Dilute Modenas

Dilute Modenas, in my opinion, are the most attractive of all the Modena colours. In definition, the dilute gene is a gene that cuts the amount of pigment in the feather by approximately half, thus causing the colours to appear faded, or as a completely different colour.

The three dilutes you are likely to come across at the shows, are yellow chequer and cream from the ash red family which is most dominant, silver and sulpher from the blue family and ochre and silver cream from the brown family.

The three colours, although dilute in their own right, have dominance to each other.

As an example, if you were to mate an ochre cock or silver cream cock to a silver or sulpher hen, the young cocks would take the colour of the mother and the young hens the colour of the father. Although both the parents are dilute, the hens are from the blue family (second most dominant) and cocks are from the brown family (least dominant). Knowing the order of dominance, enable a breeder to determine the sex of the young Modena at only a few weeks of age.

 Dilute Modena chicks hatch with very little or no down covering their bodies and tend to take several weeks to feather sufficiently enough to keep warm. With this in mind, care needs to be taken with the breeding of dilute Modenas, as the chicks are vulnerable to chill if left unattended, for any length of time, by the parents

  It is difficult to start breeding dilute Modenas without reliable dilute stock and patience. Quality dilute birds are not readily available and it pays to do a little homework first and contact a breeder who specialises in dilute breeding and will be able to trace the family tree. It may be that you are initially offered non dilute cock birds that carry dilute as these tend to be surplus stock. As only cock birds can carry dilute, these cocks are the result of mating a dominant coloured cock to a dilute hen. Most of the cocks produced from this mating will carry dilute. This is where the patience is needed. Although you do not have the dilute you want at this stage, the following year, if mated to a dilute hen the majority of the young will be dilute. If the cock carrying dilute is mated to a dominant hen, the offspring produced will be a mixture of dominant and dilute but dilutes produced will invariably be hens.

 The temptation when breeding dilutes, is to only keep and use dilute stock. This however is not an ideal course of action as it will invariably lead to a reduction in the size of the offspring. Introducing a dominant from the same colour family or one of the other colour groups can be beneficial, not only for size and type but also in some cases depth of colour.

 Many books and accompanying breeding charts attempt to explain colour breeding in Modenas and other pigeon breeds. Although helpful in some ways, the information given refers to an ideal world, where all the birds are pure in colour and are not carrying dilute gene or other factors. When a dilute carrying bird is placed in the mix, the colour possibilities are endless with over 150 standard Modena colours.

Genetics in Modenas is both a fascinating and at times, a rather confusing topic. It does not only affect the colour dominance but also the feather patterning. However pattern variation can be listed as a future topic for review.

 To those who are new to Modenas, hopefully the above information will give some insight into dilute breeding of Modenas.

 Please feel free to e-mail any questions with regard to keeping and breeding Modenas and I will endeavour to promptly reply.

 Gary.