Odd zebra chicks.

[ac12]

I have penguin pair where both mother and dad visually are penguins. 2 of their 4 offsprings have me stumped.

The hen looks like a gray but w/o the tear drop.

The male looks like a cross between a penguin and a gray. No chest bar (penguin), has a tear drop under his eye (gray), but the odd one is he does not have the brown cheek patch and flank feathers (?). He looks more like a hen than a male, but he is trying to sing so he is a HE.

Their other 2 are males. They have the correct feathers for a penguin.

In all 4 of them the gray feathers are significantly darker than both mom and dad, more like that of a normal gray zebra.

[L in Ontario]

How old are the chicks? Do they still have to colour up? Pics?

[ac12]

They should be half way thru their molt.
I can easily see the adult feather patterns on their siblings.
I will try to get pix later today.

[ac12]

This is the male.
The photo shows an orange bit on his cheek, but definitely not like his siblings. Then again, maybe he is just SLOW.
The tear drop does not belong on a penguin, so this one will have to go.

[Vargur]

looks like a fawn female zebra to me...

[ac12]

That is one odd thing, it does look like a hen.
But it sings, or at least is trying to sing, so that would make it a male.

[cindy]

the cheeks look like it has a hint of faint orange...is it the lighting? If not, is looks like a possible male.

[cindy]

check the penguin fledgling out on this page

http://www.efinch.com/species/pengzeb.htm

[kenny]

If you are not sure about the grandparents being 100percent penguin then these birds could throw up any colour aswell as penguin

[Nagdabit]

Gary:

Really don't know much of anything about the Penguin mutation but that bright white belly doesn't seem to be typical of Fawn colored birds (unless there's some Lightback in the equation). Isn't that more commonly found in Penguin traits? Is it possible that a split of some sort is sneaking in and toying with the Pengiun genetics?

[ac12]

There is some throwback going on as ALL of the penguin chicks are darker than the parents. The gray back and wing feathers are about as dark as a regular gray, much darker than either parent.