My mum has a violet normal hen who is 11 years old, had quite a lot of babies, and now is so frail that she can't fly or climb very far, but just clings on and on for life...

 

Other violets we've had seemed to live and die all kinds of ages in the same sort of pattern as any other type. So I haven't seen the pattern. I had a similar suspicion about sky spangles for a while though lol

I also used to think this about creaminos as I had such lousy luck with them

No it doesn't. I think its only 4 months old.

I am thinking it is a recessive pied with little to no markings. I guess with time we will see if iris rings develop or not PS I have a recessive chick in a nest thats feathering up all yellow with only a hint of colour on its rump...like yours.

Could also be what is called a dark-eyed clear (pure white bird with black eyes, usually no iris ring) which pops out of Dutch pieds (I think, but could be Danish.) You can also get them with one eye with iris ring, the other without. It could also be a black-eyed white carrying spangle which sometimes presents as a pure white bird, but does have iris ring. Most likely, as suggested, very lightly marked recessive pied. Violets in my experience are just as robust as other colours, though there used to be talk of a "lethal gene" if you bred violet to violet to produce double factor violets. (This would mean that the chicks would never hatch, but die in the shell.) I don't think anything has ever been proven about this. I think there could be some families of fragile violets because they are so beautiful that even poor ones are kept and bred with whereas with other colours and/or varieties any weaker birds would have been culled. This means we are putting more poor-quality violet chicks into the system. This means a downward spiral in size and quality over a few generations. People more learned than myself have also suggested that the effect of violet in the composition of the feathers causes the feather to be smaller and tighter, meaning that a violet bird may look smaller even though it has the same body size underneath. Again, don't know how accurate that statement is. Jaz

P.S. Love violet birds, particularly violet mauves and combinations with clearwing, pied, Australian yellowface.

Edited November 18, 200816 yr by KAZ
fixed doubled up post

Thanks for the link Liv, I went through that post about 2 days ago, though I had no idea what the different types were I was hoping to learn. I will read it again for reference sake (and again, and again...)

 

Interesting info jaz, my violet pied Crumbles seemed quite small, though so does her brother who is isn't violet.