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Mealanism in Penguins

Arabica March 20, 2010 February 22, 2011

Forums

I know this isn't a horse but I thought you guys might be interested in a couple of melanistic penguins. One appears to be male and the other looks as if it could be female. They look great and the other normal penguins don't seem to shun them so maybe they will be able to pass on the prediposition for darker coloring. http://www.dogonews.com/2010/03/10/rare-all-black-king-penguin-spotted-…" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false; http://news.nationalgeographic.com/news/2010/03/100316-antarctica-black…" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;

Dogrose Sun, 03/21/2010 - 19:58

Cool- but some of the 'facts' about melanism don't seem quite right- its not that rare in any animal species, in the UK for e.g red foxes can be melanistic- I've seen one so they can't be that rare :-D Also they say melanism usually causes white feathers not black- surely not right at all?

Jenks Mon, 03/22/2010 - 08:40

[quote="Dogrose"]Cool- but some of the 'facts' about melanism don't seem quite right- its not that rare in any animal species, in the UK for e.g red foxes can be melanistic- I've seen one so they can't be that rare :-D Also they say melanism usually causes white feathers not black- surely not right at all?[/quote]

I haven't heard that (about feathers). I'm currently trying to study up on bird/feather color genetics, and it is FAR more complicated than horse color! But what I see: Melanic birds are almost completely black due to eumelanin deposition throughout all feathers.

And research on the Melanic birds from 2009: http://linkinghub.elsevier.com/retrieve…" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;

and this article references "non melanic feathers" as "White" http://www.jstor.org/pss/4090304" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;

Arabica Mon, 03/22/2010 - 18:21

[quote="Dogrose"]Cool- but some of the 'facts' about melanism don't seem quite right- its not that rare in any animal species, in the UK for e.g red foxes can be melanistic- I've seen one so they can't be that rare :-D Also they say melanism usually causes white feathers not black- surely not right at all?[/quote]

Although it seems to occur in other species, it is not supposed to be as common as say in cats where 11 of the 37 species express the black mutation.
http://www.feline-nutrition.org/the-blo…" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;

I've found an article about a black barn owl in the UK.
http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article…" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;

Dogrose Tue, 03/23/2010 - 11:43

I don't know much about bird colour genetics, I mean you have all the sexual diomorphism of colours too which makes it all more complicated. I tried to look into chicken genetics and gave up :-D
I know you can get recessive (albino) and dominant (leucistic) white. I lived somewhere a few years back that had white sparrows, they were like white canaries, really pretty.