Leg color

[Bearpaw]

Curious

Is black/slate leg color domiate over green leg color?

[bryngyld]

Green happens when there is a yellow gene and a slate gene.  Slate needs to be over white.

I think of green or willow legs as being half way to slate if you crossed to yellow legged birds.

The question should be \"is yellow dominant over white?\"

[Jean]

White skin is dominant and yellow skin (which causes green legs) is recessive.

It is hard to get rid of unless you are certain you never breed with two birds that have white skin, but may be carrying the recessive trait.

[Bearpaw]

Green happens when there is a yellow gene and a slate gene.  Slate needs to be over white.

I think of green or willow legs as being half way to slate if you crossed to yellow legged birds.

The question should be \"is yellow dominant over white?\"

What I have is some silver campine chicks most have green legs but at least one has (slate) or steel blue legs? Green is not APA Stadard, so I wondered about keeping the Slate one
and what to cross him with to keep the slate legs?

[bryngyld]

Like Jean said, the slate (over white) could be carrying the yellow gene because it\'s recessive.  Since  the others show yellow, I\'d guess it DOES carry yellow.  

If you breed the slate to the willow, some of the chicks could be slate.  He will pass on the white gene 50% of the time if he has yellow hidden.  Even if they are slate/white they will hide yellow.  Since the willow shows no white, they are carrying two genes for yellow and will always give a yellow to the young.  

Breeding a slate to willow it is a good way to test whether your slate birds are hiding a yellow gene.  If they are homozygous for white, NO young will be willow.  Of course, ALL of the young will carry yellow and should be removed from the project.