Discuss all aspects of raising poultry. No topic is too small
poultry: can you cross brother with sister?
hi there can you cross brother with sister becuase i have a hen and a cock. and i was just wondering could you
Patrick Lavery
Monday, November 1st, 2010
not a good thing as some were down the line you will have problems . its always much beter to get unrelated pairs and the birds are much healther .
gerards
Monday, November 1st, 2010 yes you can get a new rooster after that breeding it will be ok
hunt
Monday, November 1st, 2010 all the top breeder line breed. breeding from related birds
egghead
Monday, November 1st, 2010 u can, but better to get unrelated cock an hen , if u have to just do for one breeding season , unless you know of the past of your breeding stock its hard to know how the young will turn out.
pearl
Monday, November 1st, 2010 Line breeding does not involve brother/sister matings, thats inbreeding to the fullest extent. Brothers and sisters carry 100% identical genes and when berd to each other produce problamatic, weak off spring which can show varing degrees of breed faults and can be very difficult to hatch.
Line breeding usually involves breeding father/daughter or mother/son. If carefully monitered this can be done for generations without any problems. Matings like this are successful as there are only 50% of the genes which are identical.
Mick
Monday, November 1st, 2010 Correct Mick!
Jemsy
Monday, November 1st, 2010
Incorrect Mick!! Actually brother and sister potentially can share 100% identical genes IF they are identical twins, or they can share 0% identical genes, or can share anything in between. It all depends which genes they inherit from each parent.
However, it is considered safest not to breed full siblings together because of the 'greater than 50%' potential to share identical harmful genes. It is better to breed offspring to parent at 50% shared genes, or better yet to grandparent at 25% or uncle/aunt at 50% or less.
Patrick it also depends how rare your breed of chicken is, sometimes you will have no choice but to resort to such matings if another choice doesn't exist. But if you have a common breed there is no reason to force such a mating.
Susan Mc
Monday, November 1st, 2010 Thanks for that was
Patrick Lavery
Monday, November 1st, 2010
i would say that brother to sister is not the best mating but to say that a unrelated cock is better is not right you have a better chant of breeden good birds if the brother and sister r good birds
egghead
Monday, November 1st, 2010 I'm afraid susan mick is correct on this one line breeding is mother/son or father/daughter, but its the mother to son one that is used the most,
Steven K
Monday, November 1st, 2010 Steven, I was referring to Mick's incorrect statement that siblings carry 100% identical genes. Mick just got the science wrong. I didn't knock his statements on linebreeding or indeed make any reference to linebreeding at all. I just layed out the relationship percentages genetically speaking.
However, if you want to get into it... Linebreeding is used to concentrate the superior traits of a bird by mating it to its best descendants; hence pullets are mated to their sires or grandsires, and cockerels to their dams or grandams. Linebreeding is not restricted to just parent/offspring matings as you imply.
But I won't argue that parent/offspring matings are usually used and have no idea if mother/son matings are used most.
Susan Mc
Tuesday, November 2nd, 2010 Sorry guys but Susan is right on this one, better option is line breeding but no harm in using brother and sister and the following year father daughter, etc. Its on old wives tall not to use brother/sister in birds, not at all the same as in humans, dogs or cats.
Weak offspring comes from lack of vitality parent birds, not from inbreeding
Marc Ruymbeke
Tuesday, November 2nd, 2010 well said marc some of the best birds i have are close bred
hunt
Tuesday, November 2nd, 2010 ya but mark it is not healthy to cross brother and sister now is it, i know u can get away with it but it dosnt mean to say that its right?? and yes that is how u will keep a good strain of birds is line breed, but do it in a way that it is fair to the birds and dont cross brother and sister,
Steven K
Tuesday, November 2nd, 2010 Steve, its not unfair on the birds, it just doesn't work the same as with other species, you can breed generation after generation brother to sister without any negative side effects as long as you take a male bird out of a large egg, the chick hatched naturally with interfearance, grow up well and is a vital adult bird. His sister has to show the same positive features + being a good layer of large well formed eggs.
You will not run in any trouble doing this, Line breeding is better but nothing wrong with B/S in birds.
Especially here in Ireland everyone is looking for unrelated birds, I believe this comes from way back were seller were left with male birds and came up with this story of selling pairs with unrelated animals. Totally wrong !!
Marc Ruymbeke
Tuesday, November 2nd, 2010 ive heard there is less of a chance of problems if they are half brother and sister like if you had a trio and bred the offspring from one hen with the offspring from the other hen it wouldnt be as bad as they only have the same father and not the same mother
Julian
Tuesday, November 2nd, 2010 What kind of problems Julian ?
Marc Ruymbeke
Tuesday, November 2nd, 2010 not fair on birds steven they are chickens you agree by crossing you can keep a good line goin so i can tell you it does no harm as i said before if it was wrong i wouldnt do it its a pity more people dont line breed instead of bringing dirt into their yards turning good birds bad
hunt
Tuesday, November 2nd, 2010 careful breeding is the way to go if the type is right whit brother and sister this is a good mating for me .i dont see how this is unfair on the birds. line breeding .inbreeding has being going on for ever
egghead
Tuesday, November 2nd, 2010 Look, what it comes down to is this. If a bird has good genes it makes sense that its descendants will inherit those genes, and this is what linebreeding is based on - breeding great birds together to produce more great birds. Keeping it all in the family also means keeping out unknown hidden qualities from unrelated stock - no surprises.
In the wild, fowl wouldn't be breeding with relatives because the young would disperse outside of the parents' territory. This dispersal reduces inbreeding which may potentially over time bring undesirable traits into the population.
In captivity it is people who decide how to breed their chickens, the chickens don't get the choice, and its not like they care. But then we are supposed to have the intelligence to step in for natural selection and to enforce survival of the fittest. This means keeping and inspecting records, evaluating offspring and the pairings that produced them, and employing our option and obligation to cull.
As long as we breeders are prepared to cull and to make informed decisions about our stock, if the breeding pair is producing healthy chicks then it doesn't really matter if they're mated to their brother or mother or an unrelated bird.
And remember, brother/sister matings aren't necessarily 'worse' than parent/offspring matings. The latter is guaranteed to have 50% shared genes, but the former can have more, or it can have LESS. You just don't know. All you can do is breed from the best birds you can find and hope for the 'best'. Lecture over.
Susan Mc
Tuesday, November 2nd, 2010 pretty much sums it up well said and well done susan
hunt
Tuesday, November 2nd, 2010 Thanks! and back to the original question...
Patrick, yes you can cross brother and sister, they won't care at all. But clearly linebreeding is a debatable issue! Some folks won't prefer an 'inbred' bird.
Also keep this in mind: If you're breeding for your own use then do whatever you want; but if you want to sell on, please make sure both birds are actually worth breeding, that's the only reason to consider it. There's enough mediocre stock out there already without adding more.
Susan Mc
Wednesday, November 3rd, 2010 Just about summed the whole thing up there Susan,don,t do it unless you have no other choice and certainly don,t do it with bad birds to begin with,well done you!
Jemsy
Wednesday, November 3rd, 2010
Well said Susan
Guill.
Wednesday, November 3rd, 2010
Spot on Susan.
Castle Farm
Wednesday, November 3rd, 2010 Do not confuse Genes with DNA, loci with alleles.
Why is it that in "inbreeding" threads it seems not only acceptable and recommendable to inbreed very closely - but in "bad hatch rate" or "deformed toes" threads the same people respond to such a question with "probably inbred"? You can't have your cake and eat it.
Marc, can you educate me pls. on how genetics (am specifically interested in detrimental genes) work differently in poultry?
Bea
Bea
Thursday, November 4th, 2010 A coupld of years ago we worked closely with a genetisist and I believe you have dogs B, did you know that brother x sister inbreeding will only be considered as an inbreeding if you repeat this process 8 times.
Bad hatch rates, deformed toes, etc have nothing to do with inbreeding, these are just perceptions of us common people. The Red Kites were reintroduced in N-Scotland starting with 4 pairs, 2 by 2 related. Now they have a healthy population of over 130+ birds.
Although we call the chicks out of a same batch bro and sis, they are not as closely related as the human bro's and sisters, each chick is an individual.
Its complex and you need to keep track but its not that bad a thing as people believe it is.
Marc Ruymbeke
Thursday, November 4th, 2010 Marc,
As I am not allowed to discuss dogs here in the forum - caroline always gets upset - just a general response.
I have been running a sheepdog rescue for the past 10 years and have seen the disasterous outcomes of closely related matings, b x s, f x d, s x m. While I don't care what is called inbreeding or incest when, I am a big fan of using calculations to establish the inbreed co-efficient. I am sick and tired of looking after folk's "breeding" attempts which have produced infertile offspring, offspring with impairments, deformities and weakened immune systems.
Even in humans each individual is just that - even in identical twins there are individual twists, some may have more freckles than the other, one may have ears that are sticking out, one may have slightly more wavey hair than the other.
I know it is complex and this is why I am happy to learn about new revelations why chickens or birds are different.
The basic genetic rule is that any offspring of the same (unrelated) parents share 50% with their genetic makeup with their father and 50% with their mother. While the single components in the DNA double helix are arranged in different ways which make for different individual traits, the basic elements the offspring inherit are the same.
I wouldn't even look so far as to refer to complicated scientific findings but to nature; in every species where a decided mating decision is made through the controlling bodies related offspring of one gender are usually driven away by the ruling parent animal; wolves are no different from chickens where both male parents may tolerate the existence of male offspring at the fringes of their family groups but will not allow them to mate with females in the group. While the animals don't know anything about inbreeding, it's natural selection to avoide the very process.
Bea
Bea
Friday, November 5th, 2010 Darn it I wrote another long bit and then my laptop crashed...
Marc, I think you're misinformed or misunderstood the geneticist. A flock can become extinct from inbreeding depression after as few as 6 generations of brother/sister matings. A flock in your 8x scenario would be doomed.
Bad hatch rates DO have to do with inbreeding. Signs of inbreeding depression: 1.low hatchability, 2.fewer eggs laid, 3. chicks lack vigor.
While inbreeding/linebreeding is necessary for strains of exhibition or rare breeds, breeders can help forestall it by: 1.selecting/culling for hatchability, egg numbers, chick vigor, 2.by using less-close matings, and 3.by outbreeding occasionally, which introduces hybrid vigor, the opposite of inbreeding depression.
I'll give you the deformed toes though, they're usually caused by something else. But inbreeding does concentrate lethal genes, just as it concentrates the desirable ones that linebreeders are aiming for.
I'd still like to know how bird genetics differs from mammal genetics to the extent that offspring from the same parents are not brothers and sisters.
Susan Mc
Friday, November 5th, 2010
poultry: can you cross brother with sister?
hi there can you cross brother with sister becuase i have a hen and a cock. and i was just wondering could you
Monday, November 1st, 2010
not a good thing as some were down the line you will have problems . its always much beter to get unrelated pairs and the birds are much healther .
Monday, November 1st, 2010
yes you can get a new rooster after that breeding it will be ok
Monday, November 1st, 2010
all the top breeder line breed. breeding from related birds
Monday, November 1st, 2010
u can, but better to get unrelated cock an hen , if u have to just do for one breeding season , unless you know of the past of your breeding stock its hard to know how the young will turn out.
Monday, November 1st, 2010
Line breeding does not involve brother/sister matings, thats inbreeding to the fullest extent. Brothers and sisters carry 100% identical genes and when berd to each other produce problamatic, weak off spring which can show varing degrees of breed faults and can be very difficult to hatch.
Line breeding usually involves breeding father/daughter or mother/son. If carefully monitered this can be done for generations without any problems. Matings like this are successful as there are only 50% of the genes which are identical.
Monday, November 1st, 2010
Correct Mick!
Monday, November 1st, 2010
Incorrect Mick!! Actually brother and sister potentially can share 100% identical genes IF they are identical twins, or they can share 0% identical genes, or can share anything in between. It all depends which genes they inherit from each parent.
However, it is considered safest not to breed full siblings together because of the 'greater than 50%' potential to share identical harmful genes. It is better to breed offspring to parent at 50% shared genes, or better yet to grandparent at 25% or uncle/aunt at 50% or less.
Patrick it also depends how rare your breed of chicken is, sometimes you will have no choice but to resort to such matings if another choice doesn't exist. But if you have a common breed there is no reason to force such a mating.
Monday, November 1st, 2010
Thanks for that was
Monday, November 1st, 2010
i would say that brother to sister is not the best mating but to say that a unrelated cock is better is not right you have a better chant of breeden good birds if the brother and sister r good birds
Monday, November 1st, 2010
I'm afraid susan mick is correct on this one line breeding is mother/son or father/daughter, but its the mother to son one that is used the most,
Monday, November 1st, 2010
Steven, I was referring to Mick's incorrect statement that siblings carry 100% identical genes. Mick just got the science wrong. I didn't knock his statements on linebreeding or indeed make any reference to linebreeding at all. I just layed out the relationship percentages genetically speaking.
However, if you want to get into it... Linebreeding is used to concentrate the superior traits of a bird by mating it to its best descendants; hence pullets are mated to their sires or grandsires, and cockerels to their dams or grandams. Linebreeding is not restricted to just parent/offspring matings as you imply.
But I won't argue that parent/offspring matings are usually used and have no idea if mother/son matings are used most.
Tuesday, November 2nd, 2010
Sorry guys but Susan is right on this one, better option is line breeding but no harm in using brother and sister and the following year father daughter, etc. Its on old wives tall not to use brother/sister in birds, not at all the same as in humans, dogs or cats.
Weak offspring comes from lack of vitality parent birds, not from inbreeding
Tuesday, November 2nd, 2010
well said marc some of the best birds i have are close bred
Tuesday, November 2nd, 2010
ya but mark it is not healthy to cross brother and sister now is it, i know u can get away with it but it dosnt mean to say that its right?? and yes that is how u will keep a good strain of birds is line breed, but do it in a way that it is fair to the birds and dont cross brother and sister,
Tuesday, November 2nd, 2010
Steve, its not unfair on the birds, it just doesn't work the same as with other species, you can breed generation after generation brother to sister without any negative side effects as long as you take a male bird out of a large egg, the chick hatched naturally with interfearance, grow up well and is a vital adult bird. His sister has to show the same positive features + being a good layer of large well formed eggs.
You will not run in any trouble doing this, Line breeding is better but nothing wrong with B/S in birds.
Especially here in Ireland everyone is looking for unrelated birds, I believe this comes from way back were seller were left with male birds and came up with this story of selling pairs with unrelated animals. Totally wrong !!
Tuesday, November 2nd, 2010
ive heard there is less of a chance of problems if they are half brother and sister like if you had a trio and bred the offspring from one hen with the offspring from the other hen it wouldnt be as bad as they only have the same father and not the same mother
Tuesday, November 2nd, 2010
What kind of problems Julian ?
Tuesday, November 2nd, 2010
not fair on birds steven they are chickens you agree by crossing you can keep a good line goin so i can tell you it does no harm as i said before if it was wrong i wouldnt do it its a pity more people dont line breed instead of bringing dirt into their yards turning good birds bad
Tuesday, November 2nd, 2010
careful breeding is the way to go if the type is right whit brother and sister this is a good mating for me .i dont see how this is unfair on the birds. line breeding .inbreeding has being going on for ever
Tuesday, November 2nd, 2010
Look, what it comes down to is this. If a bird has good genes it makes sense that its descendants will inherit those genes, and this is what linebreeding is based on - breeding great birds together to produce more great birds. Keeping it all in the family also means keeping out unknown hidden qualities from unrelated stock - no surprises.
In the wild, fowl wouldn't be breeding with relatives because the young would disperse outside of the parents' territory. This dispersal reduces inbreeding which may potentially over time bring undesirable traits into the population.
In captivity it is people who decide how to breed their chickens, the chickens don't get the choice, and its not like they care. But then we are supposed to have the intelligence to step in for natural selection and to enforce survival of the fittest. This means keeping and inspecting records, evaluating offspring and the pairings that produced them, and employing our option and obligation to cull.
As long as we breeders are prepared to cull and to make informed decisions about our stock, if the breeding pair is producing healthy chicks then it doesn't really matter if they're mated to their brother or mother or an unrelated bird.
And remember, brother/sister matings aren't necessarily 'worse' than parent/offspring matings. The latter is guaranteed to have 50% shared genes, but the former can have more, or it can have LESS. You just don't know. All you can do is breed from the best birds you can find and hope for the 'best'. Lecture over.
Tuesday, November 2nd, 2010
pretty much sums it up well said and well done susan
Tuesday, November 2nd, 2010
Thanks! and back to the original question...
Patrick, yes you can cross brother and sister, they won't care at all. But clearly linebreeding is a debatable issue! Some folks won't prefer an 'inbred' bird.
Also keep this in mind: If you're breeding for your own use then do whatever you want; but if you want to sell on, please make sure both birds are actually worth breeding, that's the only reason to consider it. There's enough mediocre stock out there already without adding more.
Wednesday, November 3rd, 2010
Just about summed the whole thing up there Susan,don,t do it unless you have no other choice and certainly don,t do it with bad birds to begin with,well done you!
Wednesday, November 3rd, 2010
Well said Susan
Wednesday, November 3rd, 2010
Spot on Susan.
Wednesday, November 3rd, 2010
Do not confuse Genes with DNA, loci with alleles.
Why is it that in "inbreeding" threads it seems not only acceptable and recommendable to inbreed very closely - but in "bad hatch rate" or "deformed toes" threads the same people respond to such a question with "probably inbred"? You can't have your cake and eat it.
Marc, can you educate me pls. on how genetics (am specifically interested in detrimental genes) work differently in poultry?
Bea
Thursday, November 4th, 2010
A coupld of years ago we worked closely with a genetisist and I believe you have dogs B, did you know that brother x sister inbreeding will only be considered as an inbreeding if you repeat this process 8 times.
Bad hatch rates, deformed toes, etc have nothing to do with inbreeding, these are just perceptions of us common people. The Red Kites were reintroduced in N-Scotland starting with 4 pairs, 2 by 2 related. Now they have a healthy population of over 130+ birds.
Although we call the chicks out of a same batch bro and sis, they are not as closely related as the human bro's and sisters, each chick is an individual.
Its complex and you need to keep track but its not that bad a thing as people believe it is.
Thursday, November 4th, 2010
Marc,
As I am not allowed to discuss dogs here in the forum - caroline always gets upset - just a general response.
I have been running a sheepdog rescue for the past 10 years and have seen the disasterous outcomes of closely related matings, b x s, f x d, s x m. While I don't care what is called inbreeding or incest when, I am a big fan of using calculations to establish the inbreed co-efficient. I am sick and tired of looking after folk's "breeding" attempts which have produced infertile offspring, offspring with impairments, deformities and weakened immune systems.
Even in humans each individual is just that - even in identical twins there are individual twists, some may have more freckles than the other, one may have ears that are sticking out, one may have slightly more wavey hair than the other.
I know it is complex and this is why I am happy to learn about new revelations why chickens or birds are different.
The basic genetic rule is that any offspring of the same (unrelated) parents share 50% with their genetic makeup with their father and 50% with their mother. While the single components in the DNA double helix are arranged in different ways which make for different individual traits, the basic elements the offspring inherit are the same.
I wouldn't even look so far as to refer to complicated scientific findings but to nature; in every species where a decided mating decision is made through the controlling bodies related offspring of one gender are usually driven away by the ruling parent animal; wolves are no different from chickens where both male parents may tolerate the existence of male offspring at the fringes of their family groups but will not allow them to mate with females in the group. While the animals don't know anything about inbreeding, it's natural selection to avoide the very process.
Bea
Friday, November 5th, 2010
Darn it I wrote another long bit and then my laptop crashed...
Marc, I think you're misinformed or misunderstood the geneticist. A flock can become extinct from inbreeding depression after as few as 6 generations of brother/sister matings. A flock in your 8x scenario would be doomed.
Bad hatch rates DO have to do with inbreeding. Signs of inbreeding depression: 1.low hatchability, 2.fewer eggs laid, 3. chicks lack vigor.
While inbreeding/linebreeding is necessary for strains of exhibition or rare breeds, breeders can help forestall it by: 1.selecting/culling for hatchability, egg numbers, chick vigor, 2.by using less-close matings, and 3.by outbreeding occasionally, which introduces hybrid vigor, the opposite of inbreeding depression.
I'll give you the deformed toes though, they're usually caused by something else. But inbreeding does concentrate lethal genes, just as it concentrates the desirable ones that linebreeders are aiming for.
I'd still like to know how bird genetics differs from mammal genetics to the extent that offspring from the same parents are not brothers and sisters.
Friday, November 5th, 2010