zebra finch, fawn

[Tibbs2346]

my finch had 3 babys a few months ago the male is a normal orange cheek and the hen is a CFW, 2 of the babys are black cheeks with all the normal markings, the other one is a fawn color with a yellow beek and black cheeks, from what i can tell its a hen, does anyone know what type of male i should use to keep the fawn color in there babys ? i will post a pic of her when i get a chance.

Thanx
Andrew

 

[AquaEyes]

my finch had 3 babys a few months ago the male is a normal orange cheek and the hen is a CFW, 2 of the babys are black cheeks with all the normal markings, the other one is a fawn color with a yellow beek and black cheeks, from what i can tell its a hen, does anyone know what type of male i should use to keep the fawn color in there babys ? i will post a pic of her when i get a chance.

Thanx
Andrew

Black Cheek and Yellow Beak are autosomal recessive mutations. For you to get Black Cheek and Yellow Beak offspring, both parents must be at least split to both mutations. This means your parent birds are both split to Black Cheek and Yellow Beak.

CFW and Fawn are sex-linked recessive mutations. To get Fawn offspring from parents that don't show Fawn, your male must be split to Fawn (females can't be split to sex-linked mutations). This also means that the Fawn offspring is a female, as Fawn males must inherit the mutation from both parents (for them to get it from Mom, she must be Fawn). Your male offspring might be split to Fawn, but you wouldn't know for sure without test-breeding.

Based on the offspring they produced, your mama-finch is CFW split to Yellow Beak and Black Cheek, and your papa-finch is Normal split to Yellow Beak and Black Cheek and Fawn. All your male offspring will be split to CFW. If all your offspring are Black Cheeks, then you really lucked out -- each would have only a 25% chance of being visual for this mutation if both parents are splits.

In order to obtain visual Fawn offspring from your Fawn hen, you will need a male that either shows or is split to Fawn. Your male parent zebra must be split to Fawn if he has a Fawn daughter, so you could breed the Fawn hen back to her father. Doing so, each offspring has a 50% chance of being Fawn, in both sexes. If you get a Fawn male offspring, breeding him to any non-Fawn female will give you Fawn daughters and non-Fawn sons (but they'll be split to Fawn).

You could also find an unrelated Fawn male (it's not a rare mutation). You might find zebra finches with combined mutations that include Fawn. Examples would be Fawn Cheek (Gray Cheek and Fawn), Dominant Cream (Dominant Silver and Fawn), Fawn Penguin (which are actually very cute...check them out), etc. If the additional mutations are autosomal recessive, you won't see them in the next generation unless your Fawn baby also happens to be split to them, but you will see the Fawn mutation come through since both parents would have it.

 

[Tibbs2346]

ok cool, i dont have any fawn males and there is nothing in the pet stores around here other than normals and no luck on the internet without driving all day lol, i do have a male that looks just like a normal orange cheek but his color is a lot softer gray should i put him with the yellow beak? he is in with a penguin hen(i think) right now.

Andrew

 

[Tibbs2346]

thats the yellow beak, she is almost 4 months old now.

those are the parents

 

[Tibbs2346]

these are the chick they have now, the one has white on its face and both wings, the other is that fawny/brown color

 

[AquaEyes]

It's kind of hard to tell a lot from these pics, but I'll give it a shot.

I don't think your Fawn is a Yellow Beak. Female Yellow Beaks have a more obviously yellow beak. In general, among the same colors, females will tend to have a paler beak than males, and younger birds will also have paler beaks. I haven't seen Yellow Beaks in-person, but all the pics on the net show a much clearer yellow -- about the color of a Masked Finch's beak. You might be seeing more of a difference from the others because the others are boys and she was the only girl. But, again, it's hard to tell from these pics.

Your male that "looks like a normal but a little softer" might be either a Light-Back or a Dominant Silver. If you had a pic of him I might be able to tell better, but those are two mutations I can think of that have a dilution effect without much change in pattern. In any case, because they are different from Fawn, if you used this male, the offspring will not be Fawn unless he also happens to be split to Fawn.

If you really want more Fawn but can't find any others to buy, could breed your Fawn female to her father. Doing so, half the female offspring will be Fawn and the other half not, and half the male offspring will be Fawn and the other half split to Fawn. Breeding a Fawn male to any other color will give you Fawn daughters, so you'd have to inbreed only until you got a Fawn male offspring, and then outcross to an unrelated bird.

Or, you could breed any other male to her. The sons will all be split to Fawn. If you bred one of her sons to any other female, half of the female offspring will be Fawn. You won't get any male Fawns this way, and not all the females will be Fawn, but it's another way. To get a male Fawn, you'll have to breed a Fawn female to either a Fawn male or a split to Fawn male.

Flip through the varieties on the web pages below and see if you can sort out what you've got. And look at the pics of Yellow Beaks to see if you agree with me about that.

http://www.efinch.com/varieties.htm

http://zebrafinch.com/NewZebra/Zebra.html

 

[Tibbs2346]

it is alittle hard to tell the beak from that pic but i have another hen that was born a week after her that i will try to get a pic of them sitting beside each other.

Andrew

 

[gem tae]

Hi my zebra finches layed four eggs which hatched a week ago for the last three days there's been a dead one thrown out the nest is this normal as it's the first time my birds have layed eggs has anyone got any tips on helping them an having surviving birdies