white ameraucana

[Guest]

Jean, I have a white rooster that I hatched from one of your eggs last fall and can say with confidence that he at least doesn\'t carry dominant white.  I hatched about 80 of his chicks this summer and the only white chicks are the three that I got from my white hen (also one of yours) before she died.  His babies from my EE (BSL cross) hens are all colours of the rainbow (no barring though).  Crossed with my buff Ameraucana hen he produces varying shades of mostly-buff babies with blue leakage; crossed with BBS Ameraucanas he produces straight blacks, blacks with silver or gold in their hackles, and blues with buff leakage.  

That white hen was a big nice looking girl, she laid by far the biggest egg of all my Ameraucanas, and she had a wonderful friendly personality.  

[Jean]

Here is one of those chicks that I hatched, there is no buff/red on it, it\'s just a weird reflection on the lens


If this chick were wheaten based & recessive white, wouldn\'t the legs be lighter?  

[John]

Jean,
Please, remind me what the parents of the chick are.
I remember seeing ones like that many years ago.

This particular hen is from Paul\'s old lines. I believe the bloodlines are from Jay Horn, which would carry buff orpington blood.

To the best of knowledge all the LF buffs go back to mine.  Arne Schmidt also started developing them from scratch, but crossed mine with his early on in the project.  Jay\'s LF buffs came from both Arne and me, @ Columbus many years ago.

[Jean]

The cock is white, he is the offspring of a cross between Jerry\'s hens and Wayne\'s cock bird.

The hen is buff as described.

[John]

I would guess it is E/eb at the E-locus.  Does the buff hen have dark, as opposed to light, slate legs?  I believe some LF buffs still carry \"brown\" (eb), rather than being pure for \"wheaten\" (eWh/eWh, if there is only one wheaten allele) and the chick could have inherited it.  The LF buffs chicks that hatch with dark shanks carry eb...me thinks.  
The resessive white can mask all kinds of color patterns that are revealed with crosses like this.  If the chick also had the Columbian gene the black would probably be pushed to the wing tips, tail and hackle as it feathers out.
 

[Guest]

The chick looks to be a columbian restricted, heterozygous silver/gold (male)  or silver (female)  and wheaten. The chick  would have inherited the wheaten from the buff bird. I do not think the chick is eb because it would of had a gray back as a chick. The chick could also carry a dark brown gene Db ( a columbian like restrictor). Some buff carry Db.

I do not think the chick is recessive white or dominant white.

Tim

[Mike Gilbert]

I agree.   Two copies of recessive white would not result in showing that much black, and dominant white should have eliminated it almost entirely.  It\'s something akin to columbian in color to my way of thinking.