Silver Laced Wyandotte question

[fancywyandottes23]

I’m looking into getting into breeding high quality silver laced Wyandottes. I’ve gotten a ton of stock from chicks and hatching eggs all over the country from select breeders. I have a couple of questions, if anyone could help me out?

1. I recently hatched some eggs from a reputable farm specializing in LF SLW. Some came out with feathered feet, and I contacted and they stated “it happens with Wyandottes.” From my guess. It sounds like Cochin was introduced, which leads me to the question are these viable to even keep, or should I cull them? If any of the birds look decent and can be retained, is the feathering feet hard to breed out, or would it eventually be phased out?


2. One of the breeders has chicks with smut / peppering in the laces. Some are very nice in form and other SoP areas. Question is, is that hard to breed out down the lines? Or should I keep getting birds that have good genetics but no peppering?

Thanks

 

[Auntiejessi3]

@Amer @Poultrybonkers

 

[EggSighted4Life]

I contacted and they stated “it happens with Wyandottes.” From my guess. It sounds like Cochin was introduced, which leads me to the question are these viable to even keep, or should I cull them?

They were correct and it's a known issue to those who've been breeding them for a very long time... one of those recessive genetic things that pops up from the original breeding of other breeds together until what eventually became Wyandotte. All current so called pure or recognized breeds were created by breeding other things together is my current understanding.

Some sources site Brahma in the background..

https://livestockconservancy.org/about-us/conservation-successes/wyandotte-chicken/#:~:text=WYANDOTTE CHICKENS&text=Their origins are uncertain but,Wyandottes have also been bred.

Others site possibly some Cochin or Langshan in the background.

https://agraryo.com/poultry/wyandotte-chicken-breed-all-you-need-to-know/

Some say Seabrite while others say Hamburg were used..

Sorry I don't have answers to the rest of your questions. but I do have a really good suggestion.. which is find and join some Wyandotte breeders clubs (even if just one season/year).. you'll likely find much more involved specific information in MY experience than all the fantastic general information you will find here on BYC.

I found another thread where you're asking questions about the low fertility or alleged slow sperm motility caused by breeding generations of pure rose comb..

https://www.backyardchickens.com/threads/cackle-hatchery-show-type-silver-laced-wyandotte.1487205/

I wonder have you read any studies or done any of your own.. I've seen reports suggesting that the limited studies (I'M) concerned about and referencing were or may have been flawed.. I mean the rosecomb breed, is it known for fertility issues also? Or are we perpetuating misinformation? Sincere questions to myself also.

I do hope you will get more feedback, and also wish you well breeding anything quality.. it's a challenging and lengthy but worthy prospect.

 

[Poultrybonkers]

I wouldnt keep anything with feathered feet as those are bym. As wyandottes shouldnt have feathered shanks at all. As for smut..im not even sure what that is

 

[fancywyandottes23]

I wouldnt keep anything with feathered feet as those are bym. As wyandottes shouldnt have feathered shanks at all. As for smut..im not even sure what that is

Not sure what to call it. I’ve seen the term peppering and smut. I’m still new at it. Are these black specks in lacing an easy thing to breed away from, or should it be culled? She’s prob the best form of all of them.

 

[fancywyandottes23]

I wouldnt keep anything with feathered feet as those are bym. As wyandottes shouldnt have feathered shanks at all. As for smut..im not even sure what that is

The previous poster stated very pure bred Wyandottes are known to produce feathered feet. This was also what the breeder stated. So which is true?

 

[Poultrybonkers]

The previous poster stated very pure bred Wyandottes are known to produce feathered feet. This was also what the breeder stated. So which is true?

Pure wouldnt need other breeds mixed it to them. Even if they started from other breeds that would of been bred out decades ago. If they have feathered feet then those breeders are selling mutts as pure bred. I wouldnt buy any stock that had feathered shanks period

 

[Poultrybonkers]

Not sure what to call it. I’ve seen the term peppering and smut. I’m still new at it. Are these black specks in lacing an easy thing to breed away from, or should it be culled? She’s prob the best form of all of them.

Ive never seen that before but seems easy to breed out if paired to a nice rooster.

 

[EggSighted4Life]

The previous poster stated very pure bred Wyandottes are known to produce feathered feet. This was also what the breeder stated. So which is true?

Pure breds are also known to produce straight combs.. I didn't say I would keep them (and I probably would not as feathered legs is a dominant trait, according to my limited understanding. But I also wouldn't knowingly keep an obvious straight combed despite it being recessive to rose)..

As noted by the other poster feathered legs or feet are not accepted parts of the standard for Wyandotte and basically a DQ.. (also maybe seen more by breeders of rare color like gold or silver partridge), they should select AGAINST it.. I was mostly trying to mind my own business and let you make YOUR best judgement call for YOUR breeding program.. I cull anything that doesn't meet SOP. I just happen to have bred enough to see some things pop up that should not and are not seen in the parent stock (eye color, clean shanks, etc)

Also I'm (was) going under your direction they were a "reputable breeder".. so I gave them the benefit of the doubt and defended that as you being an inexperienced keeper new to breed not knowing it was a possibility and making your own assumption regarding Cochin. If however they gave you ANY reason to question that then, maybe you should. DId you see their breeding stock? Please use your best judgement.

If my flock was throwing them.. I'd probably be test mating to eliminate that parent(s) from my breeding stock. I would only ever eat the offspring that hatched with it. I wish I could remember the user name who breeds them and has seen it..

The hard fact of breeding.. very little of what hatches is worth keeping for breeding (1-10%). To me, combining so many lines means bringing together so many different faults and problems to try and work out under the desire of avoiding inbreeding most likely.. but sometimes snowballing issues instead of fixing them. When how many of those folks got their original stock form the hatchery as well, maybe the same hatchery.. and if not them then the "breeder" before them. Aside from trying to let folks have their adventure, there is almost always a counterpoint to anything I express since life is complex and fantastic!

How many pens and birds (hens/roosters) are you planning to keep total? Are you planning to do line breeding, spiral mating, or ??

 

[DarJones]

Rose comb from the R1 gene whacks a section of a gene that reduces sperm motility dramatically. Not something to disagree over, this one is easily proven in your own chickens. Put a rose comb rooster with a hen for 3 days, then put her in a separate pen with no roosters and collect her eggs. Date them, hatch them. See for yourself that they will hatch for 5 days and sometimes for 7 days but that is the limit. Straight comb chickens remain fertile for up to 3 weeks.

That is not the whole story on Rose Comb. The R2 gene is basically a repair job where the original R1 mutation had the section repaired for the sperm motility gene. Chickens with R2 show fertility more typical of straight comb chickens. Such repair jobs are typical in the chicken genome. It is a result of crossover during cellular division at the pachytene pairing stage. Basically, a rose comb inversion on chromosome 7 swapped a segment with a normal chromosome 7 and the result is rose comb with repaired sperm motility. I asked someone with the ability to do DNA tests to figure out a test for the chromosome 7 inversion that produces rose comb. It is very difficult as the test must detect the points of inversion, not just the rose comb gene. There is a strong probability it can still be done though may take another year or two.

Feather feet is a strong DQ for SLW. It should not be there and if it is, the breeder is not doing their selection work. High quality SLW should have very strong very sturdy feet with no toe-curl and no feathers.

I started with SLW from Jerry Foley (foleyswaterfowl.com). I highly recommend getting some birds from him but with one huge caveat. His chickens carry a comb modifier that turns rose comb into a flat rose comb. If true rose comb is your goal, you will have to breed out the extra gene. He uses the extra comb modifier gene to produce exceptionally good hens. His roosters technically are docked a few points because the comb is flat rose. I have to point out that flat rose is significantly better in a cold climate than rose comb.

Also, the salt and pepper speckling on feathers is from a gene typically found in the partridge phenotype. That gene can be very difficult to eliminate. I've spent the last 5 years culling chickens that carry it. I got it from the Brown Leghorns that laid blue eggs which I crossed with SLW to move the oocyanin gene into a SLW background.