Turkins

[beepbeepinajeep]

I have one late egg (day 24) that is getting ready to hatch from a naked neck egg. It appears to have very little feathering. Maybe some on the wings, but the body appears to be completely clear of feathering now. Is this something that happens frequently?

 

[Kev]

Wow that's a very late egg. Is it your first naked neck chick?

It's not normal or common for them to hatch truly naked, with fuzz only on wings. But it is normal for the chicks to hatch out looking 'very naked' when the down is still completely wet.. still should see some fuzz on top of head, in a line down the back, some on the legs.

Many adult naked necks are very naked all over their bodies except you can't really tell due to having long soft feathers draping over the naked areas.. picking one of those up and looking closely can give a big surprise.

As newly hatched chicks they seem to show nothing on their breasts/bellies/butts and a pencil thin line of down on their backs. Even those always have the little down cap on top of their heads though.

Wait until the chick dries out.. if it really does not have down cap on top of head at the very least, then it's an unusual case. There are other genes that cause more extreme nakedness not related to the naked neck gene- one being scaleless. If you have seen pictures of the completely naked chickens in Israel, those have the scaleless mutation. It's called scaleless because those birds lack the scales on the legs/toes also.

Other genes can interact with the normal naked neck to make a little nakeder chicks such as pea comb.

 

[beepbeepinajeep]

Not my first naked neck chick. The rest hatched day 20/21 & one on 22. It looks really wierd....

The others I hatched... some naked neck, some cochins, some cochin/naked neck mix.

 

[Kev]

A bit hard to see in pic & light wet down against light skin.. kind of looks normal to me(especially for naked neck with peacomb).. has cap, down on legs, and possibly the pencil thin line of down down back. Does it have a pea comb? If it has pea comb, it will explain the 'extra nakedness'.. as mentioned above, pea comb makes naked necks a little more naked.

 

[beepbeepinajeep]

You could even see the internal organs through the thin skin. I just glanced through the window and saw no breathing movements, so I don't think it made it.

It just didn't look anything like the other turkins that hatched out. It makes me sad that it made it out and still didn't make it...

 

[Kev]

Aw how sad. Chicks have very thin skins and sometimes it is possible to make out some of the organs.. eventually the skin thickens and you can't see anything.

Still don't know if they are pea combed or not.. the live chicks have the look like my own pea combed naked neck chicks had(like the naked ring around the eye, small and narrower cheek fuzz patches and larger bare area between cap and beak etc).. I don't recall making birds pure for both naked neck plus pea comb, so I am wondering if that one chick that might have not made it was possibly just a chick pure for both..?

It's quite freaky if a naked neck also has the gene for black skin, but for whatever reason it does not darken the surface skin.. but it still darkens some of the internal organs.. had a few with clear skins but at the same time their trachea, skull, neck bones and vent area are clearly visible with help of their being colored in various tones of grays and blacks. It's almost like seeing a live x-ray demo with those.