Wierd comb

[teaton]

Anyone see a rooster develop a comb like this? Is it ok? Harry is a 2 month old production red cockerel.

 

[Ridgerunner]

Boy that’s weird. Two months is too young to tell a lot about the comb but that just looks weird.

There are two basic comb genes, the pea and the rose. If you do not have a pea or a rose, you get a single combed chicken. A pea without a rose gives you a pea comb, though that is an incompletely dominant gene so if the chicken only has one pea at that gene pair, you can get a wonky kind of comb, to single but not totally pea either. If the chicken has a rose and no pea, it has a rose comb. If it has both pea and rose it has a walnut comb.

But chicken genetics are never that simple, there are always complications. There are modifying genes that may cause a comb to be big or small, upright or flop over. There is one that causes a Vee comb, it kind of looks like the chicken has horns. There are gene combinations and modifiers that can give you a buttercup comb. You might want to do a search on Vee combs and buttercup combs or just look through this.

http://www.chickenforum.com/9-Comb-Types-Recognized-by-the-American-Poultry-Association.html

I don’t know what is going on there but it will be really interesting when that comb develops.

 

[Kev]

telescoped comb. Usually seen on rose or pea comb so it;s a little unusual to see it on a single comb.

Basically it is a defect where the rear part of comb is "inverted" into a hole instead of growing out normally. Considered a serious and disqualifying defect on the show bench.

It doesn't harm or is an indicator of something else wrong with the chickens with it, though..

 

[teaton]

Aw man! I kept him to keep as a breeder, but i guess not, he will just have to be a yard guard chicken lol Thanks I had no idea what that was!

 

[teaton]

When he gets older i will have to post new pics so we can see how it grew and if we were right.

 

[Kev]

Updated pictures would be great as this is a rather unusual case of it being on a single comb. There are pictures online and also on byc.. do search for telescoped comb or inverted comb. Most of the pictures will be on pea or rose comb. Not sure why it seems to be much rarer on singles.

 

[donrae]

Anyone else want to grab hold of that inverted part with a tweezers and just pull it out straight?

 

[teaton]

I haven't thought about that but it does look stuck, like it tried to grow out but stopped lol

 

[Kev]

Haha yeah it's a little disturbing to see it like that..

 

[julesconnor]

I have a new chick with the same thing! I hope she's a girl - I call her Opal and she is very friendly! I think she is a Plymouth barred rock.