Pastel blue hen to grey cock?

julie · Post by **julie** » Wed Sep 12, 2007 8:13 pm

Hi, can someone please tell me what colour babies to expect from pastel blue hen to grey cock.

Jim · Post by **Jim** » Wed Sep 12, 2007 8:46 pm

I'm going to assume that by "pastel blue" you mean what is usually just called blue and not dilute blue or pallid blue or something else.

Grey is kind of a funny gene. A visually grey bird can have either one or two copies of the grey gene and that affects the outcome. If the male has two copies of the grey gene all the babies, both male and female, will be grey. If the male has only one copy of the grey gene than you would expect 50% grey babies and 50% blue babies. As far as I know, the only way to tell if a visually grey bird is single factor or double factor without knowing anything about it's parents (and if anybody knows anything different please feel free to correct me) is to breed them and see what hatches.

Hope that helps.

Jim

julie · Post by **julie** » Wed Sep 12, 2007 9:08 pm

Here is a pic of the hen

Jim · Post by **Jim** » Wed Sep 12, 2007 10:19 pm

Ah. Turquoise. I'm sorry. I'd heard that they're sometimes called pastel and didn't make the connection. That makes it a little different. Turquoise is bit like grey in that a bird that exhibits the gene visually can have either one or two copies of it. So your male could be grey with either one or two copies of the grey gene and your female could be turquoise with either one or two copies of the turquoise gene. This could go four ways as follows:

Single Factor Grey Male and Double Factor Turquoise Female:

50% Turquoisegrey
50% Turquoise

Double Factor Grey Male and Double Factor Turquoise Female:

100% Turquoisegrey

Double Factor Grey Male and Single Factor Turquoise Female:

50% Grey
50% Turquoisegrey

Single Factor Grey Male and Single Factor Turquoise Female:

25% Grey
25% Blue
25% Turquoise
25% Turquoisegrey

Note that none of the genes in question are sex-linked. By that I mean that any baby is equally likely to be male or female regardless of what color it exhibits.

Let me know if you want me to go into more detail.

Jim

Jay · Post by **Jay** » Thu Sep 13, 2007 9:22 am

Based on that picture, she looks like a Cinnamon TurquoiseBlue or what they call Pastel Skyblue in Australia.

So all sons will be split to Cinnamon as well.

Jim · Post by **Jim** » Thu Sep 13, 2007 1:42 pm

And if if your grey male were split for cinnamon, which isn't uncommon, then things get even more complicated...

Jay - is there any way to determine visually if a grey or turquoise bird is single or double factor for their respective genes?

Jim

Jay · Post by **Jay** » Thu Sep 13, 2007 2:07 pm

Jim wrote:Jay - is there any way to determine visually if a grey or turquoise bird is single or double factor for their respective genes?

As far as IRNs are concerned, Greys are considered as Complete Dominant, and unlike the Incomplete Dominant mutations, there is no visual difference between Single Factor and Double Factor.

Now in other species of parrots, some breeders claim that SF Greys contain some Blue coloration and that the DF Greys suppress the "cloudy zone" better than SF Greys would. What this means is that in some other species, Grey behaves Incomplete Dominant .... if we take the word of these breeders at face value.

The Grey Factor is a mutation that suppresses the cloudy layer deep in the feather medulla. This cloudy layer is where the phenomena of contructive interference happens that produces the Blue coloration. So if the cloudy layer is suppressed as caused by the Grey gene, Blue color is not possible thereby IRN colors such as Blue, Violet, and Cobalt are "masked" by the Grey mutation.

In Turquoises, SF and DF is not readily identifiable. In theory, DF Turquoise should have more psittacin retention, which translates to more Green feather coloration. But modifier genes that accompany the Turquoise mutation do their number and hence, some SF's are Greener than DF's and some DF's are Bluer than some SF's.

:wink:

Jim · Post by **Jim** » Thu Sep 13, 2007 4:49 pm

For those of you without your Jim and Jay-ese to English dictionaries handy, Jay's response translates into "no, not really".

julie · Post by **julie** » Fri Sep 14, 2007 3:25 am

LOL, thanks guys. Im 99 per cent sure that I have the parents of kateykat (members) birds in her signature.

Post by **Lauren** » Fri Sep 14, 2007 3:58 am

Jim and Jay ese has a nice ring to it! :lol:

Jay · Post by **Jay** » Sat Sep 15, 2007 9:49 am

Jim wrote:For those of you without your Jim and Jay-ese to English dictionaries handy, Jay's response translates into "no, not really".

Jim · Post by **Jim** » Sat Sep 15, 2007 4:31 pm

The Jim and Jay-ese to English dictionary. Coming soon to a Barnes and Noble near you.

Julie - you mentioned that the IRN's in kateykat's signature might be the offspring of your birds. Does that include the yellow one in the middle photo?

julie · Post by **julie** » Sat Sep 15, 2007 11:45 pm

The two on the end, they look like the ones I got of jeremy. The hen in the box and a grey cock.

Jim · Post by **Jim** » Sun Sep 16, 2007 12:13 am

Ah. That makes sense. I was looking at the picture and thinking "Cool. There's an Ino gene. Julie could get all kinds of things." That thought was quickly interrupted by "Waitaminute. A grey and a blue turquoise can't make a yellow bird."

julie · Post by **julie** » Sun Sep 16, 2007 12:24 am

I have a couple of irns that look like that bird too.

julie · Post by **julie** » Sun Oct 14, 2007 1:32 am

This is the chic from this couple, is it possible to tell if they are single or double?

Jim · Post by **Jim** » Sun Oct 14, 2007 9:24 am

Since the male is grey but the baby looks turquoise blue you can assume that the male is single factor.

Jim