# Opal lace and ash yellow



## Shadybug Lofts (Mar 13, 2010)

I paired a opal lace cock with a ash yellow hen and got what looks like a all white baby Will I get yellows or opals in the next round? Here's the baby


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## NZ Pigeon (Nov 12, 2011)

Noone can say for sure if you will get opals in the next round as it comes down to odds. Using a yellow hen means you will not get any yellows from this pairing unless the cock carries dilute aswell. Any cocks you breed from this pair will produce dilute hens though. Was the baby short downed? It almost looks like it was.

Now is the Opal lace cockbird blue? If so this pair is sex linked so you will get ash red based cocks carrying blue and all blue based hens. 

Could be a recessive white you have there which would mean 1/4 of the babies from this pairing will also be recessive white.

If we are working with dominant opal you will get 1/2 being opal but recessive white will cover up the effects of the opal so this bird itself could well be opal underneath

So to break it down based on the assumptions I Have made you will get

(I have assumed that you have a blue DOM opal cock with no dilute, An ash yellow hen and I have assumed we are dealing with recessive white aswell.)

All Blue hens, 1/2 will be opal but 1/4 of the total birds may be plain white

blue 37.5 %
blue opal 37.5 %
blue under recessive white 12.5 %
blue opal under recessive white 12.5 %

Cocks

Ash red carrying blue and dilute 37.5%
Ash red carrying blue, dilute and showing opal 37.5%
ash red carrying blue and dilute under recessive white 12.5%
ash red carring blue dilute and opal under recessive white 12.5% 

Also I have not taken chromosomal crossovers into account when looking at these percentages, My wee brain can't handle the extra math.


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## Shadybug Lofts (Mar 13, 2010)

Hen









Cock


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## pigeon is fun (Sep 6, 2010)

Shadybug Lofts said:


> Hen
> 
> 
> 
> ...


Shadybug,
Very nice birds. Are those the kind of birds you enter to a bird show?


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## NZ Pigeon (Nov 12, 2011)

Now that I see they are saddles I am not sure that recessive white is in the mix pied is in the mix and with dom opal and pied it may take a while to see the pigment coming through in the young. In NZ we breed a lot of close to whites off our saddles as they are not as established as your guys.

I wonder if the lace has TS in the mix aswell, I am not that up on those colours as I have never dealt with any myself so It will be interesting to see what the other guys here think.


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## Shadybug Lofts (Mar 13, 2010)

pigeon is fun said:


> Shadybug,
> Very nice birds. Are those the kind of birds you enter to a bird show?


Yes there show birds


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## pigeon is fun (Sep 6, 2010)

Shadybug Lofts said:


> Yes their show birds


Nice and clean.


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## MaryOfExeter (Sep 30, 2007)

I don't know, are you SURE it is all white? I see a yellowish tinge I THINK. More feathers will tell. Just thinking that perhaps a dominant opal ash-yellow t-pattern cockbird could look that light. Saddle homers have very dark t-patterns that sometimes look very much like RR and RY. So that would put a LOT of white from the opal on the shield. With fine lacing. Add ash-red (or ash-yellow) to the mix and you'd get a very light bird.


Also my first thing would be of course if the cockbird is split for dilute. What color were his parents?


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## Shadybug Lofts (Mar 13, 2010)

The parents were the opal lace hen and black cock, That I showed in my loft past That off color is the pic. It looks white to me


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## Print Tippler (May 18, 2011)

The offspring is dilute. You can still see the down if it had it at this stage. It's still present in the chest up to 25 days.


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## Shadybug Lofts (Mar 13, 2010)

Print Tippler said:


> The offspring is dilute. You can still see the down if it had it at this stage. It's still present in the chest up to 25 days.


Thanks, but whats that mean? I have a hard time with the genetics thing.


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## Print Tippler (May 18, 2011)

Short down means It doesn't have or has a limited amount of yellow hair. Normal non dilute birds have that yellow hairy fuzz on the body and head. If this bird wasn't dilute it would have a fuzzy cap of "hair" so to speak. I guess it might go unnotice to most people.

See how the one closest to the camera has no fuzz while the other 3 do










Here's one that is dilute and one that isn't










Non dilutes stay hairy for while while dilutes you can only see some when it's born buts it's not long and when they feather up you no longer see any

See how you can still see fuzz on this bird










Buts it's gone on this dilute


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## Shadybug Lofts (Mar 13, 2010)

OK I understand all that now and it didn't have any down now that you pointed that out. I tried not to disturb them to much due to the cold weather. I didn't want to keep the parents off them for very long, so I really didn't notice it early on. Now what does dilute mean? less color. You have some nice birds


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## Print Tippler (May 18, 2011)

Thanks you, dilute lowers the intensity of the color. This is how you get what people call silver dun, ash yellow (cream), and recessive yellow. It just takes away most of the color on whatever bird you have.

Here's so info

http://www.angelfire.com/ga/huntleyloft/yellow.html

http://www.angelfire.com/ga3/pigeongenetics/dilutepale.html


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## Shadybug Lofts (Mar 13, 2010)

I just looked at the baby and now it looks like there is a very light color there, now that the feathers grew a little more.


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## rudolph.est (May 14, 2009)

Ypur baby is probably not all white. Time wil give us a better idea, but it is probably a dilute opal, which means the dad was a dilute (or at least carries dilute) too. If you see a creamy yellow colour, it could even be a dilute red opal (or yellow opal).

As I said, gite it another couple of weeks, for the shield to feather out nicely, and we will probably be better able to tell.


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