# Upgrading Almond



## Chuck K (Jan 12, 2013)

I want to start this thread with a disclaimer. The title indicates that the quality of almond will be upgraded by following the process that I use. This is my opinion. Other show breeders and the genetic experts may or may not agree with my process. Now let's begin the process with some information on Almond.

Almond is a sex-linked dominant gene. In good Almond pigeons Almond is characterized by tri-colored flecking in the feathers over the whole pigeon. Unfortunately in many breeds there are a lot of Almond birds that aren't good quality. Many of them lack the three base colors to make a good Almond. The breeding project I am going to show you starts with one such bird. I will take you through my selection process and the reasons I picked the pairings that I used to try to bring about a good Almond roller.


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## Chuck K (Jan 12, 2013)

*Original hen*

I did not have an almond bird in my loft. The hen in the picture below was loaned to me by a friend. I bred one round off her. Since Almond is sex-linked I knew all cock birds produced from her would be Almonds. You can see in the picture that she is well flecked up but all of the flecking is just black/blue on a white base. When no other factors are present Almond will wash out the blue/black color to white. A lot of very young Almonds will be almost all white with very little flecking. The flecking in Almonds increase with each molt as they age. This hen had one good thing going for her. She was a check or T-pat. Unfortunately she did not carry two genes for that pattern as you will see later. Pattern can be hard to determine in Almond birds but the pattern of the flecking can give you a hint.

So here is the hen starting point to bring Almond into my line. She doesn't look much different than a plain black & white grizzle or tiger grizzle. The clue that she is Almond is in the fact that individual feathers have both blue/black and white in them.


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## Chuck K (Jan 12, 2013)

*Original cock bird*

This cock bird was the best selection I had at the time to move forward. My goal was to bring in as many factors that enhance the Almond effect. The flecking in the shield area on an Almond is enhanced using the darker patterns like a dark check or a t-pattern. The ground color is enhanced by bringing in bronze and recessive red. Almond does not completely wash out bronze as it does blue/black, and recessive red enhances the red of the bronze. The problem with recessive red is that if you get two genes for it the birds are turned into a pale shade of recessive red with red flecking instead of blue/black flecking. These birds are called Deroys and I don't care for the look. They can be used to move forward.

The original cock bird carries both roller bronze which shows in the picture as a bronzing in his bars. The roller bronze was much more evident in his juvenile plumage. He also carries a one gene for recessive red which is barely evident in his flights. If his flights are spread you would see the recessive red in the base of the feathers. Unfortunately he also only carries one gene for his dark pattern as you will see.


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## Chuck K (Jan 12, 2013)

*First generation*

I got lucky in the first round and ended up raising on the one round of off the borrowed hen. The pair had produced two Almond cock birds. I returned the original hen to my friend. 

This first bird got the Almond gene but he almost completely missed the mark that I wanted to attain. Like his mother he is mostly black and white. He is either a dark check or t-pattern so at lest he did retain that quality. I think he also got the gene for recessive red from his father as you can see a slight rosy tint to the feathers in his neck. I still have this cock but he has never been used to breed. He is getting darker flecking with each passing molt. This picture was early in his adult life.


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## Chuck K (Jan 12, 2013)

*The second half*

The second half of that first round was more to my liking, but in him I did uncover one negative that I didn't want.

This cock bird got the bronze factor, and very likely the recessive red factor. However, as you can seen the faint bronze bars in the picture he did not get the dark check or t-pattern. He revealed that the original pair had also carried the bar pattern. This would mean that his shield would never show much of the blue/black flecking that makes a classical looking almond.

As you can see the bronze came through, but roller bronze is a weaker type bronze than in other breeds. The only way to get the best Almond in rollers is to double up the roller bronze factor so that a bird has two genes for it. Combined with one gene for recessive red these birds can have a very good expression of the classical Almond coloration. One other thing to note about him is that he has a very nice clear eye. That is not always the case with Almonds.

Of the two cock birds produced in the first round this bird despite his being a bar brought the most to table for what I was trying to accomplish therefore he was used in the next round. I bred one round off of him and then gave him to a young man trying to get into rollers.


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## Chuck K (Jan 12, 2013)

*Hen for the second round*

Since I am both trying to move Almond into my line of birds, and enhance the base color on the almonds, I chose this dark t-pattern hen to go back to the barred Almond cock. The picture of this hen does not show it well but she also carries the roller bronze factor. This bird would be referred to by some as a kite, but I have seen much better expressions of the roller bronze (kite) than she shows. Since I didn't have any of those better specimens, her pattern and the bronze factor made her my best candidate for the second round.


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## Chuck K (Jan 12, 2013)

*The next step*

Since the Almond barred bird in the this round was a cock bird, and Almond is sex-linked I could expect that I could get both Almond hens and Almond cocks in this round, and as luck would have it I got one of each sex.

First picture is the hen. In my experience hens tend to show less of the almond expression than the cocks but this hen was fairly good. Unfortunately I had a disease go through the loft two years ago that took this one. Also note that the undesirable cracked eye I referred to in Almonds has raised it's ugly head in this hen. It also showed up in her nest mate. The flecking in the hen is also not that great.









The cock bird below is still in my loft, but at this time he has not been bred to pass the almond gene on. He shows that the Almond and bronze are both present, and maybe a gene for recessive red. The only way I will know if the recessive red is present is with a test mating to a recessive red hen, which I probably won't do since I can get that factor back rather easy. He does have a dark pattern that has spread the roller bronze over more of his body, and in this early picture he is showing some flecking starting in the shield area. He has gotten dark with his last molt, but I don't have a more recent picture. I like the progress to this point but this bird is far from the finished type I am working to get.


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## Chuck K (Jan 12, 2013)

*The next step*

I had a couple of very nice kite hens that were the planned mate for the second generation Almond cock, but unfortunately I lost them both to disease at the time I lost his nestmate. I still have their father, and I will have to use him to get more like the one pictured below. I like to use the birds that show the most kite bronze although I would prefer a hen minus the white flights and badge head.


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## Skogsdua (Apr 15, 2016)

Interesting thread  I'm looking forward for updates!


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## FredaH (Apr 5, 2016)

Love this thread and the birds are eye candy too.


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## Crazy Pete (Nov 13, 2008)

I can't wait for the next round, I haven't got a clue what you are wanting to get so keep the updates coming.
Dave


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## Woodnative (Jul 4, 2010)

Actively following and enjoying this thread. Similar to how we are trying to improve almonds in our frillbacks! BTW our first bird is the blue spread almond cock in my avatar who we have since lost but we have improved descendents!


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## Chuck K (Jan 12, 2013)

It is going to take me a while to get the almond project back on track. I don't have any pairs together right now. I am in the process of trying to locate a place in the country where I can buy a house with a little acreage, and expand with some decent size lofts. Some areas in Texas I have been able to breed year round so I might get back on track this fall, but some of the areas get to cold to breed through the winter, and if I move north it could be next spring before I get them back in the breeding pens.

I keep being tempted by the devil to take a shortcut and use this bird to get a deep bronze base in the almonds, but one I don't know if it would work and two it would defeat my primary purpose which was to add a good almond to my spinning rollers (at least they were spinning back when I could still fly them), and I pretty sure an infusion of tippler wouldn't help performance.


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## Skyeking (Jan 17, 2003)

*I must say, the birds are all lovely & I am moving your thread to the appropriate forum.

Thanks for sharing, Chuck.*


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## cwebster (Dec 11, 2010)

Chuck, I'm so jealous of all your gorgeous birds!


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## jak2002003 (Jan 10, 2012)

What pigeon breed are they please? I really like the look of them.


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## Chuck K (Jan 12, 2013)

The main group are Birmingham Rollers. The last one was a Show Tippler.


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## Chuck K (Jan 12, 2013)

I caught a good break for my almond project. I got a kite old hen bred by a friend out of my line of rollers a couple of days ago. I just hope she is still fertile because she is five or six years old. She carries a lot of bronze. Roller bronze many times is hidden in the adult plumage, but this hen still shows a bright bronze in the bar area, and the beetle green sheen in the neck shows there is also bronze over a lot of the body. She could be more kite but I am still happy with her especially since she is from my family. She also had one more attribute I want for a good almond. She is at least carrying one gene for dark check or T-pattern. The dark patterns make better almonds than the bars because when they revert the striations in the shield are more vivid. I also checked on the progress of the molt on the young cock, and he is getting more black flecking in the back. 

The hen is also in full molt and this is an awful picture. Her type is much better than it shows, but she is a little flat headed.


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## ArcherPigeons (Sep 15, 2015)

Chuck K said:


> I caught a good break for my almond project. I got a kite old hen bred by a friend out of my line of rollers a couple of days ago. I just hope she is still fertile because she is five or six years old. She carries a lot of bronze. Roller bronze many times is hidden in the adult plumage, but this hen still shows a bright bronze in the bar area, and the beetle green sheen in the neck shows there is also bronze over a lot of the body. She could be more kite but I am still happy with her especially since she is from my family. She also had one more attribute I want for a good almond. She is at least carrying one gene for dark check or T-pattern. The dark patterns make better almonds than the bars because when they revert the striations in the shield are more vivid. I also checked on the progress of the molt on the young cock, and he is getting more black flecking in the back.
> 
> The hen is also in full molt and this is an awful picture. Her type is much better than it shows, but she is a little flat headed.
> View attachment 41993



5 or 6 years? Still a baby! You shouldn't have any problems breeding her for a few more years


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## Chuck K (Jan 12, 2013)

She is looking a lot better now that the full molt is over.


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## cwebster (Dec 11, 2010)

Lovely bird! As always, Chuck, I am jealous of your beautiful birds.


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## Indigobob1 (Jul 3, 2016)

He is spread, Chuck. Spread removes the ground colour. 



Chuck K said:


> I got lucky in the first round and ended up raising on the one round of off the borrowed hen. The pair had produced two Almond cock birds. I returned the original hen to my friend.
> 
> This first bird got the Almond gene but he almost completely missed the mark that I wanted to attain. Like his mother he is mostly black and white. He is either a dark check or t-pattern so at lest he did retain that quality. I think he also got the gene for recessive red from his father as you can see a slight rosy tint to the feathers in his neck. I still have this cock but he has never been used to breed. He is getting darker flecking with each passing molt. This picture was early in his adult life.
> 
> ...


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## Chuck K (Jan 12, 2013)

Indigobob1 said:


> He is spread, Chuck. Spread removes the ground colour.


Thanks Bob,

That makes sense. The hen was a black and white, but old enough that a lot of black came through. I had heard before that spread spread would suppress the bronze in black birds but never thought about it also suppressing the bronze in almonds. I think I saw the same thing on a brander bronze show tippler cock bird. He was a decent bronze but had some black in the shield as a young bird, but he has turned an ugly off colored black with the molt.


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## nOOb iHACK (Oct 15, 2018)

I know it's been almost 2 years but are there any updates?


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## Eddie2tone (Oct 5, 2021)

Chuck K said:


> *The next step*
> 
> I had a couple of very nice kite hens that were the planned mate for the second generation Almond cock, but unfortunately I lost them both to disease at the time I lost his nestmate. I still have their father, and I will have to use him to get more like the one pictured below. I like to use the birds that show the most kite bronze although I would prefer a hen minus the white flights and badge head.
> 
> View attachment 41025


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## Eddie2tone (Oct 5, 2021)

Why perfer not to use one with white flights or white on head? Honestly don't recall actually seeing an almond with white flights. Atleast them of the yellow color with black brown specks. Doest the white flight gene block the genes needed to create almond? If not and there is almond rollers with white flights , then my goal is possible. I am a new York flying flying flyer and never noticed any almond flying flights and which to produced a nice stock of 50-100 of theses. Have any ideas or advice for me?


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