Self Blue (Lavender) Silkie Thread

[sonew123]

Quote:
Bren,
Great explanations--very informative

 

[Three Cedars Silkies]

I think what many folks don't understand...and one reason lavenders are still pretty expensive...is that the average silkie doesn't reach sexual maturity until 8-9 months...sometimes longer. This means that you cannot get 2 generations in one year and it has taken Deb and Bren a LONG time to get where they are right now.

I would like to personally give kudo's and thanks to them for their persistence in developing this lovely color of silkie!!

 

[sonew123]

Quote:
Oh I know the waiting game. LOL...My babies are 1 yrs old-by the time I get the 2nd generation from them ( barely) it will be late Fall ( Oct-Nov) for sure if Im lucky

Bren and Deb have the most amazing birds and I could only wish for my babies to look even remotely close to them

 

[brenTx]

THANKS...I thought I was just bull headed.

Time goes fast and Deb and I both had a year we breed all year so that helped some. It took me nearly two years to get lavender showgirls out of all this when I really thought I could do it in 18 months. Time is a BIG factor creating any anything new.

 

[sonew123]

Quote:
Bull-headed? No way ...I dont mind waiting most of the time-It makes me really look -study them-and try to make the right choices-Somedays I would love to drop 200+ on a pure lav hen to get to a quick finish but then I get so much satisfaction out of knowing, once I reach pures, it's because I did it from scratch. Ive been incubating for the last 5 months as many as my splits as I can. I just want to make sure come Fall I have at least a few females. My luck Id get 20 roos and 2 girls~! Out of those 2 girls I might not even want to breed them for some reason or another...So everytime my bator comes up empty I have this thought of no pullets all roos and keep incubating them ...LOL

 

[debstein]

Hi y'all,
I'm not on this board often at all, and didn't have time to read all the posts in this thread, but bren asked me to chime in and help if I can. Her explanation is excellent, so I'm not sure that I can add very much. The important thing to remember is that lavender is a completely recessive color - it needs 2 copies of the lavender gene to express itself in the phenotype. So it must have lv/lv in order for you to SEE a lavender bird. If the bird only has 1 copy of lv, it will show as another color.

Donnie Eldred started the lavender project a very long time ago, and used a self-blue (lavender) bird of another breed - bred it to silkies and continued to breed until he produced lavender birds with silkie feathering, dark skin, 5 toes (most of the time), and correct comb. But they weren't good silkies by any means. Kind of looked like a hatchery bird. He gave me a trio of lavenders to work on - to improve type and get them ready to be shown and added to our breed standard. At first I crossed on white, because that is what I had at the time. The very best silkies I had were white. In hindsight - that was a mistake, and it probably added several years to the project.

I produced mutts, then bred the mutts back to lavenders and produced some lavenders, but since white covers other colors, it was covering buff and partridge and that showed up in the lavender as off color along the back and in the wings. I finally learned enough about genetics to realize that black was the best choice to cross the lavenders on, because it is a dominant color, and I bought a small group of decent quality blacks that were pure black - without blue hiding in the genetics.

When we crossed the lavenders on the blacks - we got splits - birds that were carrying BL/lv, 1 gene of blk and 1 of lavender. These birds had black phenotype, and usually had great pitch blk color with lots of green sheen. We still got some off color in the hackles, but since we were breeding for lavender, we didn't worry about that. I crossed the splits back on lavender and got 50% black splits and 50% lavender. Type improved - lavender color improved tremendously - using black provided even, beautiful lavender color with very dark skin and usually very dk combs.

I am not a genetics guru - I only know and truly understand lavenders. Donnie told me very early on that I did NOT want to cross the lavenders on blue or splash because they are a dilute. I know that some people are doing that, and then getting upset that their "lavenders" aren't breeding true. The fact is - if you breed 2 lavenders together - you WILL get lavender......if you don't, then one of the birds or both isn't a true lavender....that is genetics, pure and simple. It can't happen any other way. There are silkies out there that look like lavender, but genetically they are muddied splashes or some other genetic combination that resembles a lavender bird - and you can breed them all day long and you will never get a true lavender out of them because they don't have the genetics. So, know who you are buying from, know where they got their stock from, and know that they KNOW and understand the genetics. I'm not saying anyone is deliberately being deceptive, but there is a lot of misinformation and misunderstanding about the color. Lavender is NOT a new color, it's been around in other breeds for years and years. It's only new in silkies. When Donnie created his lavender silkies, he also created cochins and several other breeds, but because he couldn't find anyone who wanted to "perfect" them, those projects didn't continue. Donnie is a true genetics guru, and I call him a "mad scientist" - he likes to create things, but once they are created, he is looking for another challenge. For anyone who is interested, Donnie's current project is a standard sized silkie.

I hope this helps to clear up the lavender issue a little - I will try to follow this thread for awhile to see if I can answer anything for you.

Best regards,
Deb Steinberg

 

[sonew123]

Deb-another fabulous explanation. Thank you so much~

 

[Luvducks]

Quote:
Well put!!

 

[bacres]

So much great info! Im so glad that I made this thread. It not only helped me out a great deal but also everyone else who wants Silkies!

 

[Luvducks]

Quote:
You are right. Thanks!