# Black eyed Whites



## Shadowrunner (Sep 26, 2011)

I've been breeding BEws not too long now and I just wanted to ask a question or rather I'm confused and want to know something.'

As I understand it, there is more than one way to breed them.
Is there any way to figure out what my current mice are?
This is a new variety for me.

I -thought- they were marked mice bred to have more and more white.
But I bred two of my BEW does to a splash and got..
PEWs, a ticolor, splashes, Blacks, Blues and ...I'm not sure what the rest are yet.

What can I do to replicate the BEW does?
I looked on finmouse and around the forum but I can't seem to find anything on them.


----------



## MojoMouse (Apr 20, 2012)

This article has some interesting information in it: http://www.jstor.org/stable/pdfplus/245 ... eptTC=true


----------



## tinyhartmouseries (Dec 30, 2010)

It sounds like you may be dealing with Ivory instead of overmarked.

If you bred overmarked, you'd occasionally get a pied or two. IF they are overmarked, do you know what color they technically are, IE, overmarked blue or black?


----------



## Shadowrunner (Sep 26, 2011)

Not at all. I got them from another breeder and forgot to ask.

Ivory.. Is that what finmouse's site calls black eyed bone?


----------



## moustress (Sep 25, 2009)

BEW's can also occur from dilution of the lighter colors, and I've seen a lot of that when breeding for recessive yellow/red tricolors. c^e can completely wash out the lighter colors when paired with another dilution, and I think it always yields BEW's in a yellow/red to yellow/red when homozygous.

Yes, I have a LOT of BEW's!!


----------



## Shadowrunner (Sep 26, 2011)

That's one of the things I had read about!
A red mouse being washed completely out.
Here I was thinking I had been interested in a -simple- variety.
Maybe I should just stick to blues.


----------



## moustress (Sep 25, 2009)

Blues easy!? One can get a blue easily enough; it's hard to breed a good blue, though. And getting the dilutes (lilac, silver) to the right shade is even harder. Some US blues have light hair tips on the back and beige hairs on the flanks and vent. The mealy appearance from the hair tips is a real bother, as it can be hard to tell a poor blue from a blue agouti, especially if it's a really dark blue.

I've wondered if breeding blue that's a^e/* or a^e/a^e would solve that problem. Really good blue has a gene called 'Leaden' that is hard to come by in the US, and it is supposd to eliminate the mealiness and beige hairs.

All the problems doesn't stop me from breeding blues, though because I like ;'em even if they're not perfect; I am very much working on blue tricolors.


----------



## Jack Garcia (Oct 9, 2009)

Shadowrunner said:


> As I understand it, there is more than one way to breed them.


The two most common ways to create a BEW are as follows:

1) ce/c bred to be extremely light (the darker version is called ivory by some clubs)

2) white spotting (can be s/s, W/*, bt/bt or some combination thereof)

All other varieties (such as diluted red) are very, very uncommon.



Shadowrunner said:


> Is there any way to figure out what my current mice are?


The best bet would be to ask the breeders from whom you got your original stock. A good breeder will know what his mice carry, what they produce, and what they don't produce, even if he doesn't know the exact gene code.

Alternatively, you could breed them to a true-breeding line of non-PEW mice (i.e. blacks who produce nothing but blacks, or chocolates who produce nothing but chocolates) and cross the babies. Any recessives (such as ce or s) will pop up in the second generation.



Shadowrunner said:


> I -thought- they were marked mice bred to have more and more white.
> But I bred two of my BEW does to a splash and got..
> PEWs, a ticolor, splashes, Blacks, Blues and ...I'm not sure what the rest are yet.


There is no reason that a mouse cannot be both ce/c AND spotted. Producing both PEWs and marked mice indicates that this may be the case for at least some of the mice you're talking about. If they _are_ a light ce/c, you'd have no visual way to tell whether or not they were also white-spotted.



> What can I do to replicate the BEW does?


Backcross BEW parent to child, and cross a male and female offspring. Regardless of the allele combination you're working with, this has the highest likelihood of producing more BEWs.

Good luck!!


----------



## candycorn (Oct 31, 2011)

Those ladies are ivory. Or number one on Jacks list. They will indeed throw splash and tris. Their grandfather was Dexter the tri, and their father is my big black splash who came from Casey. The mother is a satin pew with tri background who came from Mad Science Mousery. I have a pedigree if you would like it.


----------



## Jack Garcia (Oct 9, 2009)

Well, there you go. You're dealing with both C-locus dilution and white spotting.


----------



## Patry (Sep 1, 2011)

I´m confused with BEW too.

In one of my past litter I obtained a BEW, but doe is double banded and buck is piebald. I understand that...

But now, I have a litter between a piebald black doe and a fawn self. In this litter I obtain a red piebald, dove self, fawn self, BEW and albino...Then...why BEW? I don´t understand :/


----------



## Shadowrunner (Sep 26, 2011)

I should have just asked you tara xD
But I was curious about the other ways to make them too.

My blues are actually not that bad in color. 
The guard hairs are a little too long, the tails could be more fleshed out and I have the 
white toes too but otherwise I don't get much in the way of mealiness anymore. The bellies are lighter than the top though.
I've been breeding a line of blacks just for darkening the blues up too. I -finally- got the white tips on the tails bred out. 
xD

Of the four litters Ive gotten from them. 
first litter had splash, PEW and tricolor. That made enough sense.
Second litter has black, blue and PEW.
Third litter is..What looks like pied and splash.
Fourth litter looks to be all...BEW and PEW.

I do love puzzles <3

Thank you for these guys again btw.
Dexter has a ton of grandmeece now. lol.

All of my mice other than the blues and blacks are related to him somewhere down the line.

Edit: I just re-read your post Jack, That helped a lot so thank you! ^ ^


----------



## Jack Garcia (Oct 9, 2009)

You're very welcome!


----------

