OK thanks everyone for your opinion and comments. I do agree it does look very yellow especially compared to the white chicks that were just posted. IDK this is my first year with these paticular birds and so far I have hatched nothing from this pair but black and blue so was just very suprised to get this chick. It looks like a jumbo version of your typical easter chick LOL. I will def keep everyone posted and as soon as wing feathers come in I will post pics again and again to keep everyone posted as it grows. Would be odd if it feathered in black or blue but who knows. Parents r 13 months old and I checked them out thorughly today for any buff or red leakage and couldnt find a single off colored feather nor do any of the older chicks I have hatched have any off colored feathers except some of the splash ones from the other pair r feathering in white but have dark feet legs and beaks so thinking some blue will come in those later as they hatched light grey. If in deed this chick is a buff I will still be very happy and its parents are hideing it very very well LOL. Its still very neat that I got such an off colored chick from this pair and am looking forward to the rest of the hatching season. Who knows maybe it will repeat itself or I will get some other sports. I dont show and am just happy to have them.
Adorable, lovely baby! I hope it grows up to be a healthy, big bird to give you many years of joy.
K everyone this is the oddball white orp chick. The lighter is just for size comparison and looks like it injured the top of its beak in the bator while I was gone. Not exactly fluffed up all the way and for some reason my camera is not showing color true to life. The pillow it is on is actually orange for example but looks red for some reason in the photos. So what's everyone think.....white orp?
Hey Nellie, That was not all of my post, don't know what happened, but I have had 1 person tell me they have had a splash come out of a blue to black mating, so I guess anythings possable. but that chick looks splash to me.Not possible with a black to blue breeding is it?
K everyone this is the oddball white orp chick. The lighter is just for size comparison and looks like it injured the top of its beak in the bator while I was gone. Not exactly fluffed up all the way and for some reason my camera is not showing color true to life. The pillow it is on is actually orange for example but looks red for some reason in the photos. So what's everyone think.....white orp?
Genetically it is impossible for this chick to be Splash. It just can't be. A Black bird cannot give a copy of the Blue gene necessary for it's offspring to have 2 copies of the Blue gene (1 from each parent) in order for it to be Splash. So there's just no way it's Splash IF it's parents are a Blue and Black Orpington. Are you 100% sure this chick hatched from a Black X Blue mating? Could there have been any potential pen hopping or maybe a chance that it hatched from different birds and you just confused the egg?
Theoretically it could be white, genetically it would be recessive white. Both parent birds would have to be carrying the rec. white gene and the genetic roll of the dice would have to land just right but it could happen... the fact that it looks yellow could just be because of whatever other genes are present in the birds, I've seen many pictures of white chicks as day olds that don't look white. Some look yellow, some look gray like you would expect a Splash chick to at hatch to look and others look like a combination of the two I just described and others look pure white. Again it just depends on what other genes are in the birds background. I used to breed Delawares and they are a pale yellow at hatch similar to the color of this chick and yet they feather in predominantly white. I wouldn't say it's not a white just because it has yellow down.
The only thing you can do is wait and see how it feathers in, if he or she is white then congratulations, you've got the beginning of a new white line. They will be recessive white, which means they might leak color, but with selective breeding you can clean them up. It will also be beneficial to know that the chick's parents are carrying recessive white, something you didn't know before. To produce more white chicks simply breed this chick back to it's mother or father, depending on it's gender.
Here's a crazy thought too... you did mention that this bird was out of Julie's line, right? Have you considered that maybe it's Mottled? Julie just recently posted some pictures of some Mottled birds she was working with a few years ago, Maybe the gene went unnoticed in a solid colored bird and was recessively propagated for generations without knowing it and you got lucky breeding the two birds together that you did? For the naysayers who are going to say that the down color is wrong don't jump the gun... Mottled Japanese bantams start out completely white/yellow as well and then eventually feather in black and white. So it could be...
That crazy thought made me think of another crazy thought... Julie, maybe the reason you had such difficulty breeding the Mottled birds was because they weren't actually Mottled at all but were actually just recessive white? That might explain why they would start out partially white and then molt solid black. At least I'm pretty sure that could be the cause... I need to talk to some folks who are more versed on white genetics but that may very well be the explanation.
Okay, I'm done thinking aloud now... sorry for my rambling everyone.
