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Well, we do not know that there IS a "paint gene," or if instead it is an allele of another gene, or is even a combination of alleles from several
different genes. The
working theory by those who have been breeding them for 10+ years is that paint is an allele of dominant white, and is dominant to the not-white (i+) allele. (Where it falls in dominance among the other dominant white alleles is not yet tested. Right now still testing to determine if it IS dominant white, as analyzed breeding indicates is most likely.) If paint is a dominant white allele, the postulated dominance could be stated as I > I^p > i+. Thus, if present it WILL show.
Using I^p to indicate paint, if each paint parent carries one copy of I^p, then 50% will inherit one copy of I^p, 25% will inherit 2 copies and 25% will inherit no copies. Under this scenario and theoreticized dominance, birds with one copy could be white or paint, depending on whether their other dominant white allele is I or i+; birds with two copies would be paint and birds with zero copies would be white or black depending on whether the other dominant white allele is I or i+.
I/I = white
I/I^p = paint
I^p/I^p = paint
I^p/i+=paint
i+/i+ = not-white (black)
Toss in other possible dominant white alleles, and you may have even more possibilities of expression, so I tried to simplify it by ignoring them here. Just realize that in real life they cannot be ignored, although laboratory smoky is very rare, and dun is still not common. Toss in that recessive white is common in silkies, and it could pop up even in lines that are thought to be dominant white, throwing off the percentage of whites.
Or at least one copie possibly two?? If both parents have two copies, all siblings must have atleast one copie, some two and it shows with the spots obviously but on the black offspring, they could have two copies as well but no one knows that yet because people admitted like Bren, to just selling off the blacks and not try breeding them.
By all means, please test to see if you can get paints from the black birds; if you can, it will dramatically change what is currently considered considered the most likely genetic theory of paints (by those that have been deliberately breeding them for many years). You are speculating that paint is recessive rather than dominant or incompletely dominant, and that a single copy does not express.
I'm pretty sure white will not come through on the black birds, so how would you know how many copies of the unknown paint gene the black offsprings are carrying. Maybe they carry two doses, but with no leakage how would one know? Say the blackndod carry 1 or 2 doses, wouldn't that be a viable addition to any paint breeding program to help push out more offspring with the paint gene? Why just sell them?
Once again, you are speculating that paint is recessive. You are also speculating that black (not-white or ?) turns off the expression of paint. Paint does not appear to act like a recessive gene, based upon the the outcome of percentages of breeding paints to blacks. For that matter, if it is recessive, in should NEVER express in the first generation of a cross between a paint and a black that did not come from a paint breeding heritage.
Now with that said and hopefully some Of it right ( correct me if I'm wrong I'm no pro and trying to learn to) if you breed the black offspring with one copy of the gene or possibly two, to white American silkies to improve type and continue working on the Paint Colour, then bred all babies back to the black carrier, a certain percentage would be carriers of the one copie of the paint gene and you should have some Paints or atleast 2 copied paint gene birds working 2 generations.
If paint is a recessive gene, and is carried hidden by the blacks from a paint heritage, half their offspring would inherit that hidden copy, and would also remove a copy of recessive white from that parent. Bred together, you would get paints in the 2nd generation.
Now I did not say that a certain percentage would have visible spots to the human eye, ( because of the whites possibly being recessive and not dominant that is) but wouldn't some of the white offspring be true paints, but if they are recessive whites and not dominant whites we would not know because they would not have any leakage from the recessive gene? I know that sounds confusing but Suze, please tell me if that makes any sense.
Recessive white CAN be leaky, but is less so than dominant white. One would generally expect that a bird pure for recessive white to not show paint. Breed a recessive white bird to a non-white bird and you should not expect white offspring unless the non-white is carrying recessive white.
On the flip side, maybe some white chicks will come out with spots, proving you wrong and showing that either one I AM SO LUCKY and have Dominant based american whites or I proved that recessive whites can have the spots come through. Then again, no one has any idea if the whites are recessive or dominant unless bred for several more generations because the whites don't hatch out of an egg with a name tag: "I'm Recessive" or "I'm Dominant" there is not physical way of know what anyones whites has without linebreeding correct?
There is a current breeding test that will show whether the whites are dominant or recessive. Should have results later this year.
