# What genders are these babies?



## SkittlesnBarty (Nov 22, 2015)

I'm getting 2 four week old cockatiels on Monday. The breeder told me they're both female, but I don't think she had them DNA sexed, so I'm not sure. 
As far as I can tell, both parents are split pied, the mama is cinnamon and the dad is a normal grey split lutino. I know he's split lutino because one of the babies is lutino.
Now, the babies are lutino, cinnamon and normal. Someone told me the lutino is definitely a girl and cinnamon could be either gender, but what about the grey? I'm really hoping it's a girl, but someone said any greys would be boys. 
Does anyone know?
I'm getting the cinnamon and grey.

Here are the parents: 









Here are the babies:


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## Vickitiel (Oct 10, 2012)

I'm not sure about the genders, I'm sure someone else can assist you with that but may I just say they are absolutely darling!


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## roxy culver (May 27, 2010)

The only one that is 100% positively a girl is the lutino. The other two could be either/or, because of the splits dad carries. No way to tell without a DNA test.


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## Darkel777 (Jun 7, 2013)

The normal grey is most likely a male. There is a tiny chance (downwards from 3%) that the normal grey was produced due to crossover and would be a hen instead. Looking at the offspring its plain to see the father is split lutino and split cinnamon. The chance of getting a normal grey hen from a pairing like that is negligible.


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## SkittlesnBarty (Nov 22, 2015)

What about the cinnamon, it could be either? I'm still getting both, but was really wanting a girl and I wish the breeder hadn't told me they're all female if she didn't know.


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## Darkel777 (Jun 7, 2013)

The cinnamon could be either as stated previously. This is because of the inheritance mechanics involved. For a male to be cinnamon both the mother and the father must be carriers or visual of the cinnamon trait. For a hen to be cinnamon, only the father must be a carrier; hens do not inherit sex-linked traits from their own mother. Because of this quirk, any sex-linked gene visual in chicks indicates the father must be a carrier for the mutation or visual. Hens pass on their mutation to their sons in the form of a non-visual split.

This is your pairing as Z chromosomes: L=Lutino C=Cinnamon
Male__Female
LC____C
Offspring:

L (Hen)
C (Hen)
LC(Male)
CC(Male)

Remember, males need two copies of a chromosome to be visual. So you get Lutino hens, Cinnamon hens, Normal Grey Males split to Lutino and split to Cinnamon, and Cinnamon Males.

When you run the numbers on terms of sex in your situation it comes down to a coin flip 50/50. You have a cinnamon and there's the possibility of getting a male and a female in this outcome equally.

Normal grey shouldn't really be treated as other sex-linked traits. Because normal gray is just the absence of mutation. This can come across due to crossover of two mutated traits albeit rarely or it can be the simple case of normal healthy chromosomes getting passed to the next generation.

Crossover normal gray hens would be if in the example above the father's cinnamon chromosome combined with the lutino chromosome before fertilization eliminating the mutated part of that gene. Alternatively, that same situation can create cinnamon lutino hens. Crossover is rare, but knowledge of it will allow you to avoid trouble explaining radical and strange mutations appearing in a hatch.


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## SkittlesnBarty (Nov 22, 2015)

Okay. Thank you  Mutations can be difficult to explain/understand so I appreciate your explanation. 
I'll post the gender of the cinnamon when I find out!


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