MINOHIKI HEAD STUDIES
The wattles must be small if present. Better birds
have no wattles. The comb is an indented walnut comb, firm and compact on
the head, but not small as in the Red-Shouldered Yokohama.
The head forms I have seen have been pronoucedly
rounded in the Scarlet Bamboo, but longer in the Silver Duckwings. These
Silver Duckwings are the results of outcrosses undertaken by Knut Roeder
in order to save the line he brought in from Japan by wayof hatching eggs.
Only one rooster survived. He crossed him with one of his very fine Yokohamas,
the results were then crossed back to the Silver Minohiki with superb results.
If one studies the diverese images of the Minohiki
I have on this website, one can see this difference. Note in the illustrations
here, the Scarlet Bamboos have expressly rounded heads. The Silvers on this
page are rather normal, not too long, in form. The presence of wattles IS
NOT a disqualification! The form and flow of the animal, however, is more
elegant in the examples I've seen without wattles. It were as though a flowing
line starts at the tip of the beak and moves both down the neck, chest and
dropped wing and down the back of the head, neck, back and to the tip of
the tail.
One can also see that the Scarlet Bamboo (Black-Tailed
Buff) has a more Shamoid-gamefowl eyebrow and the Silver Duckwings much
less.
The Jokohama below, very likely one of the European
descendants of the Minohiki, should have a long, pointed head like a Malayan.
