Chicken Colors 101 ???? PICS ADDED on pg 2

[blaundee]

Would anyone care to enlighten me? I would like to know the basics of "how to get the colors"... lavender, mille fluer, porcelain, so many colors that I never knew about, etc... what you can, cannot, should not cross different colors with, etc.... And what the differences are in some of the colors that look so clase, like wheaten and other brownish colors...


While you're at it, would you care to explain the different patters to me? Laced, penciled, etc... And HOW do you say what color a white chicken with gold edges on the feathers are?!?!? I would say "gold- laced" but apparently "gold laced" means that the feather is gold and has black lacing around it... I AM SO CONFUSED!!! LOL

 

[Chris09]

Quote:
MILLE FLEUR

e wh -- wheaten down color. Wheaten/whitish colored female. Male Red/Silver hackle and saddle, with a black breast.

s -- sex link gold, we want a red bird, not a white/silver one. Now we have a Gold Wheaten instead of a Silver Wheaten.

Co -- columbian Removes the black from the breast of the male. Now we have a Buff Columbian. Makes males and females the same color.

mo -- mottled. recessive 2 genes required. This adds the black bar and white dot. to the end of the feather. Now we have a Mille Fleur!!!

If we add one gene of Bl we will have a Blue Mille Fleur.

Take the same Mile Fleur that we just built. If lav -- lavender is added in 2 doses (it's recessive) we will have a Porcelain.

Mottled
E -- extended black down. Black male and female with red/silver in hackles and saddle

s -- sex link gold Mine have sex link gold, but silver would work.

mI -- melanotic. This covers the normally red/silver areas of chickens black. Now we have a black bird.

mo -- Mottled recessive so 2 genes are required. This adds the black bar (not seen on a black bird) and white spot at the end of the feather. A mottled bird is built.

If we take the Black bird designed above add Bl --Blue we will have a blue bird.

If we take the same Black bird designed above and add lav-- lavender ( 2 genes required as it is recessive) we would have a self blue.

If we take again the same Black bird designed above and add c -- recessive white( again 2 genes required as it is recessive) we would have a white bird.

If we take the mottled bird "built" above and add Bl --blue we will have a blue mottled.

So for any known color/variety of chickens it starts on the down color for the foundation. Then by adding different genes to enhance or restrict the red and black of the down color, we end up with the variety that we have.

Chris

 

[Boggy Bottom Bantams]

this will help you some. it's the chicken calculator.
put in the male color and the female color and follow the step by step instructions on the site. It will show you how and what each crossing will make

http://kippenjungle.nl/Overzicht.htm#kipcalculator


as for "making" lavender. I dont think you can make it, you can introdue it by cross breeding a lavender bird to your bird of choice though
millie fluer is basically a mottled x buff columbian bird
porcelain is nothing more than a millie fluer with the lavender gene. The lavender dilutes the body color and turns all the black feathers lavender

gold laced yes is gold with black lacing, white with gold?? never seen that, sound pretty though

laced, is just that, a solid colored bird with various colors that lace the individual feathers
penciled, same, but also in the center of the feathers, thin lines
cuckoo or bar are colors that have barring patterning threw the plumage
duckwings, all have a triangle color patch on the wing
crowwing birds dont have the patch, but males can be the same color as duckwings
birchens are similar, brown reds, silver birchen, all examples of this pattern
red pyles nothing more than a bb red with dominate white in it
goldneck, nothing but a millie fluer with dominate white in it
buff laced, nothing more than a gold laced with dominate white in it, etc

dominate white replaced all black feathers with white, and dilutes the body color

same with blue birds, replaced the black with blue and dilutes color, these dont breed true, the make 25% normal black phase, 50% blued phase, 25% splash/sport phase

same with duns as the blues, they make black, dun, and khaki in the same ration, dun is basically chocolate in color

with all these combos, color , and patterns choices, with proper breeding, you can make about any combo you want.

Hope that helps a little, it's not 100% sceintific, but should be easier to understand. Play with that calulator a while, you'll get the feel for it.

try crossing a bb red (partridge on the calculator) with millies, you get buff columbians

cross a dominate white to any of the colors I mentioned above, and you'll get the pyles, gold necks etc...

eventually, you'll get a base understanding of how it works. Using that shows you first hand and is easier to follow than typed out words, at least to me it is...

 

[Chris09]

Barring (Barred Pattern)

Barring (Cuckoo/ Dominique Pattern)

This link might help you out some if you are a new-be in poultry https://www.backyardchickens.com/forum/viewtopic.php?id=343605

Chris

 

[Henk69]

A few errors in the previous posts:

Wheaten and Partridge/Brown males also have the duckwing wing triangle.

Melanotic = Ml, dominant; mi is used for some form of recessive black/melanizer.

Extended black females are pretty black, the males are "rusty" with red/gold/silver leaking in hackle, shoulder and saddle.

 

[Coopa Cabana]

Quote:
I'm hesitant to post when the experts have already weighed in, but I'll throw my 2 cents worth in from my layman's point of view (and hopefully won't make too many mistakes):

As far as the patterns go, there are only 3 pattern genes: Pg (Pattern), Mo (Mottled), and B (sex-linked Barred). As I'm working with Golden-Laced, I found it interesting that there is more actually "going on" with a single laced pattern than with a pencilled or double-laced. If you start by adding just the Pg, you will get a "Pencilled" (sometimes referred to as Partridge**) patterned bird - it will have multiple lacing, but the base color of the bird will be at the edges of the feather. If you then add Ml (Melanizer), it will push the lacing to the outside edge of the feather, but you will still have multiple lacing, and it is a "double-laced". Then, if you add to all that the Co (Columbian) gene, all the black will be 'restricted', and pushed to edge of the feather, and give you single-laced. So my Golden Laced have Co, Pg and Ml.
**In Cochins, Pg on a Silver bird is called "Silver Pencilled". Pg on a gold bird is called "Partridge".
And all this works differently depending what building block (e-allele) the bird starts with, i.e. Golden Laced in Cochins are 'built' using eb brown foundations, and the tail is not patterned. But others, like Polish and Sebright, are built on ER birchen foundations, and the tails are patterned.

If you want "Blue Laced", you add a dose of Bl (blue), which will dilute all the black to blue. But because Blue is incomplete dominant and doesn't breed true, you can end up with some Splash Laced, and the lacing may look almost white. But I haven't seen any white birds with gold lacing.

 

[blaundee]

Oh boy!!! I haven't read the posts yet, I just now logged on and saw that I actually got detailed responses WITH PICS!!!! WOO HOO!!! Thanks everyone!!!

 

[Coopa Cabana]

Quote:
You should always "Subscribe" to any topic that you start - that way you'll always get emails whenever some posts to it!!

 

[blaundee]

Quote:
You should always "Subscribe" to any topic that you start - that way you'll always get emails whenever some posts to it!!

I do, but haven't been online since I posted

 

[Coopa Cabana]

What can you tell us about the white bird with gold lacing? Was it one you saw, or just heard about? Do you know what breed it was?