# Breeding the Autosexing Gene?



## Omniskies (Jul 10, 2008)

I have some Texan Pioneer pigeons and for the fun of it would like to make an autosexing Fantail. My question is...how? Would I want to cross white Fantail males over Pioneer females? 

I have tried searching everywhere for information on the autosexing gene in pigeons and have come up with nothing. I even tried dabbling around with a genetics calculator for pigeons and just can't come up with anything that isn't simply a sexlinking trait. I want to maintain the Pioneer's ability to create babies you can sex at birth through the lines (ie. white males and colored females). 

Any thoughts?


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## RockPigeon<3er (Aug 2, 2012)

http://www.mumtazticloft.com/PigeonGenetics.asp
Not sure difference in auto sexing or sex linking but maybe that'll help?


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## NZ Pigeon (Nov 12, 2011)

You need a hen which carries a more dominant colour than the cock and that dominant colour must be a sex linked gene which are allelic to each other

So basically an ash red hen to a blue cock will produce ash red cocks and blue hens

An almond hen and a non almond cock, All almond cocks, all non almond hens.

What colours are your birds. Do you have any ash red hens?

There is no such thing as an auto sexing gene as such but there are certain pairings which are referred to as sex linked matings. These matings produce young in the opposite colour to the parents.


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## AZCorbin (Feb 28, 2011)

Aww yes the great auto sexed Texas P's.
The gene you are speaking about is called faded. It is a sex linked in complete dominate.

Here is what a google search revealed



> The Texan Pioneer, another truly American breed, was created by Del James during the late fifties and early sixties. It is a large breed, similar in size to the French Mondain, which was used in its creation. In addition, the breed has two major distinguishing characteristics, both due to its origin as a utility (meat-producing) breed: (1)The head and feet are supposed to be small in proportion to the rest of the body, the rationale being that it is senseless to add weight to parts of the bird that are discarded when the bird is butchered ; and (2)The breed is pure for the faded factor. The latter characteristic makes the Texan Pioneer a true "auto-sex" breed, whereby the sex of all squabs can be determined by the plumage color.
> 
> So how does auto-sexing work? Auto-sexing is not the same as a "sex- linked mating", although the faded gene is on the sex chromosome and its position on that chromosome is what allows it to be used for auto- sexing.
> 
> Since in pigeons cocks carry two active sex chromosomes while the hen carries just one, the expression of the faded gene in cocks is different than it is in hens. Faded hens, since they have just one active sex chromosome, can have just one gene for faded, and its expression is that of a "faded out" bar or checker (or in the case of recessive reds, a faded out version of recessive red). Cocks, however, if pure (homozygous) for the faded gene, appear entirely different. They are mostly white with dark flecks on the head and neck. Since the breed is pure for the faded factor, all cocks are homozygous and will appear as just described.


http://www.angelfire.com/oh/raraavis/texan.html

Breeding this gene is simple.
Mix a Texas cock to your hen.
All your hens will be faded all your cocks will be het. So the first round your cocks will look the same as the hens one more round you got it!


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## NZ Pigeon (Nov 12, 2011)

Sorry I misunderstood and thought you were talking about sex linked matings. We do not have the breed here.


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## Omniskies (Jul 10, 2008)

Thank you, AZCorbin, that is exactly what I needed to know. 

So breed Texan males to regular hens, then keep the female offspring to mate back to Texan males and that will bring in the autosexing trait officially? 

NZ Pigeon, don't worry about it. A lot of people mix up sexlinked and autosexing, so it's easy to assume someone has made a mistake


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## AZCorbin (Feb 28, 2011)

No need to breed back. 
Since this is an dominate gene both your cocks and hens will have the gene first round.
First crossing would be a Texas cock to your fantail hen.
All young will be faded. It won't be auto sexed yet since the cocks will only have one dose. So first round all babies cock or hen will look the same/very similar.

I would use multiple Texas cocks, that way you take a young hen from pair 1 and breed her to a young cock from pair 2
Once you do that 50% of your hens will be faded, half regular. And the cocks will be 50% het, 50% **** as well so half the cocks only will be auto sexed.
Then round # 3 you breed your auto sexed cocks (that is to say the homozygous ones) you got to a faded hen and now you have 100% auto sexed young.

Sounds like a fun project so please let us know how it goes. It will probably throw off the fantail look bad but than again I've never mixed breeds so I don't know.

Okay now I have a question for you.
Why is it important for this breed to be auto sexed?
I thought well maybe they pull extra cocks so they could put one cock to multiple hens but then who is going to raise the babies? Don't the squabs get pulled under 30 days or there about?
I just can't come up with a reason why they would need this but it's not my business so I assume I'm missing something?
To my knowledge this is the only breed with this faded gene?... However others must have it as it is only 50+ year old breed.


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## Omniskies (Jul 10, 2008)

I love the color and I am smitten with fantails. But the main reason is because I am slightly obsessive about knowing genders. I sell my extra babies as "Your guess is as good as mine." It would be awfully nice to be able to be 99% sure as to what I have available and what I am keeping back without waiting months and hoping my guess on head shape, leg thickness, etc, is right. 

Putting a color I love into a breed I love and also being able to sex the babies at birth are all things that make it worth playing around with. For me, anyway. 

As for this being the only breed with the Faded gene, I thought it was originally in Kings. I remember reading something on the history of Pioneers that said a strain of autosexing Kings and Modenas (among others) were used to make the breed. Pioneers are effectively just those original autosexing Kings with a tiny head and giant body. But you're right, it doesn't look like the color has caught on in other breeds. I don't know if it's because Pioneers are so hard to locate or because it is considered too much of a hassle to breed the color in. To each their own, I suppose.


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## AZCorbin (Feb 28, 2011)

Well it shoud be a fun project, easy, but now you just need to be patient. Though you could have it done in 1.5 years.
I wasn't asking why you wanted it, though that's a perfectly fine reason.
I am wondering about why the squabers wanted it and or how it benifited them?


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## Omniskies (Jul 10, 2008)

1.5 years is a lot less time than I expected. I assumed it would be a 5-7+ year project, so that is good to know. 

As for the squabbers, I'm not sure why they would prize the trait above other breeders. You would think a trait as useful as that would be worth cultivating in your flock. Maybe it helps a squabber determine who to eat and who to keep? If they want to keep back a replacement pair they could easily select one or two pairs and eat the rest without having to grow a flock to adulthood. 

Maybe? Any other thoughts?


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## AZCorbin (Feb 28, 2011)

Yeah I worded the 1.5 wrong. 1.5 and you got your auto sexed mixes how long until they look like fantails again? Beats me. I would be interested to se how the first round comes out. They are distinctly different...

I'm puzzled as to why they wanted them to be auto sexed.


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