Silked Serama??

[ElizH]

I bought Serama hatching eggs from a breeder two years ago and have been hatching chicks from them since. None of my birds are silked and I have never had a silked chick. Out of nowhere, one of the last chicks to hatch was silked. How does the silked gene work with Seramas? Does this mean one of my adults carries the silked gene?

Will post pics of parents & chick this afternoon!

 

[nchls school]

S i l k i e d is a recessive trait. In order for a ch i c k to have this trait it has to get the jeans from both parents. Two of your birds have the silkied gene. This has been dictated on my cell phone pardon love mystics instrument usage. Maybe good for a laugh!

 

[nicalandia]

Silkie Seramas are a thing, the silkie mutation can hid until it appears when two parents are at least heterozygous for it.

 

[Tonyroo]

Silkie Seramas are a thing, the silkie mutation can hid until it appears when two parents are at least heterozygous for it.

Does that apply to full size having bantam size?

 

[nicalandia]

Does that apply to full size having bantam size?

Yes

 

[ElizH]

S i l k i e d is a recessive trait. In order for a ch i c k to have this trait it has to get the jeans from both parents. Two of your birds have the silkied gene. This has been dictated on my cell phone pardon love mystics instrument usage. Maybe good for a laugh!

How interesting! I have hatched out probably 60+ Seramas and have never had a silked one, and only 3 of my birds are from the original hatching eggs at this point, so you'd think the chance of getting a silked chick now would be even lower. How interesting! I would have thought at least one of the parents would need to be silked in order to have silked chicks.

 

[ElizH]

The silked chick.

Parents:

 

[Noellereagan]

Here's how it happens (my silkied won grand champion female and reserve champion male at SCNA nationals on 1/14/23 and grand champion female at the same national show in 2022):
One of your birds had to carry the recessive silkied gene to start with (written Aa). So if you cross that on a smooth (written AA) you get 100% smooth silkied carriers (Aa). Now, you cross that offspring back to the Aa parent, for example, you'll get half of them silkied (written aa) and half of them Aa or smooth, silkied carrier/ recessive silkied/ look smooth but carry the gene. Also, if you ever want to purposely breed silkied- one sure fire way to do it is silkied to silkied. All you can get from that cross is 100% silkied. So now that you have the recessive gene in your flock, you have to be very careful And likely outcross lines known not to carry the aa gene. Silkied isn't like frizzle where one parent has to have the genotype (physically present with the trait) in oder to continue or stop producing offspring that carry it. Or in other words- one parent has to BE a frizzle in order to produce a frizzle. Silkied can lay dormant and pop out down the line like it did for you.I find prospective buyers aren't crazy about smooth silkied carriers. They usually want smooth or silkied. Not one in the same with surprises. If that all makes sense.
I will say this: some people are crazy for the silkied Serama! They sure are cute little chicks! But most People looking for a Serama don't want silkied. Especially in colder climates like here in Wisconsin. There's no way a silkied Serama would survive the Midwestern winter because they can't trap heat like hard feathered birds can. In my experience, for whatever reason, silkied Serama lines tend to be smaller than normal, if not micro. Not the case always but usually among show quality lines. My champion this year is micro weighing in at 7.9 ounces (micro females are allowed to be up to 8 ounces). I've included some photos of my Pamela - this years national champion female. I hope this helps.