Lavender (Self-Blue) Chicken Genetics · Chicken Color Standards

Lavender — also called self-blue — is a recessive gene that dilutes a bird's colour to a soft, even grey. Two things make it a frequent source of confusion: because it is recessive it can vanish for a generation and reappear later, and because it dilutes everything it is easily mistaken for Blue, which it is not. For the wider system these terms sit in, see the Genetics Guide.

Lavender (self-blue) Brahma hen with even pale-grey plumage and feathered legs. — Lavender (self-blue): an even, matte grey over the whole bird — no darker lacing, unlike Blue.

Close portrait of a lavender Brahma hen, showing the same even grey dilution over the head and back. — The same even grey shows all the way from the face to the tail — no patches of a different shade.

Lavender chick with blue-grey down. — A lavender chick — the dilution already reads as a cool blue-grey in the down.

The lavender gene (lav / MLPH)

Lavender is a single recessive gene. Its molecular identity is well established: a point mutation in MLPH, the melanophilin gene.¹ Melanophilin is part of the machinery that transports pigment granules (melanosomes) to the edge of the pigment cell so they can be handed off into the growing feather. The mutation disrupts that transport, so pigment ends up delivered patchily and at reduced density¹ — which the eye reads as an even, washed-out dilution.

Crucially, lavender dilutes both pigments: eumelanin (black) becomes a pale lavender-grey, and pheomelanin (red/gold) becomes straw or cream. That both-pigment action is the single most useful thing to remember about it.

How it inherits — the disappearing act

Because lavender is recessive, a bird only looks lavender when it carries two copies (lav/lav). A single copy makes a carrier (Lav+/lav) that looks completely normal but passes the gene on silently. That is why lavender behaves the way it does across generations:

Cross	Offspring
Lavender × Lavender	100% Lavender
Lavender × non-carrier	100% normal-looking — but all are carriers
Carrier × Carrier	25% Lavender · 50% carrier (look normal) · 25% non-carrier
Lavender × Carrier	50% Lavender · 50% carrier

Why it "skips" a generation. Cross lavender into a normal-coloured breed and the entire F1 looks normal — they are all carriers. Lavender only reappears when two carriers are bred together, at which point about a quarter of the F2 are lavender again. Nothing was lost; the gene was simply hidden in the heterozygotes. You can watch that 25% fall out of a carrier × carrier mating in the Breeding Outcomes tool.

Carrier vs visible lavender

Lav⁺

lav

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Carrier (Lav⁺/lav) — looks normal, passes it on silently

lav

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Visible (lav/lav) — both pigments diluted to lavender-grey

Lavender vs Blue

This is the comparison worth getting straight, because the two are constantly mixed up:

	Lavender (self-blue)	Blue
Inheritance	Recessive — hides in carriers	Incompletely dominant — always visible
Pigments diluted	Both (black and red/gold)	Eumelanin (black) only
Red/gold areas	Washed out to straw/cream	Stay full and bright
"Two copies" look	No splash form — one even grey	Two copies give splash

The quickest field test: look at the red or gold. If it is still bright, you are probably looking at Blue; if it has washed out to straw along with everything else, it is Lavender. And related varieties build on lavender — porcelain, for instance, is lavender applied to a mille-fleur base, softening its colours.

References

Vaez M, Follett SA, Bed'hom B, Gourichon D, Tixier-Boichard M, Burke T (2008) A single point-mutation within the melanophilin (MLPH) gene causes the lavender plumage colour dilution phenotype in the chicken. BMC Genetics 9:7 — identifies the recessive MLPH mutation and its effect on melanosome transport.

Try it: run a carrier cross · compare with Blue · read the Genetics Guide