Silkie hatch results: what genes do my silkies carry?

house_hippo

Chirping
Mar 26, 2022
28
77
54
Canada
Hi all,

My first ever hatch has produced some unexpected (to me) chicks, and I was hoping that someone more knowledgeable could tell me what is going on here. I had anticipated a 50/50 white and black hatch, based on my rooster being a paint. I was clearly mistaken, and I think I had incorrectly identified one of my hens as silver. If anyone could identify the colours of the first two orange banded chicks, and the last blue banded chick, I would also appreciate that.

Thank you in advance! :)

Here are my hens:
20220329_105509.jpg
20220329_105445.jpg


My rooster (sorry for the blur)
20220329_105457.jpg


And their chicks. Orange band are from the buff hen, blue bands are from the "silver" hen, and the two un-banded I'm not 100% sure of (but I suspect both are from the "silver" hen based on the shade of the eggs they hatched from)

20220329_105325.jpg
20220329_105344.jpg
20220329_105355.jpg

20220329_105251.jpg
20220329_105304.jpg
20220329_105314.jpg

20220329_105404.jpg
20220329_105412.jpg
 
I had anticipated a 50/50 white and black hatch, based on my rooster being a paint. I was clearly mistaken
If paint is a black chicken with one copy of the Dominant White gene, then it's mostly caused by two genes: E (makes an all black chicken) and Dominant White (turns most of the black into white.) Both of those are dominant genes, and they mask the effects of many other genes, so there are many possibilities for what other genes he might have (that might show up in his chicks, depending on what combination each chick gets.)

I'm guessing the rooster has only one copy of E (makes an all-black chicken). Whatever other gene he's got there would be one that allows chicks to have other colors or patterns.

Or your rooster might have some pattern of black-and-white, with Dominant White then removing most of the black. That could also make him look paint, but allow some of his chicks to show other patterns.

Other than those guesses about what the rooster might have, I don't know what to say about the colors of the chicks. (And I might be wrong in my guesses about the rooster.)

The chicks certainly are cute!
 
If paint is a black chicken with one copy of the Dominant White gene, then it's mostly caused by two genes: E (makes an all black chicken) and Dominant White (turns most of the black into white.) Both of those are dominant genes, and they mask the effects of many other genes, so there are many possibilities for what other genes he might have (that might show up in his chicks, depending on what combination each chick gets.)

I'm guessing the rooster has only one copy of E (makes an all-black chicken). Whatever other gene he's got there would be one that allows chicks to have other colors or patterns.

Or your rooster might have some pattern of black-and-white, with Dominant White then removing most of the black. That could also make him look paint, but allow some of his chicks to show other patterns.

Other than those guesses about what the rooster might have, I don't know what to say about the colors of the chicks. (And I might be wrong in my guesses about the rooster.)

The chicks certainly are cute!

After some more research, it seems that the e^b gene for partridge might be carried by both my hen and rooster, since it's recessive they wouldn't show the pattern themselves. The blue chicks can be explained by my hen being some variant of blue/splash, which I just didn't predict because she looked more silver to me.

The extra variation is a welcome surprise. It's my goal to keep a flock where no two chickens look the same. I was only planning to keep 2-3 chicks out of this hatch but now I might have to keep a few more ;) Somethimg something chicken math...
 
Hi all, I thought I'd revisit this question now that one of my chicks from this post has grown out and his colouration has changed drastically!

20220611_003025.jpg


These photos are all of the same little cockerel, and to my knowledge he looks like a Colombian pattern? Here are his parents, a paint roo and a buff (I think?) hen. The lady has some grey/blue underfeathers so I'm not entirely confident in that. This pairing produced the three orange-banded chicks in my original post, as well as blue and black w/ silver leakage in another hatch.

20220611_003125.jpg

20220329_105457.jpg


So what do you think? TIA
 

New posts New threads Active threads

Back
Top Bottom