Cockatiel Genetics
for the Beginning Breeder
The Albino Cockatiel - By Cynthia Kiesewetter

Let me start by saying there is no such thing as a "True Albino" cockatiel. What we call an albino cockatiel only has the phenotype (appearance) of an albino (all white feathers, pink feet, red eyes and no cheek patch). The reason it appears this way is that it is really a combination of the sex-linked Lutino mutation and the autosomal recessive Whiteface mutation. Lutino is a mutation which has affected the melanin pigment in such a way that no melanin (grey or brown coloration) is produced. Thus, a Lutino is a white or yellow bird with red eyes and an orange cheekpatch. Whiteface, however, affects the lipochrome (yellow and orange) pigment in such a way that no lipochrome is produced. Without either melanin or lipochrome, the resulting cockatiel lacks in any color and appears to be an albino. What's the difference? There's a big difference where genetic determination is concerned.

Genetically, the albino cockatiel is really combination mutation: Lutino-Whiteface. It is not it's own gene. The albino cockatiel cannot pass along one gene to produce another albino. Instead, one sex-linked Lutino gene and one autosomal recessive Whiteface gene are passed separately to the offspring. If a Lutino-Whiteface (Albino) male were mated to a normal hen, none of the resulting babies would be albino. Also, none of the resulting babies would be "split to albino," another misnomer. All the male offspring produced by this mating would be normal grey split to Lutino and Whiteface. The female babies would be Lutino split to whiteface. If there were a "true Albino" mutation, it would exist as a single gene, probably sex-linked, and all the female babies would look like their father.

MALE: XL XL ww (Lutino Whiteface)
FEMALE: X Y (Normal Grey)

SONS: XL X wN (Normal/Lutino & Whiteface)
DAUGHTERS: XL Y wN (Lutino split Whiteface)

While I am on this subject, I must bring up the error on page 124 in a book called, The New Cockatiel Handbook. Table 8 consists of the mutations produced by mating "albino" cockatiels, stating that a male "albino" mated to a normal grey hen will produce 50% normal cocks split to albino, and 50% albino hens! As I showed you above, this is not the case. I wrote the the author of this book, Matthew Vriends, regarding this error, but so far no corrections have been made.

Now that I have exhausted that subject, I will finally discuss how to produce a Lutino-Whiteface baby. There are several ways to do this. The easiest way, of course, is to go out and buy a Lutino-Whiteface pair! But that's the easy way out, and I personally don't find that too challenging. The better way is to develop a good Lutino line and a good Whiteface line, and then use the best of both for your breeding.

A good Lutino male (let's try to pick one without a bald spot, please) mated to a nice whiteface hen (just a plain whiteface will do), will produce this:

MALE: XL XL (Lutino)
FEMALE: X Y ww (Whiteface)

SONS: XL X wN (Normal split Lutino & Whiteface)
DAUGHTERS: XL Y wN (Lutino split Whiteface)

The male offspring will all be split to both Lutino and Whiteface, and all hens will be Lutino split to whiteface. Now, to any of you who said, "Oh, good, now I can breed the brother to the sister to get albino babies!"....a slap on the wrist and a mighty TSK TSK. Don't you know that inbreeding is the way we developed those nasty bald spots to begin with?

Let's take the biggest male produced by the above couple and mate him back to one of his female whiteface cousins on his mother's side. That charting will look like this:

MALE: XL X wN (Normal split Lutino & Whiteface)
FEMALE: X Y ww (Whiteface)

SONS: XL X wN (Normal split Lutino & Whiteface)
DAUGHTERS: XL Y wN (Lutino split Whiteface)

As you can see, 25% of your males will be normal split to Lutino and Whiteface, 25% will be Whiteface split to Lutino, 25% will be normal split to whiteface, and 25% will be whiteface; 25% of your females will be Lutino split to whiteface, 25% will be Lutino-Whiteface, 25% will be normal split to whiteface, and 25% will be whiteface. Of course, the only babies above that will be useful in producing further Lutino-Whiteface offspring will be those carrying both Lutino and Whiteface! Since you can't tell which males are split to Lutino, you are better off keeping just the female Lutinos and Lutino-Whitefaces for future breeding.

This bit of information was brought to you by:
Cynthia Kiesewetter of NACS

Articles are Copyright Up At Six and cannot be reprinted without the written permission of Up At Six and the author.
Last Revised: Thu Aug 7 08:10:12 2008 ( Damian )
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