Quarter Bantam Chicks

[eoneill2k]

Interesting one here for you all! My hen is hatching out the last of the first clutch sired by my bantam/bluebell cross rooster, and this little gal has (barred rock mother) has one of her mams feet and one of her dad's never seen anything like this before! Much as I am prone to worrying, I'm fairly confident this is nothing to be concerned about, but it was interesting enough that I thought I'd share it here ^u^

 

[CloneFly]

Interesting one here for you all! My hen is hatching out the last of the first clutch sired by my bantam/bluebell cross rooster, and this little gal has (barred rock mother) has one of her mams feet and one of her dad's never seen anything like this before! Much as I am prone to worrying, I'm fairly confident this is nothing to be concerned about, but it was interesting enough that I thought I'd share it here ^u^
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Wowza!

 

[TwoCrows]

Very interesting, keep us posted on this little one!

 

[BlueTheBrahma]

The polydactyly (extra toes) allele is dominant, so only needs one copy to be expressed. It seems that she has one copy, but for some reason it hasn’t affected the other foot, maybe because she doesn’t have a second copy of the allele it isn’t as strong. I’ve have purebred silkies that have four toes on one and five on the other, and then another with five toes on one foot and six on the other (he’s called Footloose because he looks like he has an entire extra foot attached to his leg).

P.S I love her green legs, they look like little Dino feet.

 

[eoneill2k]

The polydactyly (extra toes) allele is dominant, so only needs one copy to be expressed. It seems that she has one copy, but for some reason it hasn’t affected the other foot, maybe because she doesn’t have a second copy of the allele it isn’t as strong. I’ve have purebred silkies that have four toes on one and five on the other, and then another with five toes on one foot and six on the other (he’s called Footloose because he looks like he has an entire extra foot attached to his leg).

P.S I love her green legs, they look like little Dino feet.

That's so interesting! I only have a very vague idea of how genetics work (begins and ends with punnet squares haha) so it's cool to know why her feet may have turned out like this! There was another chick with the same feet (sadly passed) but the other two that have hatched so far either have two bantam feet (two bantam parents) or two regular feet (presumably only the bantam rooster and a barred rock)

 

[BlueTheBrahma]

That's so interesting! I only have a very vague idea of how genetics work (begins and ends with punnet squares haha) so it's cool to know why her feet may have turned out like this! There was another chick with the same feet (sadly passed) but the other two that have hatched so far either have two bantam feet (two bantam parents) or two regular feet (presumably only the bantam rooster and a barred rock)

Yes, if you understand punnet squares I can explain it like that. The polydactyl allele is Po, mostly dominant, the recessesive, normal version is po. (P was taken for pea comb, so that’s why it is shortened to Po.) The roo is Po/po, hen is po/po, so the punnet square is this:

——- Po.—--po. ———

po. Po/po. po/po

po. Po/po. po/po



As you can see, there is a 50% chance the chick has the dominant gene, but it is never homozygous (Po/Po) which would make the gene stronger and increase the chance of both feet having more toes. Not all birds with only one copy will have only one extra toe, some will still have two, it just depends on how they develop.

 

[eoneill2k]

Interesting one here for you all! My hen is hatching out the last of the first clutch sired by my bantam/bluebell cross rooster, and this little gal has (barred rock mother) has one of her mams feet and one of her dad's never seen anything like this before! Much as I am prone to worrying, I'm fairly confident this is nothing to be concerned about, but it was interesting enough that I thought I'd share it here ^u^
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Chick four is hatched out! I'm fairly confident her mother is the buff barred rock hen, Jaffa, and she has the standard three toes + back claw. I'll look her over properly in the morning, but I'm very curious to see her claws specifically, as Jaffa has a minor birth defect regarding one toe on her right foot, which is missing a claw.
This is the second chick for whom I was able to think of a name straight away - this is Tobacco (Tobi for short ). Thought of how three in four tobacco plants are green, while the fourth is white due to [punnet square shenanigans] and given that the other three chicks are black and she's blonde, it just made sense!