# Broken vs Pied



## Gracegarden

Is there a difference?

Is where the markings appear on the body what makes it a variety? (e.g. Dutch, Berkshire, Irish, even, uneven, etc.)

Another way I'm reasoning things is, a Self with a blaze is therefore, a Blaze. Self with the correct facial marking would be a Hereford, Capped, etc. So, it basically comes down to 'naming' and breeding for specific mis-marked creatures?


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## SarahY

Broken, Dutch, Even etc are all names for specific patterns of pigment according to show standards. They are all pied mice as pied simply means coloured and white. Pied is used for part coloured animals which don't fit any specific pattern.


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## Jack Garcia

Sarah is right. I'll expand on that a bit, though:

"Broken" is the name of the show standard, which means a mouse which looks like or has been bred toward looking like the broken on this page: http://www.miceandrats.com/thenationalm ... .php#thumb (small spots of color, spaced more-or-less evenly) This term is often used (incorrectly, I would say) to describe any mouse with white spotting, even if it comes nowhere near the standard. Using the term this way is analogous to calling a dog with 2 mix-breed grandparents a "chihuahua."

"Pied" is the broader term and means any mouse with white spotting. Brokens, tricolors, evens, rumpwhites, variegateds, belteds, bandeds, and all the other variations are all pied. When in doubt, you can always call an animal with white spots "pied."

Here is a diagram from the AFRMA about how marked mice are supposed to look: http://www.afrma.org/idlmice.htm


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## Frizzle

^^^
Just to clarify, things like rumpwhites and the other examples of marked mice are not caused by the same gene. You can have pied mice that look like the examples though, which can be a pain.


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## Jack Garcia

They don't have to be caused by the same gene to be pied.


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## Frizzle

Idk how much genetic background the op has, so I just threw that in for him. I'm not sure how to word it, just that yes you can have look alikes, but it's not all s/s


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## Gracegarden

But does that matter if I am trying to breed showable mice, such as hereford or blaze or dutch markings? Does it matter "what is underneath" in order to put that individual mouse on a bench?

Are you saying mice can be culled and bred to show specific markings over time, so that they become somewhat predictable?


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## Gracegarden

To continue this line of thought...
Sarah, are all of your mice Dutch marked; some just better than others. Or do you get a litter of pied mice and "hope" some happen to have dutch markings.

Please let me know if there is a basic premise I am missing.
I spend hours every day trying to learn/figure out genetics and such, but I feel that I am making so little progress.


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## Jack Garcia

Gracegarden said:


> Does it matter "what is underneath" in order to put that individual mouse on a bench?


In theory, no. If you could get a mouse who was at/at e/e ch/ch s/s to_ look _blue, you could show it as blue.

But in practice, that doesn't (and can't) happen.



Gracegarden said:


> Are you saying mice can be culled and bred to show specific markings over time, so that they become somewhat predictable?


Somewhat, yes, but never totally, due to the way pigment is formed in utero. We recently discussed this briefly here: viewtopic.php?f=26&t=10894


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## Gracegarden

Thanks for the thread


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## Jack Garcia

You're very welcome.


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## SarahY

Gracegarden said:


> To continue this line of thought...
> Sarah, are all of your mice Dutch marked; some just better than others. Or do you get a litter of pied mice and "hope" some happen to have dutch markings.
> 
> Please let me know if there is a basic premise I am missing.
> I spend hours every day trying to learn/figure out genetics and such, but I feel that I am making so little progress.


Don't feel bad, there's a lot to learn! 

Dutch are recessive spotted (s/s) and this gene naturally clumps pigment heavily on the rump and around the eyes/ears. So when I breed two Dutch together, I can be fairly certain that the resulting mice will be Dutch. To some extent anyway :lol: But in truth (and talking in loose averages) in a litter of ten I'll have one or two actual Dutch (though rarely with winning markings), four or five with Dutch markings but also a spot or two on the body, and another four piebalds that really you wouldn't look at twice in a pet shop. All will have the cheek and rump patches but varying degrees of pigment in the white area between them. You can eliminate the spots of colour in the white areas but in doing so you will cause the saddle to slip back towards the tail and you'll lose one or both of the cheek patches. So it's a balancing act trying to keep the appropriate amount of pigment in the appropriate places.

The same principle applies to other marked mice. Herefords for example; in a litter you may get a couple with the proper blaze, a few with thin blazes often favouring one side of the face, and a few with completely white faces.


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## Gracegarden

Thanks, Sarah, it is looking not quite so murky now


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## SarahY

I took a couple of pictures today to show you the kind of variation in Dutch litters. These mice had much more heavily marked siblings but I've already culled them out. I'll try and remember to take a picture before I cull next time:

Five week old agouti and argente Dutch does from the same litter:









Twelve day old dove and black Dutch from two sisters bred to the same buck:


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## besty74

sarahy i am so pleased you posted those pictures, i had this idea that breeders like yourself always get good markings each and every litter, it is nice to see i was wrong, i was beginning to think breeding the perfect broken was impossible.Now i know i just have to keep at it.


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## SarahY

Haha, no I get plenty of rubbish! Do keep at your broken breeding, it's a very worthy goal


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## Fraction

Very interesting to see those photos, Sarah. Do you have a lot of photos of "poorly" (by your impressive standards) marked mice? I think it'd be cool to have a thread of "poor" marked mice, to reassure broken-marked mice breeders that even the breeders who are winning shows aren't getting litters full of perfectly marked mice.


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## SarahY

I never take pictures of the poor ones, and a lot of them get culled as pinkies. I'll try to remember to take more pictures. I do keep a lot of poorly mice because they have qualities that can be used for breeding and not all good breeding stock are necessarily well marked. For example, rather than keep two or three well marked stud bucks, I'd keep a lightly marked and one or two heavier marked because I can pair them to opposite does. A buck with too much colour on his face can be paired with a doe with only one cheek patch, and vice versa.

Sometimes, when I'm looking through my cages of mismarked rubbish Dutch, I don't feel like a proper show breeder at all :lol: In that way it is nicer to have cage after cage of stunning PEWs or silvers, but eventually breeding a good Dutch and winning with it is just awesome.


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## MojoMouse

SarahY said:


> I never take pictures of the poor ones, and a lot of them get culled as pinkies. I'll try to remember to take more pictures. I do keep a lot of poorly mice because they have qualities that can be used for breeding and not all good breeding stock are necessarily well marked. For example, rather than keep two or three well marked stud bucks, I'd keep a lightly marked and one or two heavier marked because I can pair them to opposite does. A buck with too much colour on his face can be paired with a doe with only one cheek patch, and vice versa.


So interesting - it's like you use your breeding stock as modifyers, which I suppose you have to to get the best markings. It seems to be the same as when breeders keep different shades of the same colour - some too dark, others too light, but they use them for colour correction in order to get the required standard colour.


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## Gracegarden

I've been away for a week, Sarah, I'm glad to be back.

Thank you for the explanation and great pictures. The visuals really help.


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