and percentages of everything possible that is known.
Searching thru here for old back posts specific to breeding is almost impossible.I've on several occasions just made a phone call to Texas to get my answer but if someone like Pedda or old Aqua Eyes could compose something that would allow you to put in the color of the bird,known visual or known genetics within each parent bird,this would ease my breeding questions. Or make the chart a sticky thread on here where no responses can be made,to keep the clutter to a bare minimum.
Searching thru here for old back posts specific to breeding is almost impossible.I've on several occasions just made a phone call to Texas to get my answer but if someone like Pedda or old Aqua Eyes could compose something that would allow you to put in the color of the bird,known visual or known genetics within each parent bird,this would ease my breeding questions. Or make the chart a sticky thread on here where no responses can be made,to keep the clutter to a bare minimum.
I was working on something like what FBC has mentioned when someone forwarded a more sophisticated version to me. It made my work look like a piece of junk, so I never bothered completing it. I am currently attempting to contact the creator of this piece of work to see if I am allowed to post it as freeware for all to use. It includes more than just what you get when you breed A to B. I currently use it to help me determine my most efficient breedings.
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That sounds very interesting and helpful!
Might help some of us determine what would be a good bird to buy also.
Okay so this is true? I have a good example of this I think... I am trying to follow this topic but I am having trouble concentrating on all the different things.
Right well my peahen Ice, who I call a black shoulder, is from the zoo. Basically I know she could be split to who knows what. When I had my pied peacock Dragon, he bred with her. She hatched out three peachicks, all of which were girls. From this black shoulder x pied matting, I got a white peahen and two splits or dark pied birds. One had a white throat latch with some frosted white flight feathers and a few white wing feathers, the other just had a few small white flight feathers. For a long time I told myself that Ice had to have stolen the pied peahen's nest. Then I started to think that maybe Ice isn't just a black shoulder. Maybe she is split to something.
So would she be split to pied or something for those kind of chicks? I am not a genetics master and I really don't even enjoy working with split birds except for Peep.
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- #37
Yes Minxfox she is would have to be split to white or pied to throw the white bird. That one got one white from dad and one white from mom. If the others are truly dark pied and not just split to white or white eye, the black shoulder hen would have to be pied. I have, for two years, bred some pied birds to IB hens. About half have white throats and or flights and about half have no markings at all. Half must be split pied and half must be split white.
Show specific pictures if you have them.
Show specific pictures if you have them.
- Feb 19, 2012
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your peahen ice is definitely split to white ( showing or not showing any white flights or white throat patch ) which contributed one white gene to your white chick. and this white chick got the other white gene from the father who is pied. ( A pied bird carrys one white gene and one pied gene ) A white peafowl must derive two white genes , one from each parent, not two genes from one parent.The second chick that got white wing and white flights is likely a pied bird ( one pied gene from father and one white gene from lace, the mother ) The third chick is only split to white ( carrying only one copy of white gene). hence showing some white flight feathers. Just a note, A dark pied is one with just two copies of pied gene, one copy from each parent. In your situation only pied father is carrying one copy of pied gene which is passed on to one of the three chicks.
- Mar 20, 2013
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Wow....you all are trying to understand something which is actually rather simple once you understand the basic terms of the topic. But rather doing that, you're attempting to explain what happens without understanding those terms, and in effect you're making things WAY HARDER than they need to be. It's a bit like scratching your left ear by reaching your right hand over your head. I'll try explaining some things to make it easier.
OK, what determines which gene is dominant and which is recessive in a heterozygous bird (i.e. a bird with two different versions of a gene)? Well, this may not always be the case, but for the most part, it has to do with how the mutation affected the original "normal" version of the gene. Genes are instructions for assembling proteins, which are made up of individual amino acids. A mutation is a change in the sequence of instructions, resulting in a change in the resulting protein. If that protein is involved in the color or pattern (from a genetic standpoint, they really don't differ), then a change in that protein will result in a change in appearance -- IF there is no "normal" version of the protein being produced. Remember that in most cases, each chromosome in the pair will generate proteins. So if there's one chromosome with a mutated version, and the other with a "normal" version, then both versions of the protein will be produced.
Sooo.......what does that mean? Think of your standard India Blue as having "normal" versions of all the genes for appearance (color and patterns). Now let's take a color mutation -- Bronze, for example. This results from a mutation (i.e. change) in one of the "normal" genes which affect feather coloration. If a pea has one copy of the Bronze mutation of the gene and one copy of the "normal" version, it means that some of the "normal" version of that protein is still being produced, and will thus allow for the "normal" India Blue coloration to show. The Bronze version of the protein will still be produced, but for whatever reason, the "normal" version in just one copy is enough to fulfill the required amount of that protein to result in "normal" India Blue coloration. You can think of the recessive mutations as being somewhat "broken" versions of the protein which don't function as well as the "normal" version. Birds with no "normal" version will thus have the "broken" appearance of their color mutation (in this case, Bronze, which might be resulting from feathers lacking the structure to refract, or "bend", light from brownish-black to blue). Huh? Yes, peas don't have blue pigment. Their blue color results from melanin, which is brownish-black, getting "bent" from feather structure to appear "blue". If the pigment goes to the "wrong" part of the feather, or the feather structure is altered, they will appear "brownish-black". Think of it like following a recipe to make a cake, but altering one of the ingredients -- the result will probably be a bit different than if you used everything in the original recipe. That's what mutations are -- an ingredient change.
Now, let's look at a visual Bronze -- what do we have? It's a pea which lacks the "normal" version of the specific gene of which Bronze is a mutated version. So it doesn't make any of the "normal" version of that protein -- both copies of that chromosome generate the Bronze version of that protein. The result is that the "normal" India Blue coloration is unable to form, and the Bronze color we see is what happens when only the mutated version of that protein is available.
OK, so what about dominant or partially- or incompletely-dominant mutations? They are also mutated versions of the "normal" version of the respective genes, and they also produce proteins. We can think of the various white-spotting mutations (White, Pied, White-Eyed) as producing "interfering" proteins -- they make something that results in pigment being blocked from getting deposited in the feathers. How they specifically work is beyond this scope (and beyond what I know in these cases), but you can think of them as little erasers which get generated by the mutated genes. Peas with one copy of one of these "eraser genes" will show milder "erasing" than those with two copies. Why? Because more "erasers" are being generated, from each member of the affected pair. As breeders have discovered, the Pied and White "eraser genes" are alleles -- which means they are two different mutated versions of the same gene. One (Pied) seems to be symmetrical in its "erasing" pattern, while the other (White) seems more random -- and potentially "erases" more. Having two copies of Pied (and thus no "normal" versions of that specific gene, and also no "White" versions, since they are alleles) results in what breeders call "Dark Pied" peas (slightly erased, in symmetrical areas -- throat, primaries, etc.). Having two copies of White results in "completely erased of pigment" peas. Having one copy of Pied and one copy of White (and thus no copies of the "normal" version) results in what is called "Pied". What's tricky is figuring out if a pea with a couple white feathers is that way because it has one copy of Pied, or one copy of White, or some other reason -- and I think that's what causes the "surprise" offspring sometimes.
Getting to White-Eyed, it is also a type of "eraser", except that it is not an allele of Pied/White. This means it is a mutation of a different gene, and also has a different resulting appearance -- most of the "erasing" is confined to the train. It also increases its "erasing" when there are two copies of it (and thus no "normal" version of that gene). Having one copy of White-Eyed usually results in a pea with some white eyes and some "normal" eyes in the train, while those with two copies typically have all (or almost all) white eyes. It also means that, since it's not an allele of Pied/White, that a pea can carry both. Thus we can have birds with varying combinations of Normal/Pied/White (but with no more than two copies in total, since they are alleles) and Normal/White-Eye.
These mutations are not completely dominant because birds being split (or heterozygous) will show intermediate appearances -- birds with one copy of White will still show some India Blue coloration, and birds with one copy of White-Eyed will still have some "normal" ocelli. Mutations which are completely dominant (as of yet, I don't think they exist in peafowl, but they do in other birds) will need only one copy of the mutated version to override the "normal" appearance. An example would be the various dark-factors in other birds. One copy results in slightly darker coloration, two copies even darker. How do these work? Well, one possibility is that these genes affect the rate of production of other proteins, increasing their output. Or they produce a version of the protein which "works" by affecting feather structure, decreasing light refraction.
OK, then how does sex-linked work? Same basic premise -- except that the genes are on the Z chromosome. Female birds have one copy of the Z chromosome, and one copy of the W. Males have two Zs. Remember in the beginning about how even if a bird has one copy of a mutated gene, but still has one "normal" copy, that the "normal" expression can still be seen? Well, if a female has a mutated gene on the Z chromosome, she doesn't have a normal version elsewhere -- there is no other Z. Males, however, do, so they can still produce the "normal" version of the protein on the other chromosome. So males can be split, but females can't.
I'll have to get back to this later.....ta-ta for now.
OK, what determines which gene is dominant and which is recessive in a heterozygous bird (i.e. a bird with two different versions of a gene)? Well, this may not always be the case, but for the most part, it has to do with how the mutation affected the original "normal" version of the gene. Genes are instructions for assembling proteins, which are made up of individual amino acids. A mutation is a change in the sequence of instructions, resulting in a change in the resulting protein. If that protein is involved in the color or pattern (from a genetic standpoint, they really don't differ), then a change in that protein will result in a change in appearance -- IF there is no "normal" version of the protein being produced. Remember that in most cases, each chromosome in the pair will generate proteins. So if there's one chromosome with a mutated version, and the other with a "normal" version, then both versions of the protein will be produced.
Sooo.......what does that mean? Think of your standard India Blue as having "normal" versions of all the genes for appearance (color and patterns). Now let's take a color mutation -- Bronze, for example. This results from a mutation (i.e. change) in one of the "normal" genes which affect feather coloration. If a pea has one copy of the Bronze mutation of the gene and one copy of the "normal" version, it means that some of the "normal" version of that protein is still being produced, and will thus allow for the "normal" India Blue coloration to show. The Bronze version of the protein will still be produced, but for whatever reason, the "normal" version in just one copy is enough to fulfill the required amount of that protein to result in "normal" India Blue coloration. You can think of the recessive mutations as being somewhat "broken" versions of the protein which don't function as well as the "normal" version. Birds with no "normal" version will thus have the "broken" appearance of their color mutation (in this case, Bronze, which might be resulting from feathers lacking the structure to refract, or "bend", light from brownish-black to blue). Huh? Yes, peas don't have blue pigment. Their blue color results from melanin, which is brownish-black, getting "bent" from feather structure to appear "blue". If the pigment goes to the "wrong" part of the feather, or the feather structure is altered, they will appear "brownish-black". Think of it like following a recipe to make a cake, but altering one of the ingredients -- the result will probably be a bit different than if you used everything in the original recipe. That's what mutations are -- an ingredient change.
Now, let's look at a visual Bronze -- what do we have? It's a pea which lacks the "normal" version of the specific gene of which Bronze is a mutated version. So it doesn't make any of the "normal" version of that protein -- both copies of that chromosome generate the Bronze version of that protein. The result is that the "normal" India Blue coloration is unable to form, and the Bronze color we see is what happens when only the mutated version of that protein is available.
OK, so what about dominant or partially- or incompletely-dominant mutations? They are also mutated versions of the "normal" version of the respective genes, and they also produce proteins. We can think of the various white-spotting mutations (White, Pied, White-Eyed) as producing "interfering" proteins -- they make something that results in pigment being blocked from getting deposited in the feathers. How they specifically work is beyond this scope (and beyond what I know in these cases), but you can think of them as little erasers which get generated by the mutated genes. Peas with one copy of one of these "eraser genes" will show milder "erasing" than those with two copies. Why? Because more "erasers" are being generated, from each member of the affected pair. As breeders have discovered, the Pied and White "eraser genes" are alleles -- which means they are two different mutated versions of the same gene. One (Pied) seems to be symmetrical in its "erasing" pattern, while the other (White) seems more random -- and potentially "erases" more. Having two copies of Pied (and thus no "normal" versions of that specific gene, and also no "White" versions, since they are alleles) results in what breeders call "Dark Pied" peas (slightly erased, in symmetrical areas -- throat, primaries, etc.). Having two copies of White results in "completely erased of pigment" peas. Having one copy of Pied and one copy of White (and thus no copies of the "normal" version) results in what is called "Pied". What's tricky is figuring out if a pea with a couple white feathers is that way because it has one copy of Pied, or one copy of White, or some other reason -- and I think that's what causes the "surprise" offspring sometimes.
Getting to White-Eyed, it is also a type of "eraser", except that it is not an allele of Pied/White. This means it is a mutation of a different gene, and also has a different resulting appearance -- most of the "erasing" is confined to the train. It also increases its "erasing" when there are two copies of it (and thus no "normal" version of that gene). Having one copy of White-Eyed usually results in a pea with some white eyes and some "normal" eyes in the train, while those with two copies typically have all (or almost all) white eyes. It also means that, since it's not an allele of Pied/White, that a pea can carry both. Thus we can have birds with varying combinations of Normal/Pied/White (but with no more than two copies in total, since they are alleles) and Normal/White-Eye.
These mutations are not completely dominant because birds being split (or heterozygous) will show intermediate appearances -- birds with one copy of White will still show some India Blue coloration, and birds with one copy of White-Eyed will still have some "normal" ocelli. Mutations which are completely dominant (as of yet, I don't think they exist in peafowl, but they do in other birds) will need only one copy of the mutated version to override the "normal" appearance. An example would be the various dark-factors in other birds. One copy results in slightly darker coloration, two copies even darker. How do these work? Well, one possibility is that these genes affect the rate of production of other proteins, increasing their output. Or they produce a version of the protein which "works" by affecting feather structure, decreasing light refraction.
OK, then how does sex-linked work? Same basic premise -- except that the genes are on the Z chromosome. Female birds have one copy of the Z chromosome, and one copy of the W. Males have two Zs. Remember in the beginning about how even if a bird has one copy of a mutated gene, but still has one "normal" copy, that the "normal" expression can still be seen? Well, if a female has a mutated gene on the Z chromosome, she doesn't have a normal version elsewhere -- there is no other Z. Males, however, do, so they can still produce the "normal" version of the protein on the other chromosome. So males can be split, but females can't.
I'll have to get back to this later.....ta-ta for now.
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Thank you
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