White silkies with other color genes hidden ??? more pics, page 3

[Krys109uk]

Blues are laced, which is a combination of Pg & Ml, so partridge can percolate out of the mix if the bird in het for Ml (Pg was passed to the offspring, but not Ml). The best lacing is hom for both Pg & Ml, so if the blues have wide lacing or lacing only at the tips of the feathers, they are het for both Pg & Ml or for Ml, respectively.

Blues silkies are laced? I didn't know. (Not that I know much about silkies anyway.

) Are they laced as in single lacing or double? But if silkies are eb wouldn't restrictors push the blue into the single or double lace leaving gold (or silver) background?​

 

[Sonoran Silkies]

In the US all blues are laced, or at least supposed to be laced.

Single lacing. Think of the colour of a blue andalusian or a blue cochin or a blue ... That is the way blue silkies are supposed to be coloured. Dark blue lacing with lighter blue ground colour.

For the e^b background to be clear you need melanizers--that is why gold or silver in the hackles is often a problem--not enough melanizers. It isn't the genes the bird has--it's the ones that are lacking.

 

[Krys109uk]

You mean with proper lacing like on Andalusian blues?
Wouldn't it be easier to have blue silkies on E?

The only eb blacks I've had were black leghorns & never messed around with restrictors on those. So with eb blacks with the eumelanising genes are not affected any more by Co with Pg-Ml than would be an E bird? How interesting. Have I got that right?

 

[jossanne]

Wow, I've got so much to learn. So my one blue chick in this hatch, how do I tell if it's "pure" blue? If color bleeds through the blue, obviously. If no color bleeds through, do I have a good chance of having "pure" blue? That will breed true? If I get b/b/s chicks from another source to breed it with, because my original goal was to have only b/b/s, how do I know if this one is good to breed with? Just trial and error?

 

[Poulets De Cajun]

Looks like Suze has this one covered....

Although we did hear a good saying this weekend:

"what's white should be left white..."

And thats from the mouth of a degreed poultry geneticist...

 

[Heather J]

My head is spinning! I seriously need to take a crash course on chicken genetics for dummies because I got totally lost when you all started spouting off initials and letters for various traits. It means absolutely nothing to me!

But I want it to mean something. Any suggestions?

 

[jossanne]

Quote:
I'm with ya on that one! I think I got the general gist of it, but not the deeper meaning. One of these genetics gurus needs to write that Chicken Genetics for Dummies book for us...

 

[Sonoran Silkies]

How much general genetics knowledge do you have?

Except for the sex-linked genes, all birds have two copies of every gene, one inherited from each parent.

Each gene has two or more alleles, or alternatives.

If both alleles are the same, the bird is homozygous for that allele. If they are different alleles, the bird is heterozygous.

The alleles for each gene have an order of dominance. If an allele is dominant, it will override the presence of a less dominant allele, and you won't even know that it is present. If an allele is recessive, it will only make its presence known if the other allele present in the bird is identical, or even more recessive. If an allele is incompletely dominant, the traits exhibited in the bird are intermediate between the more dominant allele present and the more recessive allele present.

Genes are abbreviated with specific letters, usually one or two, but occasionally three. When there are multiple alleles, superscripts are used to indicate the various alleles (often written with a carot (^) preceding the superscripted characters when the text does not allow real superscripts). Dominant alleles are written with an initial capital letter; recessive alleles are written with an initial lowercase letter. Wild-type is identified with a +.

Bl is the dominant blue allele; bl is the recessive not-blue allele. E is the dominant extended black allele, E^B is the dominant birchen allele, E^Wh is the dominant wheaten allele, e+ is the recessive wild-type (aka duckwing) allele, e^b is the recessive brown (aka partridge) allele.

All alleles for the blue gene are written with the letters bl--the difference is whether the B is upper or lower case. All alleles for extended black are written with the letter e--the difference is the characters, if any after the ^ and whether the E is upper or lower case.

There are many genes; each researched gene has an identifier such as Bl or E. However some genes are not well enough researched for this. Their affect can be seen, but exactly how they work and their sequencing, and even if it is one or multiple genes that cause the efffect are not clear.

All the alleles present in a bird work together to create the bird's appearance.

 

[jossanne]

Quote:
WOW, that's a great explanation. I have a VERY basic understanding of genetics. Like Punnet squares basic. I had no idea about the alleles, and I've been confused when people have said a bird is hom or het for something (I know that is homozygous and heterozygous). I've always over-simplified genetics, thinking two genes from every parent means only those Punnet square options. But then I've been confused by all the variety shown by my own 6 children - how can one look like my Uncle Roger, and the other look just like my brother, when I look just like my mom? The alleles thing really explains that to me, finally. Thank you!

So now I've got to do a deep study of alleles. I really need to understand this if I'm going to get into silkies like I want to.

One last question - can this bluish brown partridge looking baby have gotten the blue from a blue parent and the partridge from a white or black? The blue and splash parents of my chicks have no other colors bleeding through that I can see in the pictures.

 

[jossanne]

I'm looking at one of the partridge-ish babies, and it definitely looks like it has blue in its brown. What a weird concept - bluish brown. It's going to be darling.

I guess I'm going to talk to the lady I bought my eggs from, to see what generation her birds are from the sources she got them, and see what pens she's had her colors with. She says she's as clueless about the genetics as I am, so hopefully we can figure this out together.