This article is from the WSSF 2016 AFRMA Rat & Mouse Tales news-magazine.

By Karen Robbins

Katherine Brown, FL, e-mail
Q I saw your website and loved the information you gave! I got a light mock chocolate fox buck, and I also bought two does. I purchased these mice at a pet store. The first doe is a regular mock chocolate fox (almost black on the top) and her belly is diluted between recessive yellow and cream. The other female is just regular PEW, all white with pink eyes. I know the PEW parents were both PEWs as well. I have seen through researching that PEW mice no matter what other fancy mice they are bred with, the babies usually come out all white. I think the PEW trait is dominant. I once had a PEW and a Black buck. The babies came out 5 white and 3 black but none came out black and white. I was wondering if you could help me figure out what the babies will look like if my white doe breeds with my male? Will all babies be white or maybe some tans or spotted? And if my other female breeds with my male? Thank you so much!

A By your description the one with the light yellow belly sounds more like a poor Tan. By the photos you sent it looks like you have a Black Tan female (not regular mock Chocolate Fox; with poor quality Tan) and Chocolate Tan male (not light mock Chocolate fox; Tan is too light). Breeding these two together will produce Tan kids and it depends on if the female carries Chocolate as to whether you will get more Chocolate Tan. If you want show-quality Tans, you will need to buy stock from a show breeder.

Albino is a recessive trait, not dominant. Your Black male carried the albino gene so when bred with the PEW, that is why you got so many PEW in the litter. To come out Black and white on one mouse, they have to have the spotted gene or other marked gene, otherwise you get plain black or white.

Unfortunately, with the PEW you won’t be able to tell what she really is until you breed her as the albino gene just covers up what the mouse really is colorwise, so she could be spotted, Tan, Siamese, Agouti, Black, or ???? underneath the white. Two albino will produce all albinos but they are still genetically a color underneath that white. PEW x Chocolate Tan = some Tans, rest depends on what the PEW is, also depends on if the male carries albino as to whether you will get white ones. You can only get spotted if they carry the spotted gene.

It all depends on what they all carry as to what you will get, but breeding a Tan, will produce more Tans.

You can check with the Fancy Mouse Breeders’ Association or the United Mouse Club to see if they have anyone near you that could look at your mice in person to help you out with their ID. Also, to see if they have shows near you that you could participate in. There are also several Facebook groups you could try joining to see if there are others in your area. There is also a mouse forum in the U.K. that has lots of U.S.A. members

Update: My Chocolate Tan male and my white female finally had their litter and all babies turned out Black Tans.

A If all the babies were Tans, then the PEW is genetically a Tan and more than likely a Black Tan that doesn’t carry Chocolate since all the kids were Black. If you got her at the same time and from the same cage as your Chocolate Tan and Black Tan, it would make sense she would be that color underneath the white. The kids now carry Chocolate from dad so if you wanted more Chocolate Tans, either breed brother/sister or a daughter back to dad.

Q This is the litter of my Chocolate Tan male and Tan female. She had two more but I left them nursing with the momma. I’ve never seen that light color before, I wonder if they are going to be Chocolate like their dad or lighter? Kind of looks like Champagne.

Litter of mouse babies from Chocolate Tan male and Black Tan female. Photo from Katherine Brown.

A In the first photo they look like Black and possibly Lilac. If they are brown like candy, they would be Chocolate, which would mean your Black Tan female carries Chocolate. If they are gray, then they would be Lilac if they have pink eyes when they open them. Lilac is a pink-eyed Black where Champagne is a pink-eyed chocolate. (the P.E. gene changes Black to Lilac and Chocolate to Champagne). Champagne would be a very pale tan at this age and these look gray. To produce Champagne or Lilac, both parents would have to carry the pink-eye gene.

Update: So the babies are about 14 days old and all three light colored ones had pink eyes. But the rest have black like both parents. And out of all of them there is only one Self Black.

One of the Lilac Tan kids, looks like a Satin. Photo from Katherine Brown.

One of the Black Tan Standards from the litter. Photo from Katherine Brown.

A In the photos it looks like you have one Lilac Tan Satin (Satins have the shiny coats) and two Lilac Tan standard coats. That means both parents carry the Satin gene. In one of the original photos of your Black Tan female, it looked like she might possibly be Satin but was hard to tell because of the lighting, size of the photo, and movement of the mouse when the picture was snapped. Check the Black Tan kids to see if they have a shinier looking belly (the orange would be darker looking than on a non-Satin). The other photo looks like a Black Tan Standard.

An Agouti Tan Standard mouse with the nice dark tan show-bred mice have. Mouse owned and bred by Jack Garcia, Jack’s Mousery, KY. Photo ©2012 Jack Garcia.

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