We have heard of some people curious about the color of their baby cockatiels once they are born – and this is exactly what a cockatiel genetics calculator can do.
Interestingly, you can guess what your cockatiel babies will turn out to be. It’s actually pretty simple.
Currently, there are a couple of genetic calculators online for cockatiels. These are helpful tools that allow you to determine the color mutations you can expect in the babies. So, if you want to learn more about these interesting tools, keep reading to discover just what these do and how to use them.
Let’s jump right into it.
Cockatiel Genetics Calculator
When it comes to reliable cockatiel genetics calculator, there are a few options you can use:
Cockatiel Color Palette
One of the most popular cockatiel genetics calculators is the Cockatiel Color Palette. It is a simple tool that lets you figure out what the color mutation is. Now, this is found on the App store, which works only on Apple devices.
According to the creator of this tool, this was designed as a helpful resource for breeders who would like to know more about the color mutations, genetics, and possible offspring types that will result from various pairings.
Moreover, the tool has been downloaded by users more than 2,700 times. The tools used were based on the genetic inheritance principles, which predict the types of offspring a cockatiel pair specified by users.
Now, with the older version of this tool, crossovers were not considered. This is a variable that impacts the result once the father cockatiel is split to a couple or so of sex-linked mutations. But as for the new version, it considers crossovers and should be more accurate.
It is also worth noting that this cockatiel genetics calculator makes use of some basic terminology, so you should be able to understand it easily. Keep in mind that it only works for cockatiels. Thus, if you have other bird species, this may not be much useful.
When using this tool, you just have to click the option “male”, and then tick the appropriate boxes opposite the genetic traits. Then, click the “set male”. This may be a bit of a challenge to obtain the sex-linked splits correctly, particularly if you are not quite familiar or accustomed with this concept.
Next, click on the “female” options and choose the appropriate traits before clicking the “set female” button. Afterwards, select “breed” and you should be able to see the results in your calculator. It is not possible to highlight the text, which means you will not be able to copy it. However, you can always click the “copy text” option to perform this task.
When performing a new calculation, just choose the “start over” option to do this.
GenCalc
Now, the GenCalc is slightly more complex to use. It does not consider crossovers, which makes it a bit tricky. Furthermore, the terminologies used are slightly more complex, so if you are not very much familiar with it, there tends to be a steeper learning curve to consider.
There are certain symbols to know such as 1.0 for male and 0.1 for female. There are also calculators available for various species of birds, which is why it is quite diverse. However, it makes use of a general-purpose type of mutation names and not only for cockatiel-specific mutation. Thus, this adds to the confusion in using this tool.
But one tip to consider is that you should easily understand the results by copying them into your Word document followed by writing the translation right next to the terminologies used by the calculator.
It is also worth noting that the marbled type of mutation on the calculator is for the Australia-only silver spangle type of mutation. However, folks in North America and other places use this for emerald because of the recessive inheritance mode.
Pay close attention to any punctuation marks when you read the results. If you see a slash sign, everything after this symbol is a split. But everything else before this is a visual mutation. As for the hyphen sign, this refers to sex-linked splits.
Lastly, the calculator presents both of the parents on one page. This is why it makes it easier to select the genetic traits. Just be careful when choosing the X1 and X2 splits of the male. And when you have finished choosing the traits, click the generate button to obtain your results. You can copy the result by highlighting your text and clicking copy and paste.
Read More: Is Your Cockatiel Making Squeaking Noises? Here’s Why!
Bottom Line
Determining the color mutations of your cockatiel is quite straightforward and easy with the use of the right tool such as a cockatiel genetics calculator. We hope that this has been helpful for you, and you can go ahead and explore the tools we mentioned to begin your calculations!
