Aussie Finch Forum

Hi All,

Can anybody shed some light on the yellow beak colour in the pied Parrot finches? I have pied birds with only a small portion of yellow on one mandible, I have others with a complete mandible coloured and others with completely yellow beaks. And some of those completely yellow beaked birds don't have a yellow feather on them, whereas some birds with only a small amount of yellow in their beak are showing good pied colour. Is the beak colour random? Or, is it a precursor to how much colour the birds might throw?

I haven't been breeding the pieds long enough to know, but any info will surely help for future pairings.

Regards

Can't explain why some have just the lower mandible yellow & others both apart from the random nature of the pied mutation. However, any bird showing yellow mandible (either or both) at maturity is a pied genetically. They may only have a single pale feather under the wing where it can't be seen or may even not show any paleness but are still pied mutation birds.

Any explanation as to why some pied will have a black (normal) beak, and some will have yellow? Is it just a matter of the pied colour showing through where it choses as it does with the feathers? If that is the case would it mean that a heavily pied bird is more likley to have a yellow beak? (from my own observations I don't believe that last bit is correct).

All I can say to try to shed light on this is that the Pied mutation is totally variable & apparently random in its physical expression and can be anything from the smallest and virtually undetectable to the eye one-feather variation to a virtual full body transformation. I have found pieds in several species to be the most difficult mutation to intentionally produce a desired quality young bird in. I guess the variation in yellowness of the beak or lack thereof in certain pied PFs is also an indicator of the pot-luck expression of this mutation. I have seen some birds which have a fully yellow beak with virtually no distinguishing pied feather markings & others, as you've mentioned, nearly all yellow-bodied with virtually black bills but usually these ones have at least some pale-ish colour at the base of the lower mandible on close inspection.
My main query with this mutation is the existence or otherwise of double-factor pieds (which seems necessary for any dominant mutation) and how to physically detect them?? I suspect only test mating to normals can do this but would be very interested to hear of any experiences with visual detection methods.

Would love to see pictures of ppls pied parrot finches