
The Leg Color Problem in Embden Geese
Time after time over the past
few years, I and many other judges have been confronted by the same dilemma
when judging the class of Embden geese. At the top of the class are one or two birds
of superior type, size and condition but we know that the top Embden will
likely not go any further. Why not? Because the breed standard calls for deep orange
legs and feet and the winning Embden’s legs and feet cannot be accurately said
to be orange. They are pink, not orange and there is no getting around that
fact. The judge knows that the one point deduction for incorrect leg/foot color
will not likely be fatal at the breed level but may make a difference at the
Heavy Class or Championship level when competing against very good birds of
other breeds.
How did it happen that an obvious problem with leg and foot
color could become so widespread in so popular a breed of goose? Apparently,
the problem is a genetic predisposition toward pink leg and foot color which
the breed comes by honestly from its progenitor, the Graylag goose. Authority
on waterfowl genetics Dave Holderread says that Graylags naturally have
leg/foot color which is much more pink than the deep orange required by the APA Standard for Embdens. If so, how is it that the
Embden was standardized with orange legs/feet? Evidently, the recessive orange
color was preferred by early breeders and it was selected for instead of the
dominant pink color gene as the breed was developed. The orange color can be
re-enforced (assuming that it is present) by heavy feeding with corn. Unfortunately,
when the price of corn skyrocketed, the amount of corn in most types of
processed feeds declined. When combined with the understandable tendency of
most Embden breeders to emphasize traits in their birds that they deemed more
important than leg/foot color, the number of birds that carried the recessive
gene for orange leg/foot color has evidently declined.
I am sure that there still exists in most of the better
lines of Embdens the genetic wherewithal to improve the color. Meanwhile, the
feeding of controlled amounts of corn to enhance the orange pigment that is
there will also enhance Embden’s chances in the show situation.
It might make sense for the APA
Standard Committee to recognize the genetic realities (also present in other
European breeds of geese, by the way) by mentioning the color problem in lists
of common defects for the breeds affected.
Originally published: 11-17-2009
Last updated: 11-17-2009
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