The California Gray is an American
breed of domestic
chicken
The chicken (''Gallus gallus domesticus'') is a domesticated junglefowl species, with attributes of wild species such as the grey and the Ceylon junglefowl that are originally from Southeastern Asia. Rooster or cock is a term for an adu ...
. It may be also known as the "production black".
History
The California Gray was developed in
California
California is a state in the Western United States, located along the Pacific Coast. With nearly 39.2million residents across a total area of approximately , it is the most populous U.S. state and the 3rd largest by area. It is also the m ...
in the 1930s by Horace Dryden in
Modesto, California. His aim was to produce a dual-purpose chicken that would be suitable for
meat production and would also lay large white
eggs
Humans and human ancestors have scavenged and eaten animal eggs for millions of years. Humans in Southeast Asia had domesticated chickens and harvested their eggs for food by 1,500 BCE. The most widely consumed eggs are those of fowl, especial ...
. By
cross-breeding
A crossbreed is an organism with purebred parents of two different breeds, varieties, or populations. ''Crossbreeding'', sometimes called "designer crossbreeding", is the process of breeding such an organism, While crossbreeding is used to main ...
of
Barred Plymouth Rock
The Plymouth Rock is an American breed of domestic chicken. It was first seen in Massachusetts in the nineteenth century, and for much of the early twentieth century was the most widely kept chicken breed in the United States. It is a dual-pu ...
and
White Leghorn
The Leghorn (, ; it, Livorno, italic=no or Livornese) is a breed of chicken originating in Tuscany, in central Italy. Birds were first exported to North America in 1828 from the Tuscan port city of Livorno, on the western coast of Italy. Th ...
birds, an
autosexing breed with barred gray adult plumage was produced. As in other autosexing breeds, the sex of chicks can be distinguished at about a day old.
The California Gray was never recognized as a breed by the
American Poultry Association
The American Poultry Association (APA) is the oldest poultry organization in the North America. It was founded in 1873, and incorporated in Indiana in 1932.
The first American poultry show was held in 1849, and the APA was later formed in respo ...
, and in the twenty-first century is a
rare breed
In modern agriculture, a rare breed is a breed of poultry or livestock that has a very small breeding population, usually from a few hundred to a few thousand. Because of their small numbers, rare breeds may have a threatened conservation statu ...
. It is not listed on the conservation priority list of the
Livestock Conservancy
The Livestock Conservancy, formerly known as the American Livestock Breeds Conservancy (ALBC) and prior to that, the American Minor Breeds Conservancy, is a nonprofit organization focused on preserving and promoting rare breeds, also known as "h ...
, and is not reported to the
DAD-IS
DAD-IS is the acronym of the worldwide Domestic Animal Diversity Information System of the Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations, within the FAO's management of animal genetic resources programme.Domestic Animal Diversity Infor ...
database of the
FAO
The Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations (FAO)french: link=no, Organisation des Nations unies pour l'alimentation et l'agriculture; it, Organizzazione delle Nazioni Unite per l'Alimentazione e l'Agricoltura is an intern ...
.
Use
The California Gray is a dual-purpose bird, producing both meat and eggs. Cocks are crossed with White Leghorn hens to produce the California White commercial
sex-link
Sex-links are crossbred chickens whose color at hatching is differentiated by sex, thus making chick sexing an easier process. Sex-links come in several varieties. As hybrids of laying or dual-purpose breeds infused with extra vigor via heter ...
hybrid.
References
Chicken breeds
Chicken breeds originating in the United States
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