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Young Wheaten cockerels should not be culled at an
early stage on color, but be allowed to mature
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The Genetics of the "Wheaten" colour
Wheaten is dominant to e+ and eb when in isolation, as in Marans; but is
recessive to all alleles when in combination with ‘recessive black’ genes, as
in the Rhode Island Red
- They are both recessive to the
Copper-black. Mating to the benchmark wild type Duckwing e+, determines if
other ‘e’ alleles are dominant or is recessive to it.
Nevertheless,
the uniform degree of our Wheaten Marans birds has favored the work and
has allowed us to give a precise definition of this
color.
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Description of the Wheaten cock
The color of the head, the hackle and the lancets vary from golden-red
to brown-red. It is uniform and there is no noticeable lacing. The lancets have a much stronger tone than the hackle. The back, the
saddle and the rump are mahogany-red. The covers of the wings and of the
shoulders are strong mahogany-red.
The large covers form through the wing a black armband with a green
sheen. The secondary flights constitute a wing triangle of cinnamon-brown with
a folded back wing. The throat and the breast are black. The color of the
head, the hackle and the lancets vary from golden-red to brown-red. It is
uniform and there is no noticeable lacing. The underside,
thighs, and abdomen are blackish with a gray under-color. The tail is black but has some reddish-shades on the sides and a green
sheen or mauve sheen, notably on the large sickles.
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Description of the Wheaten hen
The color of the head and of the hackle varies from golden-red to
dark-red sometimes with light lacing in the lower part of the hackle. The
ear-down is cream-colored. The body (composed of the
shoulders, the wings covers, the and the rump) is wheaten-colored (color
of the grains of wheat). Each feather has a lighter shaft and edge. The breast
and the all underside of the body are cream colored. The secondary color is
whitish. The tail and the flights are blackish with fawn and black colored
edges. The folded back wing (secondary flights) appears cinnamon-brown
colored. The plumage might be on the whole being a little darker (a clay
shade) but that three shades must be present and contrasting (wheat, dark-red
and cream-colored). We must be careful with some Wheaten Marans, which due to
insufficient selection may have bluish gray colored shanks.
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The Wheaten variety of Marans is not as complicated as the Black Copper Marans genetically.
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SERIOUS DEFECTS TO BE AVOIDED
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Cock: breast spotted with
black or no brown wing bays.
Hen: washed out back
colors |
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| Colors based on
the eWh allele: |
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Although the Wheaten variety didn't appear in the first Marans Standard
it is with the Brown-Red and Silver-Cuckoo, one of the commonest varieties of
the Marans. It's most likely that the Wheaten
colour, like the Blue, has really existed in the Marans since it’s origin, i.e.
since the very fist cross to the original English Game cocks. This colour was
ignored for a long time, due to ignorance, as well as a poor description of the
variety in the former Standards. The description
"red-salmon-fawn-partridge" variety, which was used during the first
dozen or so years after recognition, was a very poor description lacking any
definition for one of the most legitimate varieties of the breed. It is necessary to have better idea of the genetics of this erroneously
named color.
The Wheaten Marans, has suffered for many of years uncertain in regards
to the simple genetics of its plumage color. The utmost accuracy is
essential when using the vocabulary used to describe the different plumage
colors.
The terms red, fawn, salmon, partridge, correspond to 4
precise genetic plumages' that are well defined and different from each other.
They have little in common and they are based on different ‘e’ alleles.
Returning to the Wheaten colored hens, apart from the fact that the different
genomes & have often been wrongly called "salmon-fawn", their
Wheaten colour is accompanied with a slight edging on the feathers, which
perhaps explains the erroneous use of the term "partridge".
As for the salmon shades of this Wheaten colour, it may once
again explain the use of the incorrect
"salmon-fawn" term.
So the confusions were numerous, and caused the mistaken crossings of
the various colors for a long time.
The Wheaten color has been described for a long time in at
least 3 or 4 other breeds of poultry (it is a relatively rare color, and often
very badly described).
The descriptive elements of the old Standard (the original
standard) were relatively coherent as far as the majority of the Marans variety
were concerned, however the "red-salmon-fawn-partridge" description,
that was erroneous and confusing, was applied to both the Wheaten, and the
Black-tailed-Buff varieties (the latter was not named at the beginning, and so
its genetics were ignored), resulted in stopping the evolution of these two
varieties for more than 30 years.
However, we can accept the idea that different selections of the Wheaten
and Buff breeding stock, known since the origin of the breed, seem to have
never been correctly segregated. The true Wheaten cocks are black, with a
coppery-red coat, and so look like the Brown-Red cocks except for the color of
the wing triangle, which is brown instead of black.
Consequently, the selection of the Wheaten breeding stocks must
precisely correspond to the correct description of the Wheaten as per the
Standard.
 The wing triangle of Wheaten coloured cock is cinnamon-brown. When the
wing is folded back, it forms a visible triangle of this colour.
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The Selection of the Wheaten Variety
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The Wheaten variety, is dominant to the Golden-Salmon (
Duckwing e+ Partridge), and is always recessive to the Birchen (Brown-Red &
Silver Birchen) ER, and the Silver-Cuckoo & Black E.
The crossings of the Wheaten variety with the Brown-Red or
Silver-Cuckoo variety should be avoided because these varieties are based on a
different ‘e’ allele. However it maybe
necessary to improve the dark egg color , crossing to an other variety
constitutes a case of emergency . Two similar varieties are found on the eWh
wheaten allele. These two types are different colors, Wheaten &
Black-tailed Buff, i.e. different genomes but based on the same ‘e’ allele. The
crossing between Wheat and Black-tailed Buff birds is theoretically less risky,
than if the cross were to a Brown-Red for example. This phenomenon certainly
explain the reason why the numerous unintentional crossings between the Wheaten
and the Black-tailed Buff varieties produce some Wheaten birds which are in
accordance with the ideal type. So the selection of the Wheaten variety
consists in spotting and isolating the birds that comply with the Standard , in
the hens as well as the cocks, due to them having different colours. Both
Wheaten and the Brown-Red cocks are from a distance, almost alike and so are
difficult to tell them apart. In a batch of fully-grown cocks, it is necessary
to observe them correctly in order to recognize the Wheaten birds amongst
Brown-Reds; this can be done by looking at the wing triangle. It is black in
Brown Reds, and cinnamon in the Wheaten.
As for the chicks of these two varieties, they are very
dissimilar in their down colour. At birth, the Brown-Red chicks have a largely
black down, The sex distinction between Wheaten cockerels and pullets is
possible from the plumage appearance, as the pullets have a wheaten color with
a very light underside, and the cockerels are blackish with an underside which
is red, sometimes some red spots on the breast.
So Wheaten chicks are easily sexed from the age of 2 to 3
weeks, as the first wing feathers on the pullet are wheaten, and on the
cockerel they are black.
Wing color of Wheaten Cock Chick
Wing color of Wheaten pullet chick
David Hancox
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Wheaten Genetics
