The Legbar Thread!

[ladyfaeden]

My Gold Legbar hen has been laying off-white eggs lately, but laid a nice cream color egg four days ago (a lot more brown color than the off-white eggs).  My wife said that the hen was on the box for a long time the day the cream egg was laid and that the hen really labored to get the egg out.  So...my explanation is that the longer the egg is in the oviduct of the hen the more brown pigment that is coated on the egg.

Since the brown pigment is what turns a blue egg green, it is likely that it took longer for your Cream Legbar pullet to pass the egg through the oviduct the day you got the green egg than the days you get the bluer eggs. 

Ah! That makes sense. Thanks!

 

[cjwaldon]

I just broke a broody Legbar using the wire cage method. Took three days for her to get the message.

 

[madamwlf]

I'll be putting her into a cage tonight. Already have another broody hen in a cage.

 

[blackbirds13]

I found a copy of Morley A Jull's Poultry Breeding, Third Edition from 1952 - it is my summer reading book (wish it were on my Kindle Fire). I am trying to learn about breeding and genes in poultry.

This is what he states
" Warren and Conrad (1942) showed that, although some pigment is deposited on the shell the entire time the egg is in the uterus, from 50 to 74 per cent of the pigment is deposited the last 5 hours before oviposition, or laying of the egg. It was also shown that the amount of pigment in the shells of eggs is roughly proportional to the amount of time the eggs have spent in the uterus. The Araucana's blue-tinted eggs vary from the lightest to the darkest tints. Even among the white-shelled eggs of Leghorns, tinted shells sometimes appear." ....

"Genes for darkest-colored shells exhibited dominance over genes for lightest-colored eggs..." - good to know if you breed Marans like I want to.

"The blue shell color of the Araucana proved to be dominant to white shells in tests conducted by Punnett (1933)"

"The heads of Silkies, Houdans and Polish fowl are adorned with crests. There is considerable variation in size of crest, those on Polish being much larger than those on Silkies. The crest develops in the frontal region of the skull, is present in the chick, and is inherited. The crested conditions results from the fact that the frontal bones of the skull are raised into a dome-shaped protuberance, giving rise to a condition know as cerebral hernia.
The results secured by various workers, from Hurst (1905) to Dunn and Jull (1927), led to the general conclusion that the development of the crest is due to an autosomal dominant gene, Cr. Variation in crest size is apparently due to multiple genes. From the results secured by Warren and Hutt (1936), it was concluded that cerebral hernia is in reality homozygous crest, although hernia may not be evident in quite a high proportion of the Cr Cr birds, but is sometimes present in a proportion of the Cr cr birds."

He also says that cream plumage gene is autosomal (so not sex linked) and a diluter of gold.

There is also a section on Autosomal Barring where he talks about Campines - silver and gold and how the silver variety is dominant to the gold and I wonder if this has any bearing on the white chicks we are seeing. He points out how the white and golden-bay bars and the black and golden-bay bars are" different due to a single gene, ab, suggested by Hutt (1949)". My two legbar girls have different hackle colors - my layer has a darker more tan/gold tint while the youngers hackles are whiter, more cream/silver. I wonder if this is gene related and helps to account for the white sports? Maybe not exactly like the campines (i am not gene expert)

"The Silver variety has black and white bars, the Golder variety black and golden-bay bars and the Chamois variety has white and golden-bay bars. Since the plumage of the Silver variety is dominant to that of the Golden variety, Punnett (1923) pointed out that the white bars of the Silver variety are due to the action of agene which inhibits the development of golden bay. Punnet then pointed out that the plumage of the Chamois is dominant to the plumage of the Golden variety, the difference between white and golden-bay bars and black and golden-bay bars being due to a single gene, ab, ...It is apparent, then that the golden-bay bars of the Chamois variety correspond to the golden-bay bars of the Golden variety, and that the Chamois variety contains a gene which inhibits the development of the melanic pigment contained in the black bars of the Golden variety. Chamois variety contains a gene which inhibits the development of melanic pigment contained in the black bars of the Golden variety. Therefore, a cross between the Silver and Chamois varieties should produce white birds, which Punnett found in the case."

I just found it interesting and may or may not have anything relevant to the Legbars but thought I would share. Hope I have not bored anyone.

 

[ronott1]

I found a copy of Morley A Jull's Poultry Breeding, Third Edition from 1952 - it is my summer reading book (wish it were on my Kindle Fire). I am trying to learn about breeding and genes in poultry.

This is what he states
" Warren and Conrad (1942) showed that, although some pigment is deposited on the shell the entire time the egg is in the uterus, from 50 to 74 per cent of the pigment is deposited the last 5 hours before oviposition, or laying of the egg. It was also shown that the amount of pigment in the shells of eggs is roughly proportional to the amount of time the eggs have spent in the uterus. The Araucana's blue-tinted eggs vary from the lightest to the darkest tints. Even among the white-shelled eggs of Leghorns, tinted shells sometimes appear." ....

"Genes for darkest-colored shells exhibited dominance over genes for lightest-colored eggs..." - good to know if you breed Marans like I want to.

"The blue shell color of the Araucana proved to be dominant to white shells in tests conducted by Punnett (1933)"

"The heads of Silkies, Houdans and Polish fowl are adorned with crests. There is considerable variation in size of crest, those on Polish being much larger than those on Silkies. The crest develops in the frontal region of the skull, is present in the chick, and is inherited. The crested conditions results from the fact that the frontal bones of the skull are raised into a dome-shaped protuberance, giving rise to a condition know as cerebral hernia.
The results secured by various workers, from Hurst (1905) to Dunn and Jull (1927), led to the general conclusion that the development of the crest is due to an autosomal dominant gene, Cr. Variation in crest size is apparently due to multiple genes. From the results secured by Warren and Hutt (1936), it was concluded that cerebral hernia is in reality homozygous crest, although hernia may not be evident in quite a high proportion of the Cr Cr birds, but is sometimes present in a proportion of the Cr cr birds."

He also says that cream plumage gene is autosomal (so not sex linked) and a diluter of gold.

There is also a section on Autosomal Barring where he talks about Campines - silver and gold and how the silver variety is dominant to the gold and I wonder if this has any bearing on the white chicks we are seeing. He points out how the white and golden-bay bars and the black and golden-bay bars are" different due to a single gene, ab, suggested by Hutt (1949)". My two legbar girls have different hackle colors - my layer has a darker more tan/gold tint while the youngers hackles are whiter, more cream/silver. I wonder if this is gene related and helps to account for the white sports? Maybe not exactly like the campines (i am not gene expert)

"The Silver variety has black and white bars, the Golder variety black and golden-bay bars and the Chamois variety has white and golden-bay bars. Since the plumage of the Silver variety is dominant to that of the Golden variety, Punnett (1923) pointed out that the white bars of the Silver variety are due to the action of agene which inhibits the development of golden bay. Punnet then pointed out that the plumage of the Chamois is dominant to the plumage of the Golden variety, the difference between white and golden-bay bars and black and golden-bay bars being due to a single gene, ab, ...It is apparent, then that the golden-bay bars of the Chamois variety correspond to the golden-bay bars of the Golden variety, and that the Chamois variety contains a gene which inhibits the development of the melanic pigment contained in the black bars of the Golden variety. Chamois variety contains a gene which inhibits the development of melanic pigment contained in the black bars of the Golden variety. Therefore, a cross between the Silver and Chamois varieties should produce white birds, which Punnett found in the case."

I just found it interesting and may or may not have anything relevant to the Legbars but thought I would share. Hope I have not bored anyone.

Thank you for this!

I am amazed that breeders figured this stuff out all those years ago before Gene Mapping.

Ron

 

[debs_flock]

I did it, I did it.....................I've read the whole thread start to finish.

(I don't know if I'll ever make it all the way through the Icelandic thread).

Now I have no excuses, back to chores for me.

Deb

 

[GaryDean26]

I found a copy of Morley A Jull's Poultry Breeding, Third Edition from 1952 - it is my summer reading book (wish it were on my Kindle Fire). I am trying to learn about breeding and genes in poultry....


...I just found it interesting and may or may not have anything relevant to the Legbars but thought I would share. Hope I have not bored anyone.

One of the professional forms that I am on lets you award people with starts when they post helpful information. I feel like I need to award Blackbird13 a start.

Crested breeds are new to me and I only have one word for how cresting is created. Wow!

 

[ronott1]

Quote: I clicked on the thumbs up icon at the bottom and added to her reputation. To see this, you have to go to the original post.

There was a post saying they were going to add reputation to our profiles. Of course that was two months ago.

Ron

 

[Wolf-Kim]

Ugh, I have a Legbar hen trying to go broody on me.

Stick the other hens eggs under her and see if it's the other non-broody hen that's throwing the sports.

 

[GaryDean26]

I clicked on the thumbs up icon at the bottom and added to her reputation. To see this, you have to go to the original post.

There was a post saying they were going to add reputation to our profiles. Of course that was two months ago.

Ron

Done!