Welsh Harlequin Phase question

[Fuchsia]

Hello so I was wondering about gold phase and silver phase WH. And I have a question. Can A silver phased WH Have gold phased babies or can a gold phased have silver phased babies?

 

[lomine]

Silver is dominate. So any duckling that receives a silver gene will be silver. If a duck is gold it means it has two gold genes. A pure silver breed to a gold will produce all silver. If you breed a silver that has one silver gene and one gold gene to a gold duck you'll get a 50/50% mix of each. If you breed two ducks that each have one silver and one gold, you'll get 75% silver and 25% gold. You won't really know if the silvers carry a gold gene (other than a DNA test ) until you see what color ducklings they produce.

 

[TomCahalan]

Silver is dominate. So any duckling that receives a silver gene will be silver. If a duck is gold it means it has two gold genes. A pure silver breed to a gold will produce all silver. If you breed a silver that has one silver gene and one gold gene to a gold duck you'll get a 50/50% mix of each. If you breed two ducks that each have one silver and one gold, you'll get 75% silver and 25% gold. You won't really know if the silvers carry a gold gene (other than a DNA test ) until you see what color ducklings they produce.

That isn't quite right. "Gold" harlequins express the recessive chocolate allele. The complication is that the chocolate gene is on the Z sex chromosome. Males have two Z chromosomes, so that means that they need two chocolate alleles to be gold. Females have one Z chromosome, so that means that they only need one to be gold, and that they need to get it from their father.

Therefore, if you have a gold father and a pure silver mother, you will get a mix of gold ducklings (all of which will be female) and silver ducklings (all of which will be male, and carry a copy of gold).

There is also the question of the Dusky gene. I believe that goldens have two copies of the recessive dusky allele, while silvers have two copies of the regular "mallard" allele.

 

[Fuchsia]

Thank you!

 

[ibarbidahl]

Tom's got it! Genetics are so much fun. LOL