All About Roosters, Hens, Combs, Beards and Wattles

Why does my rooster NOT have a comb and beard?

First of all, from what I have been learning, there are two types of combs.

A Single Comb

Rhode Island Red Rooster
with Single Comb

Cross-bred rooster -
Ameraucana or Araucana and Rhode Island Red -
with single comb.

And a Pea Comb

Ameraucana or Araucana Rooster with Pea Comb

Araucana or Ameraucana Rooster with Pea Comb

And then there is the single floppy comb, which isn't really a kind of comb, it's just the condition of the single comb.

Rhode Island Red Rooster with a Single Comb

Combs can become limp and floppy for a number of reasons in a rooster - many times it's from an injury when it was young or from a genetic defect or it can be that the comb is so large that it simply cannot hold itself up. I'm thinking he just needs to start watching his head.

The base of hens' combs are genetically thinner than those of roosters so their combs often become floppy, especially when they are in egg production. Producing eggs takes a lot out of a girl! Hen combs also become dull in color (so if you're looking at your mature flock and trying to decide which one needs to go, look for the brightly colored comb - she's the one that's not producing.)

The hens in the back - Barred Rock Bantams - are in production.
The crowns of laying hens become duller in color than that of the other chickens.

As far as the beard goes (also called the Wattles), some breeds have them and some breeds don't. The rooster in the picture above is a cross between an Araucana and a Rhode Island Red. The feather structure and coloring is very much like an Araucana, but the pronounced single come and wattles is from the Rhode Island Red line. 


The rooster below follows the Araucana breed more, with a pea comb and no wattles.

Now:

If you have a pea comb rooster and mate it to a female who has a pea comb AND lays blue eggs, you have a greater chance of their daughters laying blue eggs.

Interesting.

Here's the numbers from Alberta Chickens:
"For ANY hen that lays blue/green eggs, half of her daughters (or more) should also lay blue/green eggs. If she's mated to guy with a blue gene or two, then a higher proportion will lay blue/green.

Basically the probabilities are (where O is blue gene, o is non-blue):
parent 1 OO x parent 2 OO: all daughters will lay blue/green eggs
parent 1 OO x parent 2 Oo: all daughters will lay blue/green eggs
parent 1 OO x parent 2 oo: all daughters will lay blue/green eggs
parent 1 Oo x parent 2 Oo: 75% of daughters will lay b/g
parent 1 Oo x parent 2 oo: 50% will lay b/g
parent 1 oo x parent 2 oo: none will lay b/g
It's hard to know if your bird is OO, Oo or oo (especially if it's a roo). If it's a pure ameraucana or Araucana, it should be OO. If it's a recent descendant of either, and has a pea comb, it should be OO or Oo."


NOTE: When a pure Araucana is crossed with other breeds (regardless of the pea crown) the result is the Ameraucana. The color of the egg shell produced varies from blue, pink to green.


Information from Oklahoma State University regarding the Araucana chicken breed.
Information from Oklahoma State University regarding the Rhode Island Red chicken breed.
Information from Oklahoma State University diagramming the parts of male and female chickens (no, not just the wing, thigh and drumstick.)


 



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