Bielefelder mix chicks- auto sexing?

[Fluster Cluck Acres]

I have 2 Bielefelder mix chicks. Mom is Biele. Dad is a black mix of mostly orpington. I believe this means the chicks’ colors are sex linked since Bieles have barring?

Am I correct in my thinking and can anyone tell me what traits I should be looking for to tell the difference? I have 2 this hatch but also have more on the way in the next couple weeks. These 2 look very different, so I’m thinking one female and one male, but which is which?

If the coloring is anything like Welsummer, I think the chick on the right with the prominent markings is female? And the more muddled colored chick on the left is male?

 

[NatJ]

As far as whether the hatcheries vent sex their autosexing breeds, I have no clue, but that is an interesting question

I have read that at least some hatcheries do vent-sex the autosexing breeds, because that avoids problems with chicks that aren't clearly the male or the female coloration, and it may sometimes be easier to have the vent sexers do those chicks too than to train someone else to recognize the correct traits.

It probably varies from one hatchery to another, and a hatchery might change from one year to another as well (for example, a change in how many vent-sexers they can employ would cause a change in whether it is worth handling the autosexing breeds differently.)

 

[pipdzipdnreadytogo]

As everyone else has said, the head spot that indicates barring is white or yellowish. It's most obvious in black chick down, and other chick down colors can muddy the expression of it, especially in single-factor barring like what females would have in autosexing breeds and like what males would have in barring sexlink crosses.

Example, here is a Barred Plymouth Rock bantam pullet with a clear head spot (she is black barred, her leg band was blue and that's why I wrote blue on the picture )

This is sort of not a great picture, but I don't have many that even show the tops of their heads, unfortunately. Anyway, this is a Bielefelder pullet that you can see has barring in her feathers, but no visible head spot in her chick down:

 

[NatJ]

Sorry. This was supposed to ask about silver and white, not black.

White is a color you see on the chicken. There are a number of different genes that can cause white, plus a few more that cause colors light enough to look "white" in some situations.

Silver is caused specifically by the Silver gene, that turns gold/red shades into white. So it is white caused by a specific gene, rather than white caused by any other gene.

Dominant White is a gene that turns black into white.

Because chickens often have patterns of gold and black, you can find white in different places depending on which kind of "white" is present. For example: if you start with a Gold Laced Polish, you can add one kind of white to get a Silver Laced Polish (black edges on white feathers), or a different kind of white to get a Buff Laced Polish (white edges on gold feathers), or both to get a White Laced Silver Polish (which just looks white, so rather pointless to care if it is laced or not, unless you are trying to predict what chicks it can produce.)

Recessive white is a gene that turns all colors into white, but because it is recessive you only see the effects when a chicken inherits this from both parents.

Silver and Dominant White tend to be a bit leaky. Extreme examples would be Paint chickens (Dominant White with lots of black leakage) and Salmon Faverolles (Silver, but they sure do not look white!)

Recessive white tends not to leak as much.

The barring gene causes white stripes across the feathers, and the mottling gene causes white tips on feathers (or sometimes white on more than the tips).

Splash does not seem to cause a nice clean white, but it certainly does cause some light color that is close to white.

Lavender also causes light colors (black becomes a light gray, red becomes a light yellow.)

Cream is a gene that dilutes gold to a light yellowish shade. That can sometimes look almost-white as well.

 

[MysteryChicken]

I have 2 Bielefelder mix chicks. Mom is Biele. Dad is a black mix of mostly printing. I believe this means the chicks’ colors are sex linked since Bieles have barring?

Am I correct in my thinking and can anyone tell me what traits I should be looking for to tell the difference? I have 2 this hatch but also have more on the way in the next couple weeks. These 2 look very different, so I’m thinking one female and one male, but which is which?

If the coloring is anything like Welsummer, I think the chick on the right with the prominent markings is female? And the more muddled colored chick on the left is male?

If father is solid, & mother is Barred then yes, they'd be sexlinked.

Males would have a headspot, & females won't.
Both chicks appear female.

 

[pipdzipdnreadytogo]

Dad is a black mix of mostly printing.

Was this autocorrect or is this something I'm just not familiar with?


Head spots are funny on down colors other than black and can be pretty tough to see in some cases. Female Bielefelders, Legbars, and other autosexing breeds are barred and often don't have a visible head spot in their chick down despite that, for example. Personally, I'd hold out until they start getting wing feathers before determining what their sexes are based on that trait, as the barring may be more apparent in actual feathers than the head spot is in the chick down.

 

[Fluster Cluck Acres]

Males would have a headspot, & females won't.
Both chicks appear female.

That would be awesome. I mostly just hatch roosters, haha! The head spot would be white, right?

 

[NatJ]

What color would this head spot be? I’m not making any drastic decisions based on gender at this point, but I’m that person that can never stop guessing- even with non sex linked chicks.

When barring causes a head spot, the spot is white or yellow in color (like on the heads of Barred Rock chicks, or on male Bielefelder chicks.)

Some chicks have dark markings on their heads (like one of yours does, or random-looking dots of actual black on some chicks I have seen), but those are not a "head spot" when talking about barring.

 

[MysteryChicken]

That would be awesome. I mostly just hatch roosters, haha! The head spot would be white, right?

White, or yellowish white.

 

[Fluster Cluck Acres]

So my chick with the darker markings on the head seems like it has a be a pullet. The more muddled chick does not have any obvious white spot, but does have some patches of silvery type down on the head (not quite where the head spots should be). So I'm thinking female for this one, too, as @MysteryChicken already suggested. But I'm feeling a little less confident with this one.

Anyone else have have opinions about how accurate this headspot is - particularly on lighter downed chicks? I've read that some of it has to do with breeding and genetics and birds that are bred to be more obvious to sex as chicks- whereas birds bred for other reasons (like mine) may be harder to determine/less accurate due to smaller/camoflaugued headspots (sort of Like @pipdzipdnreadytogo mentioned). My Bieles are hatchery quality (Hoovers) and my roosters are random homebred mixes. One roo is black and one is (I think) splash.

I also have a semi of off-topic question and I have no idea if anyone knows the answer- do the big hatcheries still vent-sex their auto sexing chicks? In particular the breeds that are a little less obvious like the Bieles or the legbars?