Buff Orpington Pekin Cross

[LeanneCW]

We've had an accidental clutch of chicks hatch from a white pekin who had been kept free range with a Buff Orpington Cockerel (she ran off and hid in the bushes, took a while to find her and by then she'd been sat a while on a big batch of eggs.

They started hatching and now I have so many questions!

Will the chicks grown up to be a mix of their parents - so like a giant pekin? Or do they pick up dominant attributes from one or the other parent?

Also colouring - do Pekins usually (if they are kept with same pure breed coloured pekin) produce offspring the same colour as them, or can you get any of the pekin colours from any of the hens?? And what will happen with this Buff thrown in to the mix??

The chicks have all come out very similar colouring - all this lovely grey, with mottled faces. Does that mean they will all be the same colour when they are older, and is it possible to tell from the chicks what that colouring might be? Could a grey chick end up being white, or would that need to be a white chick to start with?

We had quite a few losses from the hatch, one was born with egg sack attached and 3 just seemed to pass within the first 24hrs for no apparent reason. Could the cross be bad, or is this just unlucky? Mama hen also seemed to give up after she had 4 and I'm not sure she kept them all tucked in, two were found dead in the morning out at the side of her nest area. A heated area is also available in the hutch. Yesterday she booted a freshly hatched chick out and refused to look after it, it seemed quite weak, but I'm not sure if it was just because it was new. I've been attempting to keep that one going by hand feeding egg yolk and water, but it looks like that one is loosing the battle too. There were 5 more eggs which we've now moved to an incubator as I'm sure she's decided she's got enough chicks and is now on looking after chick mode, rather than hatch mode. I'm not sure they will hatch now either as she'd stopped sitting on the eggs. Basically lots of drama, but 4 very healthy looking 3-5 day old chicks, 4 others died and 5 unhatched eggs in the incubator.

Lots of questions, but any thoughts or tips appreciated!!

Has anyone else done this cross?

 

[Lady of McCamley]

Lots of questions indeed. First, congratulations to momma. This obviously was a totally unplanned hatch in a less than ideal place and situation.

What I think you are experiencing is a small bantam on a lot of eggs with a lot of those eggs not kept at ideal temperature, due to the momma being small and the clutch large, thus the weak chicks. I doubt seriously it is due to the cross itself, unless someone had unhealthy genes (unlikely if both parents are healthy).

Also you had a staggered hatch. The hen would have collected/laid those eggs indiscriminately rather than having them all set at the same time, thus you had early hatches (chicks now at day 3 to 5) and those just hatching out later. Most hens give up after day 2 on those eggs that haven't hatched to take care of the babes who have as they need food and water. Younger chicks are weaker and more vulnerable once mom starts moving around.

As to size, my personal experience breeding a bantam Cochin to a Barnevelder rooster was 3/4 size offspring.

Coloring depends on the genetic laws of color dominance, and I'm not sure why you have dark/grey blue chicks who look like they will be predominately dark with white markings. You said you had a white Pekin and a Buff Orpington rooster???

This is where it gets interesting. My understanding (and I'm sure if I'm wrong someone will correct me) is that Buff is recessive and takes two genes. White can be recessive and need two genes or it can be dominant needing only one gene. Coming out with dark-grey chicks from a white hen indicates to me that your hen was recessive white not dominant white. Current coloring can hide a lot of genetics "under the hood," so you'd have to know the backgrounds of these birds to figure out why they came out this color...or another rooster may have been the father, if that's possible. It is important to note that both breeds come in many, many colors, which may explain the chicks. I'm not surprised by the white recessive Cochin hiding colors but I am a bit surprised the Buff Orpington was hiding colors. (Others will correct me here.)

Typically your dark grey/black chicks with white bellies will come out predominantly black or mostly black with white markings. If that is indication of diluted black (blue), then they will come out predominately blue/grey with possible white markings. They honestly look like the coloring of Black Australorp chicks, LOL, who grow up totally black.

So I think it is safe to say you will have mostly dark grey/blue or black chicks, with feathered feet, straight combs, probably 3/4 size. The body feathering will be interesting if they take more after the soft Cochin folds which is possible as the BO has a similar soft tail pattern.

Should be hardy good layers. Good luck.

LofMc

 

[Lady of McCamley]

Looking at closeup on your hen, she is not true white, so I'm not surprised she has colors hidden. Is it possible she is a splash? (I can't tell in the photo if she has any soft grey splots anywhere). If she were splash, then of course all the chicks would come out blue.

LofMc

 

[LeanneCW]

Oh wow, thanks for the reply, that's all really interesting and helpful. Our 9 year old daughter is main chicken girl of the house, so this is also a great opportunity to go through some basic genetics in real life examples. How fascinating it all is.

I'm now also really intrigued about the background of the parents. The buff cockerel we hatched ourselves from a friend that I know has A LOT of different types of chicken types, I've not been to his place, but looking at the other eggs we hatched from him I think they are all mixed together so there's a chance the Buff is hiding something! I'll post some pictures at some point, but he has two feathers in his tail that have a brown streak..

The white pekin was bought from a breeder, so definitely just pekin, but I don't know if she could be dominant white or double recessive. She's much more white in real life, her feathers are still recovering from her rather wet and muddy her stint in the bushes. We have photos of her too from when she was new that I can dig out. I'm almost tempted to contact the breeder as I'm finding it all really interesting.

We do, just to confuse things, also have a cuckoo coloured pekin hen knocking about in the same area, I never saw her near the nest area and it was too far away from the coop for Snowy to have moved the eggs, but who knows, maybe the cuckoo snook in when we weren't looking and laid a few?

To be honest I was amazed any hatched as we'd literally never seen the rather slow and goofy buff on any of his girls, they could all be up to all sorts when we are not around.

I like the sound of 3/4 orping sized blue pekins though, so that would be fab. Any colours would be really, they're all adorable. Mainly got all our fingers and toes crossed for not too many cockerels!

Also, what to call them Pekingtons? Porkingtons? Puff Eekingtons?

 

[calicocows]

i like the sound of puff eekingtons