Chick color

[Artchic528]

I have been wondering about what color my green cheek chick might be. Dad is a yellow sided and mom a turquoise yellow sided. No clue on Either Mom’s parentage or Dad’s. It’s a long story, didn’t plan on it, but chick is here now.

I’ve done research and everything tells me the chick is most likely a yellow sided turquoise like mom. Am I correct? Chick is a few days old and covered in white fluffy down right now, but everything I’ve read says yellow sided chicks start off with white down.

 

[Karearea]

Your chick will definitely be yellow-sided, but everything else is more or less a mystery until its colored feathers come in. Chances are highest that it will be a normal yellow-sided, but it may be a turquoise yellow-sided if the father is split turquoise, or even dilute yellow-sided if both parents happen to be split dilute. Since you havent mentioned any redness to the eyes, cinnamon is out of the question.

 

[Artchic528]

Your chick will definitely be yellow-sided, but everything else is more or less a mystery until its colored feathers come in. Chances are highest that it will be a normal yellow-sided, but it may be a turquoise yellow-sided if the father is split turquoise, or even dilute yellow-sided if both parents happen to be split dilute. Since you havent mentioned any redness to the eyes, cinnamon is out of the question.

Here they are. You can see for yourself about eye color.

 

[Karearea]

Young cinnamons have reddish eyes while non-cinnamons have black eyes. Usually you can see those on the chick pretty early. Mom doesn't have any cinnamon genes but dad could be hiding one, which is why I mentioned it.

 

[Artchic528]

Oh.

Young cinnamons have reddish eyes while non-cinnamons have black eyes. Usually you can see those on the chick pretty early. Mom doesn't have any cinnamon genes but dad could be hiding one, which is why I mentioned it.

Oh. Here is the best I can do for a pic of the chick’s eyes then. They look dark to me.

 

[Karearea]

The eyes do look black in that photo. You may have seen this picture in your research, but if you haven't, the bird in the foreground is yellow-sided while the bird in the back is pineapple (yellow-sided + cinnamon). You can see the difference in the eyes + the fuzz and beak color. The fuzz of regular wild-types and turquoises is gray, the fuzz of yellow-sides is slightly lighter, and the fuzz of cinnamons and dilutes is off-white. That said, these are older birds where the differences are much easier to see. Birds as young as yours can look very similar to one another.