Hi Robin,
A curious 2 pictures. My simplified comments are: It does not look to me at all like a typical hybrid Crimson/Eastern Rosella (they usually have a yellow belly, far more dispersed
yellow on top and pale blue cheeks). It looks much more like an odd Crimson Rosella, deficient in the red pigment. So I suspect it is that. Or maybe one that has some Yellow Rosella parentage somehow (that being another form of the Crimson Rosella), rather
than having Eastern Rosella parentage.
The question about
and that any mutations have not passed onto the young
is hard to know. Assuming a single gene mutation (if that is what it is), then, on a very simplistic answer, the chance that it was passed down to any one particular offspring is 50% on each one. Depending on the inheritance of that character, it may or may
not display in the phenotype of any offspring. (And does it matter?)
I am not sure I am assuming something wrong in intent from your sentence, but hybrid characteristics are something entirely separate from mutation. I think you are suggesting a
connection, which there isn’t. Of course hybrid genetics would be passed down to a next generation, because then you are dealing with half of the whole animal’s genetics, so obviously that would be passed down in the process of formation of sex cells. Rather
than just one gene, in the case of a mutation. Apart from the obvious constraint, that in many situations, hybrids are sterile, so mostly they won’t. Various reasons why hybrids are mostly sterile, main one is that the chromosome set from two different parent
species do not match correctly and the meiosis process does not work.
Then again, is that really
the young that it is feeding?
Why then is the bird on the right in full adult plumage? Would this not be courtship feeding of a partner? I suggest that is what is happening.
Philip
From: Robin Eckermann [
Sent: Wednesday, 17 October, 2018 5:55 PM
To:
Subject: [canberrabirds] Hybrid Crimson/Eastern Rosella?
Would I be correct in assuming that this is a cross-bred Crimson/Eastern Rosella ... and that any mutations have not passed onto the young that it is feeding?
(Click on thumbnail for larger view)
(Click on thumbnail for larger view)
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Regards ... Robin Eckermann
Phone: 02-6161-6161 (w) 0418-630-555 (m)
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