Help IDing Society Morphs/Genetics

[nimure]

Hi! I'm new to society finches, and while I've been looking up everything I can get a hold of online, I was hoping I could get some help/confirmation from the folks on here.

I have a group of 5 adults currently. I've been trying to figure out what morphs they all are, as there are a few I can't figure out. Some are pet store birds, some are surrogates from a gouldian breeder. I know for sure one of the birds is a male (the coppery brown one with no white, chestnut self?). Not sure if there are more males in the group or not. The darkest bird (chocolate self?) is a female, and her and another female (one of the birds with white on it's face) are sharing a nest and raising a group of babies. I assume the coppery male is the father, but not sure if there are any other potential dads or if he is it.

There are 5 babies, 3 are dark like the dark female, two are fawn colored with pied markings? (Please feel free to correct me if I'm saying something wrong!)

Just trying to understand what morphs I have, who the likely parents are, and how the genetics work. Will the dark one always be dominant? Is pied a dominant trait?


This pic shows all 5 adults, the dark female on the bottom left and the coppery male to the top right. The three birds inbetween are all similar in coloration with varying amounts of white. One has a white chest.


White chest bird


Coppery dad in with babies, dark female on nest, one of the other 3 off to the side. Potential mother of the lighter babies but I'm uncertain.


Group photo. 9 eggs in the nest total, 5 fledgling birds


dark baby


fawn pied? Not sure..

Thank you for the time and assistance!! These are really fun little birds, and I love learning more about them.

[lovezebs]

nimure

Hello and welcome to the Forum.

First of all let me say, you have some cute little darlings in your collection, thanks for sharing them with us.

The Society Finch, are the sweetest finches out there (which you already know).

I am not an expert on their genetics, or all the colour mutations that are out there, but hopfully someone more knowledgable will pipe in with the information you're looking for.

I found this Aussie site on line, which has lots of infomation which you may find helpful. Regretably, it's in Auusie lingo, but still may give you some insight into things.

http://aussiebengos.blogspot.ca/2013/10 ... guide.html

If you click under Topics on the left side of this site, it will show you all sorts of different mutations of the Societies (aka Bengalese, aka Bengos).

[nimure]

Thank you for the info! I'm certainly looking forward to being here and learning more about these cute little birds.

[paul-inAZ]

try this one:
http://www.zebrafinch.com/SocietyFinch/Society.html

[nimure]

try this one:
http://www.zebrafinch.com/SocietyFinch/Society.html

Hi! Thank you. I have been looking at that website, but I still haven't been able to confirm what all I have. I am guessing the dark female is a chocolate self (or a black/gray self), but I'm not sure. The male could be (from the pictures I've found) a chestnut or fawn/fox red self. I'm still not sure and looking for clarification of what he is. The other 3 adults don't look like the typical chocolate pied that I've seen though I'm thinking the white on their faces and the one's chest means pied?

Will the babies the dark female have always look like her? Is that a dominant mutation? The two light fawn babies must have been due to hidden/recessive genes? None of the adults have that color.

Or is the red brown one a fawn self, and the 3 pied ones are chestnut selfs with pied?

[lovezebs]

nimure

Because Socies will breed with anyone at anytime and any place , it's very difficult to know exactly what you have.

Unless you get them from a serious Society breeder who show breeds, and is very meticulous about their breeding habits, you have no way of knowing what exactly lurks in their genetic make up.

If I remember right (and that's a big if, lol), once you get 'pied' in there, it's very hard to get rid of it again....

There is one member that show breeds Socies, and might be able to give you some ideas. Lets see if we can locate her for you.

[paul-inAZ]

I may have a simplistic view of this but if there is one white feather it is a common pied regardless of what the base color is.
If you are looking to breed selfs you will have to exclude the pieds from the breeding program and try to breed the pied genes out of the others. My experience was that the pied chicks kept popping up even with parents that looked like selfs. I also started with birds of unknown genetics. Eventually I gave up.

[Sheather]

At least two of your adults look like chocolate colored pieds. The others could be chocolate selfs but could be chocolate pieds if they have even one white feather, with the red brown possibly a genetically chocolate bird carrying an additional gene slightly modifying her background color (I've had chocolate pieds occasionally produce reddish and slightly gray-colored chicks and assumed it was the result of an additional genetic factor on the chocolate color) but may still be carrying recessive pied genes.

The chicks you've gotten are either three chocolate selfs or three very lightly pied chocolates, and two chestnut pieds. Personally chestnut - intermediate between fawn and chocolate - is my favorite color. And you're right, at least some of your adults are carrying the gene for it recessively.

[nimure]

Thank you all for the info. I'll have to check the ones that appear to be selfs to see if they have any white feathers. I'm not aiming for show quality birds or anything like that, just like to have names for what I see, and I've always enjoyed playing with genetics. I used to breed snakes as a hobby.

[wilkifam]

The one with no white on it appears to be a American Self - Mocha Brown bird. I think I see some white down by its right leg on the belly, or it is just very light colored feathers, or lighting is bad. The rest are chocolate pied. If a bird has even one white feather, consider it pied. If you want to breed selfs, take all pieds out of the breeding program, or use them for surrogates.

The BEST book out there on Benegalese finches is:

"The Benegalese Finch" and can only be ordered from the following gentleman:

j.ward39@btinternet.com

I've ordered two from him. I believe the cost is around $30.

[wilkifam]

I have several Juvenile Societies in molt now, and they will be available for sale in the next few weeks. They are all Euros, Americans, and Japanese Pearls. Selfs, no Pieds. If you are interested, I will advertise here first. I ship.

[lovezebs]

wilkifam

Thanks Lori .

[nimure]

So I doubled checked when I got home. The coppery colored male has some white between his legs, between his breast feathers and his tail. The dark female is all dark, not a single white feather on her anywhere.

3 of the babies appear to be the chocolate selfs? 3 babies currently have no white anywhere.

This is the coppery male with white


~~~~

This is the all dark female, no white



So I guess all chocolate pieds except the one female I guess. I'll be curious to see how the dark babies turn out. No white so far but not all their feathers are in yet.

[nimure]

Also a thanks for the offer to buy non-pieds, but I'm just enjoying the birds I have currently. No plans to really collect or show.

Why is the pied gene so common? Is it naturally occurring or just dominant and accidentally got bred into so many animals?

[Sheather]

The society finch is the domesticated form of the white-rumped munia, which naturally looks much like a chocolate self. They were kept in ancient China (hundreds or even thousands of years ago) as pets, and as the only domesticated songbird really available in that area at that time, I suspect that when the novel pied mutations appeared, they were selected over the "boring" naturally colored birds and eventually the naturals became rare. This still happens today with our pet birds. Normal gray cockatiels and greenback purplebreast gouldians that don't carry recessive color genes are hard to find nowadays as everyone breeds for mutation.