The Yurlov Crower is an old Russian breed of

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 ...

primarily selected and used for long crowing cock contests in

Russia Russia (, , ), or the Russian Federation, is a transcontinental country spanning Eastern Europe and Northern Asia. It is the largest country in the world, with its internationally recognised territory covering , and encompassing one-eig ...

Breed names

* Russian: юрловская голосистая * English: Yurlovo Crower, Yurlov Vociferous * German: Jurlower Kräher * Dutch: Joerlov-kraaier * Italian: Canterino di Yurlov

Breed history

The Yurlov Crower breed was presumably created in the second half of 19th century by crossing Chinese meat-type breeds,

fighting cocks A cockfight is a blood sport, held in a ring called a cockpit. The history of raising fowl for fighting goes back 6,000 years. The first documented use of the ''word'' gamecock, denoting use of the cock as to a "game", a sport, pastime or ente ...

and

landrace A landrace is a domesticated, locally adapted, often traditional variety of a species of animal or plant that has developed over time, through adaptation to its natural and cultural environment of agriculture and pastoralism, and due to isolatio ...

s, but doubtfully with the direct influence of the Malay breed. According to Moiseyeva (1992), the known breed's plumage color variants are white, silver, scarlet, black with light yellow, or golden, hackle (most of all), and black. The breed was a subject of interest among

fancy Fancy may refer to: Places * Fancy, Saint Vincent and the Grenadines, a settlement * Fancy River, Saint Vincent and the Grenadines Music Albums * ''Fancy'' (Bobbie Gentry album), 1970 * ''Fancy'' (Idiot Flesh album), 1997 * ''Fancy'' (video ...

, commercial and state

breeder A breeder is a person who selectively breeds carefully selected mates, normally of the same breed to sexually reproduce offspring with specific, consistently replicable qualities and characteristics. This might be as a farmer, agriculturalist, ...

s in Russia and

Ukraine Ukraine ( uk, Україна, Ukraïna, ) is a country in Eastern Europe. It is the second-largest European country after Russia, which it borders to the east and northeast. Ukraine covers approximately . Prior to the ongoing Russian inv ...

for a long time in the 20th century. It has been preserved and studied at few state

poultry Poultry () are domesticated birds kept by humans for their eggs, their meat or their feathers. These birds are most typically members of the superorder Galloanserae (fowl), especially the order Galliformes (which includes chickens, quails, ...

collection farms since the 1970s–1980s. Th
''Geflügel-Börse'' magazine
articles published by two German writers, Rüdiger Wandelt in 1993 and Wolfgang Vits in 1994, introduced the breed to poultry fanciers in

Germany Germany,, officially the Federal Republic of Germany, is a country in Central Europe. It is the second most populous country in Europe after Russia, and the most populous member state of the European Union. Germany is situated betwe ...

. However, the breed was not well known until recent time to a broad community of Western poultry breeders. The continued contacts between German and Russian poultry breeders in the 1990s and 2000s led to the import of the Yurlov Crower breed to

Western Europe Western Europe is the western region of Europe. The region's countries and territories vary depending on context. The concept of "the West" appeared in Europe in juxtaposition to "the East" and originally applied to the ancient Mediterranean ...

and growth of its popularity first in Germany and then in other European countries. According to the

USSR The Soviet Union,. officially the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics. (USSR),. was a transcontinental country that spanned much of Eurasia from 1922 to 1991. A flagship communist state, it was nominally a federal union of fifteen nationa ...

Central Statistic Administration, there were only 200 Yurlov chickens registered in the entire

Soviet Union The Soviet Union,. officially the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics. (USSR),. was a List of former transcontinental countries#Since 1700, transcontinental country that spanned much of Eurasia from 1922 to 1991. A flagship communist state, ...

by 1985 (Moiseyeva, 1992). After the USSR disintegration, the breed

population Population typically refers to the number of people in a single area, whether it be a city or town, region, country, continent, or the world. Governments typically quantify the size of the resident population within their jurisdiction using a ...

in independent

Russian Federation Russia (, , ), or the Russian Federation, is a transcontinental country spanning Eastern Europe and Northern Asia. It is the largest country in the world, with its internationally recognised territory covering , and encompassing one-eig ...

, Ukraine and other republics dramatically declined. Based on the data collected in 1993, a Ukrainian

strain Strain may refer to: Science and technology * Strain (biology), variants of plants, viruses or bacteria; or an inbred animal used for experimental purposes * Strain (chemistry), a chemical stress of a molecule * Strain (injury), an injury to a mu ...

of Yurlov Crowers (line 92) was included in the second edition 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 ...

's World Watch List in 1995 (Scherf, 1995). The breed and line 92 data were also summarized in the third edition of the WWL in 2000 (Scherf, 2000), in which, as of 1993, only 205 Yurlov birds (line 92) kept in Kharkov Region of Ukraine were mentioned and the population status was

endangered An endangered species is a species that is very likely to become extinct in the near future, either worldwide or in a particular political jurisdiction. Endangered species may be at risk due to factors such as habitat loss, poaching and in ...

. The current population of the Yurlov Crower chickens in Russia and Ukraine may be several thousands including both state farms and fanciers. However, bird influenza may represent a serious threat to and decrease numbers of

pure Pure may refer to: Computing * A pure function * A pure virtual function * PureSystems, a family of computer systems introduced by IBM in 2012 * Pure Software, a company founded in 1991 by Reed Hastings to support the Purify tool * Pure-FTPd, F ...

chicken breeds (including Yurlovs) in these countries to a large extent.

Genetic analysis

The breed was included in the studies of genetic diversity and relationships between various chicken breeds: * Moiseyeva ''et al.'' (1994) * Nikiforov ''et al.'' (1998) * Romanov and Weigend (2001) * Semyenova ''et al.'' (2002) * Moiseyeva ''et al.'' (2003) * Hillel ''et al.'' (2003) The latter study was done in 1998—2000 within the framework of an international research project entitled «Development of Strategy and Application of Molecular Tools to Assess Biodiversity in Chicken Genetic Resources», or shortl
AVIANDIV
that was sponsored by

European Commission The European Commission (EC) is the executive of the European Union (EU). It operates as a cabinet government, with 27 members of the Commission (informally known as "Commissioners") headed by a President. It includes an administrative body ...

and co-ordinated by Prof. Steffen Weigend, of th
Institute for Animal Breeding
Mariensee, Germany. The AVIANDIV project employed anonymous

genetic marker A genetic marker is a gene or DNA sequence with a known location on a chromosome that can be used to identify individuals or species. It can be described as a variation (which may arise due to mutation or alteration in the genomic loci) that can be ...

s, so called microsatellite loci spread across the whole

genome In the fields of molecular biology and genetics, a genome is all the genetic information of an organism. It consists of nucleotide sequences of DNA (or RNA in RNA viruses). The nuclear genome includes protein-coding genes and non-coding g ...

. It was shown that 33 populations had no unique

allele An allele (, ; ; modern formation from Greek ἄλλος ''állos'', "other") is a variation of the same sequence of nucleotides at the same place on a long DNA molecule, as described in leading textbooks on genetics and evolution. ::"The chro ...

s, 14 populations had one unique allele, but the Yurlov Crower from Russia has 8 unique alleles. That the Ukrainian population of Yurlov Crowers did not have any unique alleles, that is, had remarkably different genetic features. Overall, the Russian Yurlov Crower population became one of three the most diverse, or polymorphic, populations in the study, along with a wild

red junglefowl The red junglefowl (''Gallus gallus'') is a tropical bird in the family Phasianidae. It ranges across much of Southeast Asia and parts of South Asia. It was formerly known as the Bankiva or Bankiva Fowl. It is the species that gave rise to the ...

population and a

broiler A broiler is any chicken (''Gallus gallus domesticus'') that is bred and raised specifically for meat production. Most commercial broilers reach slaughter weight between four and six weeks of age, although slower growing breeds reach slaught ...

dam A dam is a barrier that stops or restricts the flow of surface water or underground streams. Reservoirs created by dams not only suppress floods but also provide water for activities such as irrigation, human consumption, industrial use ...

line.

References

* * * Scherf, B.D. (Ed.). 1995
World Watch List for Domestic Animal Diversity.
2nd edn., FAO, Rome, Italy. * Scherf, B.D. (Ed.). 2000

3rd edn., FAO, Rome, Italy. * *

Breed names

Breed history

Genetic analysis

References

External links