Black plumage advantage
We study color genetics in game fowl because we are trying to locate some correlations between plumage color and some wild type traits (most common traits among animal in the wild) that might be responsible for survival of species and thus, traits advantageous to fighting cocks.
There might be linkage between plumage color and fighting ability. Indirect of course. Like a color linked to power, intelligence or speed. These traits if present in a game fowl can improve fighting ability. Or Pleiotropy wherein a single gene may affect multiple traits, like perhaps, plumage color and gameness.
These wild type advantageous genes might be somewhat associated to certain plumage and leg colors, as well as comb types.
For instance, we learned that one advantage of black plumage in birds is for thermal control.
Common sense suggests that light-colored feathers would be a better adaptation to heat. Like wearing a light-colored suit in the tropics.
But as it turns out, black plumage in birds works well in hot climate. Example is the raven in the desserts.
Black feathers do conduct the sun’s warming rays, but they concentrate the solar heat near the surface of the plumage. All it takes is a breeze or air movement from wind, or from flying, to convect the heat away from the surface of the dark feathers.
Light-colored feathers absorb some of the sun’s rays, too. But they tend to trap heat and send it more directly to the skin, where a breeze gives less relief. So in even a slight wind, the skin of a black-feathered bird stays cooler than the skin of a white-feathered bird. This breeze also helps explain why many desert tribes, such as Bedouins, deal with extreme heat by wearing dark robes and sheltering in black tents.
Black color in animals is called melanism. It is related to the process of adaptation called adaptive melanism. Most commonly, dark individuals become fitter to survive and reproduce in their environment. This makes some species less conspicuous to predators, while others, such as black panthers, use it as a foraging advantage during night hunting.
Black is also the color of some of the fiercest and toughest animals. Black mamba, tarantula hawk, black panther, bullet ant, komodo dragon, Tasmanian devil and many other. There seem to be correlations between the color black and traits responsible for toughness.
Melanin has several physiological roles in maintaining health, such as the synthesis of vitamin D. Melanin is the primary determinant of the degree of skin pigmentation and protects the body from harmful ultraviolet radiation.
Genes for melanism may provide resistance to viral infections. A viral epidemic may explain the prevalence of black leopards in Java and Malaysia and the relatively high incidence of black leopards and black servals in the Aberdares region of Africa.
At RB Sugbo our signature color is black.
