Eye Color Genetics

[Steve Neumann]

Curious to know from those who have been at it for awhile.  I have some birds with the nice red bay colored eyes and am looking to improve eye color in my other birds.   Is there any sex linkage or strategic way of going about getting more birds with good colored eyes, other than just hatching and culling?  Also, I have some birds that have dark staining in the center of the eye and the color of their eye is confined to a ring around their eyes which makes their eyes look dark.  Is this genetic and how undesirable is this considered?

[John W Blehm]

My strategy has just been to breed from the best and inbreed to fix the characteristics when you have them.  If a characteristic, like good eye color, isn't in a variety then an outcross is needed to bring in the needed genes to work with.
 
Eye Colour:

There is a gene for brown eye, but I can't remember to much about it. I'll have to look it up. Eye color is also associated with the E locus alleles (black produces darker eyes) and genes like dominant white will dilute the eye color. I would expect blue and lavendar to do this too.

I had a Blue splash Ameraucana rooster that had bright orange eyes with red streaks in them. I bred him for two generations (the second one back to his daughters) because I like the eye color, but I never got anymore like him. Eye color is pretty much a genetic mystery for chickens.
Smyth in Poultry Breeding and Genetics, 1990 Crawford, ed. Cites a Sex-linked brown eye phenotype (Br). The normal color is called bay. Brown eyed birds are also seen in association with dark shanks and the id^M sex-linked dermal melanin allele. The dominant E allele is associated with brown eye too.

Pearl eye is thought to be recessive to bay eye. I'd think that there were at least two genes involved, but the genetics aren't known. Something inhibits carotinoid deposition and also melanin deposition in these eyes. White skin is known to inhibit carotinoid deposition in the skin, but Smyth claims that it isn't involved in pearl because yellow skinned Cornish can have pearl eyes.

The color I had in my Ameraucana was not the normal bay color it was a bright orange eye with blood red streaks in it. It was pretty striking and could not be confused with the normal bay.

The red color may be carotinoids (the pigment left in fall leaves and can be seen in vegetables like carrots and red peppers).

[Mike Gilbert]

Curious to know from those who have been at it for awhile.  I have some birds with the nice red bay colored eyes and am looking to improve eye color in my other birds.   Is there any sex linkage or strategic way of going about getting more birds with good colored eyes, other than just hatching and culling?  Also, I have some birds that have dark staining in the center of the eye and the color of their eye is confined to a ring around their eyes which makes their eyes look dark.  Is this genetic and how undesirable is this considered?

Steve, have you read my article in the Handbook?   I know it does not answer all your questions, but it may be a start.   Not a lot is known about eye color genetics because, I imagine, there has been no financial incentive to do so. 

[Suki]

The color I had in my Ameraucana was not the normal bay color it was a bright orange eye with blood red streaks in it. It was pretty striking and could not be confused with the normal bay.

What colour id the bright orange eye show up in?  I ask as i have a white like that
Thanks Sue