Posted by Rosalyn I'll see if I can find a copy of an article of tufts that I wrote for the Clucker a few years ago and e-mail it to you when I get home. Hopefully some other breeders will weigh in here.
on 10/16/2006, 6:30 pm, in reply to "Tuft genetics question"
12.33.21.99
The tufts genetics is both simple and complex. The simple part you probably already know, and that is that the tufts gene is dominant, and that it is lethal if two copies of the gene are present (homozygous). The complex part has to do with the appearance of the tufts. You already know that tufts can vary widely in appearance. This is not because of any difference in the gene, but most likely depends on both chance factors and modifiers that might be present. Some breeders have developed lines of Araucanas that produce large percentages of good tufts, lending support to the importance of genentic modifiers. However, most breeders find that they need to hatch large numbers of chicks to get a few good ones.
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