The Moonshiner's Leghorns

[KF0002]

Yeah it's been awhile. I think my question on that was a few years ago.

I will have to dig the thread up.

 

[KF0002]

There will be extras in the group. When I moved everyone out of the 2nd pen that the coon broke into there was a hidden nest. I pulled the babies and added them to the Silver Ameraucana. I heard peeping from that pen last night and four more eggs had piped with one half hatched. Moved them to the incubator and three have hatched the other piped one didn't make it. But dam eggs hatching with out a momma on the for over 24hrs.

That’s because it has been so hot and humid there. Kind of a blessing. But that is awesome!!

 

[KF0002]

I think it's the cream one. That's how I could tell the golden Phoenix from the silver Phoenix as chicks. This was per nicalandia.

Do you have pics of the silvers vs goldens? The goldens should look gold based duckwing at hatch, correct?

 

[NagemTX]

Do you have pics of the silvers vs cream? The goldens should look gold based duckwing at hatch, correct?

I think I still have the pictures and yes the look like gold based duckwing and the silvers are much lighter.

 

[NagemTX]

Pictures! Can you tell the difference?

 

[KF0002]

Pictures! Can you tell the difference?

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View attachment 4147936

Yes I can! But you can see how whatever diluter gene the Goldens have has disrupted the chipmunk markings on the Golden chick's neck and back. The head stripe is broken up and not a continuous mark down the back of the neck, and the lighter colored stripes in between the darker stripes is wider on the back. Very interesting to see a side-by-side comparison as it provides evidence that the likely diluter gene is Ig since Cb does not disrupt the chick down pattern.

 

[KF0002]

My hypothesis is that my Recessive White Legbar rooster was genotypically Golden Crele underneath the recessive white with Cb (or even possibly Di?) on a gold duckwing base, but perhaps only heterozygous for it? That would explain why some of the chicks are diluted, while some are not and appear regular undiluted gold duckwing based crele. Half of them inherited their sire's single copy of Cb (or Di since both are autosomal dominant), while the other half didn't. It is possible the Legbar line has any combination of Cb, Di, and Ig, but since Ig is autosomal recessive, it wouldn't show up with only one copy even if all of the chicks inherited it from the Legbar rooster.

Additionally, I have read how silver birds like SDWs or Dark Brahmas for example are believed to have diluters such as Ig, Di, or Cb to create a clean silver, as it further dilutes any autosomal red that shows through the silver, since silver does not completely dilute or eliminate autosomal red. Autosomal red shows up on silver birds as a yellow in the shoulder/wing/back areas without extra diluters to clean it up to a pure silver color. Any line of clean silver birds is sure to have additional diluter genes at play for them to have clean silver without yellow. It is all very interesting.

Sorry to geek out on this.

 

[NagemTX]

My hypothesis is that my Recessive White Legbar rooster was genotypically Golden Crele underneath the recessive white with Cb (or even possibly Di?) on a gold duckwing base, but perhaps only heterozygous for it? That would explain why some of the chicks are diluted, while some are not and appear regular undiluted gold duckwing based crele. Half of them inherited their sire's single copy of Cb (or Di since both are autosomal dominant), while the other half didn't. It is possible the Legbar line has any combination of Cb, Di, and Ig, but since Ig is autosomal recessive, it wouldn't show up with only one copy even if all of the chicks inherited it from the Legbar rooster.

I have read how silver birds like SDWs or Dark Brahmas for example have diluters like Ig, Di, and Cb to create a clean silver, as it further dilutes any autosomal red that shows through the silver, since silver does not dilute or eliminate autosomal red. Autosomal red shows up on silver birds as a yellow in the shoulder/wing/back areas without extra diluters to clean it up to a pure silver color. Any line of clean silver birds is sure to have additional diluter genes at play for them to have clean silver without yellow. It is all very interesting.

Sorry to geek out on this.

There is also the gen involved in sunbleaching. I have two clean silver Ameraucana but one will bleach out and the other won't. I know I've read about it in a few different places but I don't remember exactly.

The one that bleached out starts out with pure crisp silver white after a molt but as time goes on and more sun exposure happens the more the white will yellow. If no sun exposure he stays crisp white silver.

 

[NagemTX]

Oh I do know that alot of people who show white birds keep them out if the sun for that reason. That same bleaching can show up in other colors as well. Turns blue into a dull brownish brassy look and on lavender it shows up as a brassy look as well.

 

[KF0002]

There is also the gen involved in sunbleaching. I have two clean silver Ameraucana but one will bleach out and the other won't. I know I've read about it in a few different places but I don't remember exactly.

The one that bleached out starts out with pure crisp silver white after a molt but as time goes on and more sun exposure happens the more the white will yellow. If no sun exposure he stays crisp white silver.

Hmm that is interesting. And I read that there are diluters at play that have not been genotyped or mapped out yet so a lot of chicken genetics still remains unknown, and that may definitely be one of them.

We have raised the line of SDW games we have for many years. Prior to us bringing in a fresh rooster from the same line, but from a different breeder, the line had beautiful snow white silver with ZERO autosomal red, no wheaten genetics, and no Silver Ginger sports ever cropped up. My husband and I have recently been talking about it and he suspects that the rooster we brought in several years ago had been infused at some point in his ancestry with some type of Brown Red based bloodline, or Pumpkin Hulsey for the Db to be introduced, and then back crossed to the SDW side, but not all of the genes from the outcross were eliminated from all of the birds. The rooster we brought in shows obvious signs of autosomal red and being a heterozygote for Db upon closer look, now that I understand the genes and what to look for. I never really noticed before, but he has never been a clean silver like our original stock. He has the yellowing signs of autosomal red even right out of a fresh molt. So he doesn't have the diluters that the original SDW birds had, or the autosomal red was introduced and not completely bred back out. Our original SDW roosters were clean silver but would all become yellow with sun bleaching as their feathers aged and got weathered.