Genetic discussion of slow Feather (K) and tardy feather (t)

[dak]

I culled every lav bird with a slow to feather tail this year.  I worried I wouldn\'t have a cockerel left. In the end the only males I had left were 5 from a split hen.  

[Mike Gilbert]

So, back to the question.  Let\'s assume it is K, as Jean has said.  How do we eliminate it?
By breeding only from fast feathering birds and known splits.  Over time, eliminate the splits

Can males who exhibit the trait be used if they are crossed on normal females?  I have gotten some lovely females from this cross, but if they are all carriers, we\'re back at square one, which leads me to the next question--If they feather fast why are you back to square one?  Since K is a dominant gene, and they feathered fast, they did not inherit K. Can females who are daughters of slow males carry the gene hidden? No, but if they do carry K they will still feather faster than KK males Does it pass to only their male offspring, female offspring, or both?Potentially both.  But if the male is K/k, he will send fast feathering to about half his offspring and slow feathering to the other half

I don\'t understand sex chromosomes in chickens, and therefore sex-linked traits are confusing to me.  I really want to, I just can\'t seem to wrap my brain around it.Keep trying.  Maybe go to the Sellers website and click on the photo to get to some of the basic information?

[Mike Gilbert]

Lets go back to basics for a minute.   Genes are inherited in pairs, one from each parent, EXCEPT for sex linked genes.  For those, males get two - one from each parent - and females get one - from their father only.    So your slow feathering male could be Kk or he could be KK.   K is dominant, that is why he was slow feathering even though it is possible he has only one K gene (the other would be k).  The capital letter designates which is dominant.  Lower case means recessive.   IF your rooster is Kk, he will throw K to about half his offspring, and k to the other half, so his pullet offspring would be either K- or k-.  They don\'t get either one from their mother.    The genotype of his male offspring will depend 50% on whether their mother(s) are K- or k-.      They could be KK, kk, or Kk.   Does that help at all?

[crystalcreek]

But that\'s not consistent with the females I\'ve hatched.  I haven\'t seen 50% female offspring with slow feather.  I think I\'ve hatched enough that I would have seen one here and there with slow feather, even if I wasn\'t getting 50%.  Whether he\'s KK or Kk, he should be producing females with slow tails, right?  Surely I haven\'t been that lucky not to hatch one.

[OldChurchEggery]

So, to visualize, if you know you have a slow feathering male, would the inheritance work out like this?


I called the hen contribution \"hemizygous\" since she would only have one copy of any gene if it\'s sex-linked. I don\'t know what the official term would be, but I figured hemi- would work okay as a prefix since it means half.

[Mike Gilbert]

Hemizygous is exactly correct.  I try to avoid such terms with folks who are confused enough already.   Crystal, how many pullets have you hatched from your slow feathering rooster?
Like I said earlier, even if they are slow feathering they will feather faster than their male siblings.
OR, maybe we are dealing with t instead of K.   Whole different set of possibililties.

[Beth C]

I looked at the Sellers site, and this sounds just like what I\'m getting:

\"Kn:

Very slow feathering or \'delayed\' feathering gene. The order of dominance among the genes allelic to this locus is Kn>Ks>K>k+. The slow feathering gene is believed to be associated with a bald patch on the back of the adolescent bird. The feathers do come in given enough time. Since this is likely due to a dose effect of the slow feathering gene, the homozygous males should be the most likely to exhibit the trait. In my personal flocks, I have both males and females exhibiting this. Many novice poultry keepers wrongly attribute the bald back phenotype with a picking problem.\"

The \"dose effect\" part confuses me - is Kn a separate gene or the effect of multiple copies of the K gene? Or a combination of K & t? Or can you have K & t in the same bird?

All of my lavenders hatched looking normal. Most started to get wing feathers on schedule. The females took longer than any of the same age birds of other varieties to get body feathers, and took forever to grow tails. Some had bald patches that weren\'t noticeable until you parted the feathers, since the feathers they did have were long enough to cover them. The males had primaries, tail stubs, and feathers on the tops of their heads, breasts & thighs. Their necks, backs, & abdomens were completely bald. The few I grew out did eventually feather in, but it took roughly 5 months. I got 2 fast-feathering birds, both pullets, both with single combs (don\'t know if that means anything).

In hindsight, the original birds were also slow to feather, although none were as severe as their offspring. But I do remember them looking \"rumpless\" until they were nearly grown.

[Mike Gilbert]

The dose effect just refers to two K genes versus one, or vice versa.   The three different  K genes with different subscripts simply refer to three different mutations/manifestations of K.
They are all inherited at the same place on the same chromosome, so they are alternate genes for the same locus (location) on a chromosome.  

[Beth C]

So if these are mutations of the K gene, can a bird carrying K produce a Ks or Kn offspring, or would the parent bird have to carry the mutated form of the gene? I\'m curious, since the slow feather is so much more pronounced in the chicks than it was in the parent birds. I guess if the parents were each Kk, they would produce KK chicks that would be slower to feather than they were. But those should be about 25% of the offspring, instead of nearly all of them, right?

[Mike Gilbert]

Mutations happen.  Your experience would indicate the arrangement of the molecules making up the K gene could be somewhat unstable, causing mutations more likely to occur than what would be considered normal.   I don\'t really know.
Another possibility is that you are dealing with both the K and the t series of genes, and you got real unlucky with the birds you chose to breed.  That would be another example of dosage effect.   I don\'t think anyone can say for sure.

[crystalcreek]

Beth I think the best course of action is to immediately stop using these males that don\'t grow a tail until after 6 months.  If you have females that are normal (k-), these can be crossed on a normal black cock and you have eliminated it in one generation.  If you didn\'t watch them carefully when they were chicks, you probably won\'t know at this point because they are fully feathered.  I\'m guessing since their offspring are naked, the females must be K-.  If you think your females are K-, I can help you start over with female older chicks this coming spring.  Then you can cross those on a normal black cock/cockerel and you\'ll be good to go by fall.  It might seem as if we are taking two steps backward, but I think this is the way to go.  I looked in my brooder last night and I saw about five chicks, both lav and split, that have about 3/4 to 1\" of tail growth at 9 days.  These should all be fast feather females.  It\'s only five out of 41, but hey, it is five.  One of those is bound to be a keeper, right?   I\'ll share my lav females with you to get this thing back on track.  Don\'t you have some splits from me from the Smith birds?  If those don\'t carry it, you can hang onto them to use later.

So I guess we\'re in the market for phenomenal black males around here.  

I\'m going to watch carefully the offspring of my young cockerel that had an apparent normal tail and see what they do.  If he\'s kk, I\'m truly in luck.  We\'ll see.

Clare, what do those 5 you raised look like?  Do you still have some?  

[Beth C]

you got real unlucky with the birds you chose to breed

I\'m starting to feel that way no matter what the genetics. But that\'s what happens when you roll the dice on hatching eggs instead of coughing up the money to ship birds the breeder has had a chance to evaluate. Slowly making my way around the learning curve...

Cindy: That\'s pretty much what I\'ve been thinking - time to pull the plug. The original males bit the dust when I saw what they were producing. The only male still here from this season is a split. He feathered normally but is starting to show some leakage in his hackles, so he\'s out. I think I\'m going to do one hatch with my black cock over the fast-feathering pullet and see what I get. Depending on what happens, I may take you up on your offer (which is very nice of you, btw). I have them under lights, so hopefully she will start laying soon.

[crystalcreek]

The only male still here from this season is a split. He feathered normally but is starting to show some leakage in his hackles, so he\'s out.
Yeah, don\'t use him.

I think I\'m going to do one hatch with my black cock over the fast-feathering pullet and see what I get.
If you have a black fast feather cock and a lavender fast feather hen, you\'ve got everything you need!  The male cannot pass it on and neither can the female, so make some splits and either put the splits together or a split son back over his momma.

Your genetic diversity will be lacking starting with just two birds, but you can add fresh blood in your F2 or F3.  You should obtain a black chick order in the meantime or hatching eggs and be working on that at the same time.

If you get slow feather again, either your birds are not truly fast feather, or perhaps you are dealing with a double whammy involving t, and if that is the case, maybe it\'s time to get all new birds.

You should be able to obtain two lav pullets without breaking the bank, to cross back to your black cock.  Just make sure you get them from a trustworthy source if you get birds that are already feathered.  If you get hatching eggs, you know when you grow them out at day 12 what you got.

If you are able to mark and keep the offspring from each of two pullets separated, I think you could safely mate the splits together, doubling up only on the black cock genes (he is a good one, right?) and 25% of your offspring will be lav with fast feather in your F2.  You can ditch all the blacks at that point, since you won\'t know which are blacks and which are splits.

Jean was already doing that (split to split) cross in 2010.  I was lucky enough to get some hatching eggs from that cross and I currently have two split daughters and one lav son of one of those original hens.

I have 5 lav females at my place that are laying or starting to lay (well, one is broody).  I believe they are all fast feather.  I think my course of action is going to be finding a nice black male to put over these lav hens and make some splits (again).  

It looks like my Pen B lavender cock, sadly, is on his way out--he does produce some gorgeous female offspring, so it\'ll be a little while, as I don\'t want to back myself into a corner with too few birds to work with.  I do have the young cockerel who is his son to replace him with, I know his mother is fast feather, so at the worst he is Kk, and I can still produce females using him.

And I will see what the other cockerel with a faster tail does for me over the Smith splits.

I\'ll keep everyone posted.

Honestly, John, Paul, Jean and others who ship chicks, I don\'t know how you can afford to do it for the very reasonable prices that you do.  You are to be commended.

[crystalcreek]

My dogs are going to get real tired of eating Ameraucana    

[Beth C]

My dogs are going to get real tired of eating Ameraucana  

I butcher a few, but it kills my back. The ones I cull as chicks go to the wildlife rehab to feed the raptors (yeah, I know, just what I want to encourage local birds of prey to eat :p). The bigger ones go to the sale. They have a minimum bid and everything sells, so I\'m assuming there must be a buyer(s) for a processor. I took a load of cockerels last month & got $108, less fees. At an average of $4/bird it\'s no where near what I\'d put into feed, but at least it\'s something.

I\'m honestly on the fence with the lavenders. I\'ve gotten out of blacks, except for these 2 cocks, and there are so many challenges with the buffs, and a lot of things to work on in the wheatens, too, that I\'m thinking my dance card might be full...