# Red reds ;)



## Lyra (Mar 1, 2013)

I'm having a hard time with Ay reds - my first pair is quite nice coloured, their coat is a rather dark orange colour. The problem is, I have a feeling I'm losing that shade, as their offspring is just yellow... I have one boy with an "ok" shade, but he's piebald and promised already, and all the other pups for now were born pale... 
I don't have any chocolates, and they are impossible for me to get. Besides that, I'd really like to work with what I have already, as I'm not able to get better mice for now (if ever - I'm talking about type, mostly). I'm planning to breed a line of Ay reds and black tans in satin, so I'll need them to be brightest red possible.

For now, the black tans I have are sadly very poor, but on the other hand, are big and slim (I don't know why but my agouti does tend to get quite chunky after first litter...). 
I have quite nice tans... on the blues. Especially on too light, too mealy doe the tan is surprisingly bright. Not sure it would be wise to introduce blue to reds, though.
My agouties are, hmmm, quite lemony, I'd say  I have some umbrous agouties, and I'm tempted to breed some sables, but I haven't decided yet. 
In latest litter (Ayat sasa x Aa SaSa) I've had two different shades of agouti: light and dark, and I have no idea if I should keep one of does for the red line or not. I kind of hoped they will be more orange than their mother because of the father, but no such thing happened... Photo attached, they are 12 days now and just opened their eyes.

Another thing, the dark orange buck has quite pale tan belly. The black tan buck I have from Ay x Ay pairing has very, very pale belly too. Are there any specific genes that affect the depth of Ay coat colour only, and not the tan? Or I'm just having a really bad luck?

The final, and most important for me question: is it possible to darken the red colour enough just using a selection method, without introducing more "orange" mice?

3 shades of A:


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## candycorn (Oct 31, 2011)

Wow...yeah you really lost the color. What other colors did you breed into the AY? Blue? Black? Those colors can dull the intense red on the Ay mice. At this point honestly...I would get new AY stock. Otherwise just keep picking the most intense colored babies to breed and do not breed anything that pale. Good luck!


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## Lyra (Mar 1, 2013)

Um, I haven't breed them into anything yet really - this litter is after my original Ay buck and agouti self doe (as I was sure she isn't umbrous, and she shouldn't carry anything more - she's Aa BB DD PP for sure). The red's are still "new" - I have them around 2 months now. Not possible for me to get new ones, too. 
For now I just plan to breed all the good colored daughters back to the buck, but in this litter there was only 1 red doe, and she was this pale  She's satin career too, maybe in satin she'd look little better? Though the other litter after original red pairing AyxAy had a pale yellow pup in too...
I really, really need some luck (and red does!) on my side now


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## ThatCertainGlow (Jun 23, 2012)

My gosh. That's terrible color loss.  You are sure on the DD? No way she could be D/d? Wondering about the carried traits of your Ay as well, seeing as I think you are saying you had just as bad results with Ay X Ay?

You at least know S/s is in their background, or someone's, if that pied came from the Ay X A pairing, so they might have even more recessives lurking. Blue is very bad for reds, it's a dilute. ('d', stands for dilute/dilution, after all.) Bad for all versions of yellow, recessive and dominant, unless you are after a very pale shade.

Chocolate doesn't get the red pigment back, just reduces visible 'soot' that can occur from black or agouti based. Soot is not the problem I'm looking at there. In fact it's totally absent, from what I see. What about possible c-dilutes in the Agouti doe? Or for that matter, the Ay's? With a pale tan belly, you could still be looking at something washing the Ay out, I think.

I'd think keeping the dark agouti, for your reds, and/or any with the least amount of 'lemon'... but I'm not well versed on Agouti in the slightest, yet. Might want to test breed the washed out 'orange' mice for c-dilutes, or blue. I'm personally thinking a carried blue is causing the problem.


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## Lyra (Mar 1, 2013)

The buck can carry p or d theoretically, but I suspected it would come in Ay x Ay pairing, as they are related but the only thing I've got were reds and black tan in self and pied. Doe is one shade lighter than the buck, but still quite nice orange, and still much darker than the pale pup the pairing produced.
The agouti doe can carry c-dilutes, she can be CC, Cc^ch or Cc. The Ayat x Aa litter was all in red and agouti, both self and pied, as the lightest one of the dark pigmented pups was that lemony doe.

The comparison - dad and his pup from Ay x Ay:








Pup's yellow...


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## candycorn (Oct 31, 2011)

Ahh, there is your issue. So you need to breed away from that. If you cant get chocolate, can you possibly get some agouti does that do not carry any c dilutes? Then breed the buck to those and keep picking the darkest. I would not use any of those lighter babies if at all possible.


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## Lyra (Mar 1, 2013)

I'm afraid all of my mice can carry c-dilutes. It's really common here, and it hasn't been bothering me before, as they were planned to be bred into chinchillas, so it'd be easier for me to tell apart chinchilla and non-chinchilla carriers. The only other mice I have access to are from petshop or feeders, so it could be even worse...

The red's were a surprise for me - their breeder said they were golden and told me he bred only red eyed varieties, so I was expecting argentes and I'm quite unprepared, but determined to breed them into red as dark as possible.

I'll try to breed away all dilutes, then - I guess I'll have to choose only the darkest from all litters from now on. The yellow babies that were born already will stay, as those 2 pale pups are all I have besides original pair, and I really need backup for Ay's, in case something happens to them. I really hope I'll get some more reds in future litters and I'll be able to finally pick some pups... 1 red out of 10 pups kind of surprised me... Thank you for your help candycorn and ThatCertainGlow 

Btw, I think it's easier with recessives!


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