playing with feather colours

Skinny rooster · Post by **Skinny rooster** » Mon Apr 04, 2016 8:45 pm

For the people who are into playing with feather colours here is a question. I have a Cochin bantam hen, she is mottled-ish she is not a true mottled, her parents were sort of but her family is actually blue Cochins and this comes out every now and again. Any idea what will happen if she is bred to a white Cochin rooster? At the moment she is his companion so I was wondering what happens if I hatch out eggs?

Silkie Sue · Post by **Silkie Sue** » Mon Apr 04, 2016 9:49 pm

only one way to find out... i always say

windwalkingwolf · Post by **windwalkingwolf** » Mon Apr 04, 2016 10:00 pm

In my experience, if the white is silver based, as with white production layers, all offspring will be white...if the white is actually white, the offspring will be mostly white with black (or blue) splashes. But I've got some strange chickens, and your mileage may vary lol

Robbie · Post by **Robbie** » Tue Apr 05, 2016 8:11 am

Photos of the parents would make guessing easier!

Post by **WLLady** » Tue Apr 05, 2016 8:20 am

it depends on whether the white cochin is recessive white or dominant white....
recessive white you will get blacks and possibly splashes as www mentioned, but if dominant white you'll get all white.

Skinny rooster · Post by **Skinny rooster** » Fri Apr 08, 2016 11:51 pm

Lol @ silkie Sue, you are giving me an excuse to hatch, I like that way of thinking. All white or all black would be fine, to make it even more complicated, usually when my chicks come out mottled, the males are also burchen. I just remembered that I got mottled hens out of white hens bred to mottled rooster, so bred back white should give me white, I think???

Robbie · Post by **Robbie** » Sat Apr 09, 2016 9:11 am

If your birds are black and white with a lot of black in the white (not mottled, I mean both black and white together like a Delaware or light sussex) the white is probably silver. Chickens can be a combination of dominant white, recessive white and silver which makes guessing tougher. The only way is to test breed sometimes! But from what you said it does sound like dominant white.

Skinny rooster · Post by **Skinny rooster** » Sat Apr 09, 2016 1:14 pm

The rooster is white, I know the family and it was always white. The hen is black with little spots of white. Her parents were both the same. They however came out of blue Cochins.
I have two other mottled hens, their father was one of my mottled (from blue parents) and their mother was a white hen. So I should get white from them but I'm not going to use them for now. A white Cochin with black splash in it would be cool if that happened.

Skinny rooster · Post by **Skinny rooster** » Mon May 09, 2016 1:15 pm

Ok the results are in!!!! Silkie Sue made do it lol, it's her fault. So file this under "what the heck" the mottled hen bred to the white rooster gave me, not white, not blue, not mottled but little brown chipmunk chicks with white fuzzy feet. So this is going to be interesting to see what colour feathers come out. The white rooster came from all white parents and grandparents and the mottled is out of my blue line, so where the heck did Brown come from??? The hen was not with any rooster before the white so no chance of cross breeding, very strange.

Robbie · Post by **Robbie** » Mon May 09, 2016 5:20 pm

You can get partridge hiding under white....... or blue. The white fuzzy feet are interesting. You may get mostly brown with white feathers here and there.