The breed dictates the behaviour debate.

[Shadrach]

Apparently not with dogs.
I've never believed it does with chickens either.
https://www.nature.com/articles/d41586-022-01193-1

 

[Geena]

In well bred animals you should generally see a certain set of behaviors that are attributed to the breed. With random or poorly bred animals not so much.
With an across the board study such as that one, I would expect the results to be as they found. I think if you did the same study with only well bred animals you'd find each breed would have a lot more behaviors in common than not.

 

[Shadrach]

In well bred animals you should generally see a certain set of behaviors that are attributed to the breed. With random or poorly bred animals not so much.
With an across the board study such as that one, I would expect the results to be as they found. I think if you did the same study with only well bred animals you'd find each breed would have a lot more behaviors in common than not.

How would one define "well bred?"
You've presented a classic straw man arguement.
I'll go with the study.

 

[sdm111]

In well bred animals you should generally see a certain set of behaviors that are attributed to the breed. With random or poorly bred animals not so much.
With an across the board study such as that one, I would expect the results to be as they found. I think if you did the same study with only well bred animals you'd find each breed would have a lot more behaviors in common than not.

Which will never ever be seen in hatchery layers. It can even be seen in the roosters which are nothing more than the byproduct of breeding for egg laying volume. Most have zero or close to zero natural instincts left. It is very apparent when watching selectively single bred gamefowl. The gamefowl cocks you can see have all the natural instincts that they had centuries ago. They act more like a wild bird as opposed to layer roosters that act as though they lost all instinct and are kind of just there.

 

[Shadrach]

Which will never ever be seen in hatchery layers. It can even be seen in the roosters which are nothing more than the byproduct of breeding for egg laying volume. Most have zero or close to zero natural instincts left. It is very apparent when watching selectively single bred gamefowl. The gamefowl cocks you can see have all the natural instincts that they had centuries ago. They act more like a wild bird as opposed to layer roosters that act as though they lost all instinct and are kind of just there.

My experience has led me to believe that many, but not all, and none quickly, exhibit more natural behaviour in more natural keeping conditions.
It hasn't seemed to matter what breed in the very small sample I've studied.
It's a bit of a hard call to expect a male in your example to exhibt any natural behaviour given his provenance.
But, say you introduced one such male into an existing free range flock. Does he re-learn more natural behaviour, or are they there always, but suppressed?

What science I've read relevant to the subject suggests that certain behaviours are so deeply embeded that no amount of selective breeding can remove it.

 

[Geena]

Well bred meaning carefully bred to a standard and/or for a purpose, which would include various behavioral traits as well as conformation. Gamefowl are a perfect example of this with the well bred birds looking and acting in a very predictable manner.
With random bred animals like hatchery chickens you'll end up with something that's somewhat the size, shape and color it's supposed to be, maybe, but often sorely lacking in the finer points.
The only way to keep certain desired traits in a breed is to continuously select for them, otherwise you eventually end up with a more generic diverse animal.

 

[Shadrach]

Breeding for physical characteristics is rather different.
I have yet to see any evidence that it works for behaviour.
I think it's best not to confuse the two.
If one breeds a chicken to look a particular way that chicken will look that way no matter what external triggers there are and over time the looks won't change bar those brough on by aging.
This isn't applicable to behaviour because behaviour is modified to adapt to conditions. Change the conditions of any species that I know of and over time their behaviour will change so it's not fixed parameter.

 

[Mrs. K]

I don't think behavior is tied to a breed in chickens in layers. Layers have been bred more towards physical characteristics as to shape, color and egg laying. Same for meat birds - physical characteristic of size

Gamefowl, in my understanding were bred towards behavior. And perhaps is more closely tied to more predictable behavior.

I do think, that if the animal lives, a new situation can alter their behavior.

This is just speculation on my part.

Mrs K

 

[Geena]

By over time do you mean the lifetime of that animal or over time as in evolution?

I think it depends on how intelligent and adaptable the animal is as to how much it's behavior can be modified. Certainly environment plays a large part in how an animal acts and reacts. But I think you are confusing the two, one is innate behavior, the other is learned behavior.

You can most definitely breed animals for a certain set of behavioral characteristics and have them breed true. That's how we've been able to produce hunting dogs, guard dogs and lap dogs all out of the same basic genetic material, by choosing the particular behaviors that we wish to reproduce.

I don't think you can really equate dogs and chickens, or even say parrots and chickens though. Chickens are a more basic animal and don't necessarily possess the variety and multilayered behaviors you might see in some higher animals. And being prey animals they might be effected by their environment to an even greater extent, since it's probably more critical to their survival

 

[Shadrach]

By over time do you mean the lifetime of that animal or over time as in evolution?

I think it depends on how intelligent and adaptable the animal is as to how much it's behavior can be modified. Certainly environment plays a large part in how an animal acts and reacts. But I think you are confusing the two, one is innate behavior, the other is learned behavior.

You can most definitely breed animals for a certain set of behavioral characteristics and have them breed true. That's how we've been able to produce hunting dogs, guard dogs and lap dogs all out of the same basic genetic material, by choosing the particular behaviors that we wish to reproduce.

I don't think you can really equate dogs and chickens, or even say parrots and chickens though. Chickens are a more basic animal and don't necessarily possess the variety and multilayered behaviors you might see in some higher animals. And being prey animals they might be effected by their environment to an even greater extent, since it's probably more critical to their survival

Well, this particular point in the debate is going nowhere.
I hope these links might alter your perception of the chickens intelligence (whatever that is) and the complexity of their social interactions.

https://www.mdpi.com/2076-328X/8/1/13/htm
https://link.springer.com/article/10.1007/s10071-016-1064-4
https://papers.ssrn.com/sol3/papers....ssrn.com/sol3/papers.cfm?abstract_id=2066265

I may come back and deal with a couple of the other points you've brough up later.