# Brindle + Splashed = ???



## YuukikoOgawa (Jul 26, 2013)

Does anyone here have any pictures or examples of what it looks like when you mix American brindle (A^vy/*) and Splashed (Spl/*)?

The doe in my current pairing is a bit of a mystery...breeder says she's just recessive yellow, but she has that brindle chubbiness and if you look at her back you can see just a few faint stripes of some very pastel, bluish-white color...also, both her mother and grandmother were brindles.

The buck is a Himalayan Splashed, so if this doe does turn out to be a brindle, I'd like some idea of what to look for in the babies to see if she is a brindle or not.


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## Laigaie (Mar 7, 2011)

So, first off, whatever breeder assumed an all-orange mouse that came out of a brindle mother was RY needs to step back and remember that the simplest solution is much more likely the correct one.

Second, what they'll look like depends entirely on what c-dilute the mother carries. Since dad's a himi, you've got c and ch on his side, but mom has C and... what? If she has two copies of C (if all her ancestors have been undiluted, this is likely), you'll need to breed her brindle daughters back to the himi splashed dad in order to get brindle splashed pups.

Third, almost all brindles are some partially-diluted shade of normal brindle striping on some shade of cream to white. If the brindle is Avy/a, you'll get some off-black stripes on white. If she's Avy/A, you'll get muddy silver agouti-ish stripes on white. Darker c-dilutes like ce won't dilute the red color between the stripes as much, so you'll get a creamier color. With ch, you'll get a more diluted cream, and cch gives you white. c/c obviously is just a pew mouse regardless of what else you've got going on. 

AND! Are you familiar with the breeder who goes by Mrs. Beach's Brindle Empire? She has REALLY LOVELY brindle splashed and tri projects. Using the search bar at the top of the page for "victorian brindle" or "brindle tri" should find you a lot of her threads. Hopefully, she'll pop in. Otherwise, the Empire is on Facebook, too.  Search for "Mrs.Beach Brindle" (yes, with Mrs. and Beach as one word).


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## YuukikoOgawa (Jul 26, 2013)

Alas, I have a lot of missing information on my possibly brindle doe, as when I was trying to coax info on genetics out of the breeder I started getting the impression that she hadn't actually been keeping track, or was using very different terminology than what I was used to.

She said that Caramel's sire was a satin recessive yellow (so, at the very least she has to be carrying both satin and RY). Her mother was a "black brindle," described as black stripes over red (so I'm assuming that's Avy/a). The grandfather on the mother's side was a longhair satin blue tan, and the grandmother was a "c-dilute brindle," described as having dark grey stripes over a pale grey or white background (genetics unknown).

The pairing is technically for an experiment that's only testing how size and type are inherited, but since there's some unknowns here regarding genetics and color, I figure I might as well take the time to test to see who might be carrying what. Not really trying to get a particular color right now, just seeing what pops up.

So in addition to not knowing for sure whether Caramel is a regular recessive yellow or a very undermarked brindle, I also don't know if she's carrying a c-dilute, or which kind of c-dilute, or if she's hiding any tan, blue, or longhair genes either.

The sire at least, Cappuccino, has a fairly definite pedigree. Himalayan splashed, from a Siamese Splashed father and a Black Belted mother (who was carrying albino/PEW). Bred him to his sister and got at least one chocolate-point Siamese Splashed, so at least with him I know his genotype is a/a B/b Bt/bt c^h/c D/* E/* P/* ww Lgh/* Sa/* Spl/spl. The breeder Cappuccino's father came from doesn't usually deal with blue, recessive yellow, or longhair, so it's reasonably safe to assume that he's D/D E/E Lgh/Lgh, though he might be carrying PE.

(Also, I have actually been communicating with Mrs. Breach! We're in the same breeding and genetics group on FB.)

For reference, here's the best pic I have of Caramel so far. I'm still working on getting a better picture of her back end...


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## Laigaie (Mar 7, 2011)

If she's pink-eyed, chances are good that she's not carrying any c-dilutes, or if she is, it's c. The P/c and p/C linkage is breakable through randomness, but when you don't already know you have that problem in your lines, it's fairly safe to go on the assumption that pp mice have both copies of C, and c-diluted mice have both copies of P. Since c is the most common c-dilute, it's more likely to have already attached itself to a p. In that case, you'll eventually get a chunk of pews, some himi brindle (which would have very pale stripes on white), on top of your fawns and reds. Caramel being pp will complicate your ability to cull against the C/* mice, since some of them will be pink-eyed, too.


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## YuukikoOgawa (Jul 26, 2013)

So I paired Caramel (the ??? yellow doe in a previous post) and Cappuccino the Italian Pimp (Himalayan Splashed buck).

Babies were born January 4th!

Sadly, there were some difficulties. We started with ten pups, and I had a scheduled appointment with a friend and an acquaintence with several years of experience sexing baby mice. It was set for when the pups were just shy of a week old. Unfortunately, the night before that appointment, I checked on the babies to find that three were missing (presumed eaten), three more were so horribly emaciated that we had to cull them (we think the nanny mouse panicked after the first three were eaten and tried to "save" these three by hiding them from Caramel), so that left us with four (two bucks, two does). This is now Caramel's only litter. Ever. And I'm even hesitant to breed either of her daughters; I really don't want to encourage cannablism.

I can at least say, with absolute certainty now, that Caramel is a brindle! I am not quite 100% certain what kind of brindle, but after searching around I think I found a picture of one that looks almost identical to Caramel in base color, and the stripes are just a shade darker than Caramel's faint spots. It was on the Finn Mouse site, listed as a Lilac Brindle (A^vy/a b/b C/* d/d P/*). Since Caramel is also confirmed to be p/p, I think that additional dilution may account for why her "stripes" are so incredibly faint.

I think Caramel might be A^vy/a^t, too, because one of the remaining pups and two of the culled ones all had a very clear division between very dark tops and very pale bellies as pinkies. The one remaining of that bunch is a chocolate doe; that division of color seems to have faded into nothing now that her coat is all the way in, but I'm wondering if that will change over the next few weeks again? I noticed my black tan's colors shifted a bit too.

I'm not totally sure what the three brindle survivors are, in terms of what shade of brindle. I'm not sure if their stripes are just pale black, or blue, or possible even dove (their paternal grandfather was said to carry pink-eyed dilution, but I haven't managed to confirm it yet).

So far, I'm not seeing any clear signs of c-dilutes in any of these pups. For all I know, there may have been a couple among the culled and eaten babies...there was one very pale runt among the culled ones, but all three of the remaining brindles were the exact same shade of pink before their fur came in, so I honestly don't know. Except that all of the remaining babies are C/* with the * being either c or c^h, and the C had to come from Caramel's side.

...and now I have two bucks that I need to find homes for, which I am NOT particularly happy about (the plan was to cull all but 3-4 of the best does, but Caramel did it herself and I got no say in the matter at all).

P.S. I'll post pictures, as soon as Photobucket stops derping.


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