# Tri-colored Surprise!



## kisha (Apr 8, 2011)

So, I was on the hunt for some new-blood for my mice and came across a group of rex-coat mice. One is a splashed female. I generally breed my new bloods together when i don't know what's in the line to begin with, and then I decide if it's a line I wish to work with. I may breed for feeders, but I've been breeding for naturally tame pet mice and I've bred some super tame babies who need no handling, ever. They are just naturally tame mice and are comfortable to be held, pet, and carried around.

So, I did just that, bred the new bloods together and guess what I got? ....Rex coat babies, most of them splashed and a few clearly marked TRI-colored babies. I'm in the process of getting pictures up. Computer is slow. But while I work on that part, i'd like to see what other tri-colored mice are out there, show me what you have! I would really LOVE to improve this line. They are very jumpy and pretty wild, they are FAR from the tame mice I've been breeding, but I plan to work the tameness into them once I get this color under control. I'll also note that all the tri-colored babies have red (or ruby) eyes.


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## moustress (Sep 25, 2009)

I'm curious to know where you found your stock, that you should have come up with a tri/splashed mousie off of it. There are markings in regular standard meeces that look like splashed but really aren't splashed.

A picture would be great, if you can manage that.


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## kisha (Apr 8, 2011)

Uploading pictures one by one, my computer won't go any faster, but here is what I've got right now (just one female mouse).. 
They are two weeks old right now. The curly coat makes it harder to see the colors in my opinion. I got the adults from a breeder who just raised her mice to feed her ferrets pinkies and she had extra mice available. I have hardly any breeders available to me outside of petstores, and I avoid petstores for health reasons.


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## kisha (Apr 8, 2011)

Eh, that first one posted twice for some reason. 









And another mouse









And then some splashed babies I guess



















I'll work on getting more uploaded, but I have to run for now. Hubby just got home and he rear-ended another car so he's quite upset :/


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## windyhill (Jan 19, 2010)

Im in LOVE!!


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## moustress (Sep 25, 2009)

Wow! I knew tris and splashed might show up eventually at pet stores and from feeder bins, but I didn't think it would happen this quick! They are really nicely splashed and the tricolors are well marked. What part of the world are you in? Just curious...

I am amazed to see this many recessives line up by accident. Quite a find.


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## kisha (Apr 8, 2011)

I'm in the USA, Florida  I thought these were lower grade tri colored mice... but after that response, I guess I'm working with better quality mice? I've always had a draw toward show mice... I see myself YEARS away from that prospect but one small step in a better direction?

And, another question. I know that people make "puppy contracts" to protect the interest of the dog, like a no-breeding right thing. Are there similar ones for mice? I don't want these mice in the wrong hands and I do sell pet mice. If all my rex mice have these genes, it'd be pointless to release them as pets. Which brings be to another question...can I breed the splashed and tri colors OUT of a mouse and still keep the rex trait? So many new questions!


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## moustress (Sep 25, 2009)

I can't speak to the conformance to show standards as far as body type, but the markings are quite nice. And now we all know what tricolors and splashes look like on a curly mousie.

These mousies appear to be quite young; if not, they are pretty small.


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## kisha (Apr 8, 2011)

They are only two weeks old in these pictures. They were taken today. They are rather large for 2-week-old mice, at least when compared to my average sizes with the original mice I've had.


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## candycorn (Oct 31, 2011)

As to your breeding rights question...there are some breeders who sell with a contract not to breed. But it's fairly useless. With a puppy the breeder has to mark that you have the right to breed on the pups papers and then you send that to the AKC. Otherwise you can breed all you like but you can't have papers. Since mice don't have papers...it's just your word that keeps you from breeding when asked not to. They "might" be able to sue you for breach of contract of course...but why spend thousands on a 5 dollar mouse? Most would not follow through. *shrugs*


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## Laigaie (Mar 7, 2011)

As for breeding out the Spl, that should be quite easy. Breed your best Rex to a non splashed, non-c-diluted, non-piebald mouse, and the first gen will be carriers of all those things. Breed those together, and select the rexes with the fewest of those conditions. So, try to find the most standard self rexes, and breed those together.


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## kisha (Apr 8, 2011)

So by selecting solids, I can breed out the splashed? that would also terminate the tri colored gene as well right, since it's need to get tri colored mice?


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## candycorn (Oct 31, 2011)

kisha said:


> So by selecting solids, I can breed out the splashed? that would also terminate the tri colored gene as well right, since it's need to get tri colored mice?


Tricolors are just pied splash...but bred for specific clumps of color.


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## kisha (Apr 8, 2011)

I bred a blue rex male to a colony of my really tame mice already. I have some rex and some normals from the breeding. The male is the splashed carrier, but the females are not even close. But together, they are throw some amazing pied markings and really nice blue colors. Should I breed these babies to another colony of my tame (non-splashed) mice?


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## kisha (Apr 8, 2011)

Here are three babies from the blue rex male and my group of pied tame mice. They are all females.







Just about 2 weeks old as well. I didn't snap any pics of the other pied babies.


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## STandTR (Apr 11, 2012)

ooh the best tricoror-babies i've ever seen!


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## Wight Isle Stud (May 19, 2010)

Just wondering why you wouldn't want any one else breeding them ?, Over here The top show breeders let loads of Trios of mice go to other Fanciers, knowing full well the progeny will be shown against them and wasters packed off to the pet shop.


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## Laigaie (Mar 7, 2011)

Wight Isle, while many of us here in the States are fans of that intra-mousery cooperation, there are also many American mousers who prefer to have a "corner on the market". It's a very different way of thinking about mousing, and less community-driven, but quite common here in the US. It's what drives people to refuse to share mice, refuse to adopt out mice as pets (for fear they'll be bred), and pts all their excess stock. If you've got the best of your variety, or even the only of your variety, and you don't share, you will always be the best. I may not personally practice that for my mousery, but I understand the impulse behind the idea.


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## kisha (Apr 8, 2011)

Laigaie said:


> Wight Isle, while many of us here in the States are fans of that intra-mousery cooperation, there are also many American mousers who prefer to have a "corner on the market". It's a very different way of thinking about mousing, and less community-driven, but quite common here in the US. It's what drives people to refuse to share mice, refuse to adopt out mice as pets (for fear they'll be bred), and pts all their excess stock. If you've got the best of your variety, or even the only of your variety, and you don't share, you will always be the best. I may not personally practice that for my mousery, but I understand the impulse behind the idea.


While some people may use that to their advantage, that's not the real reason I'm overly protective of my mice. I have several local "BYBs" who mass breed their animals in very, very, very poor conditions and their sole motivation is to make profit on the animals. I work to improve my mice and their care and health are my top concerns and priority. If these people managed to get their hands on my mice (especially tri & splashed) they would use and abuse them for every dollar they could squeeze out of them. I don't mind parting with some special mice to trusted breeders, I would rather part them off to people who will respect and love them as much as myself. For example, there is an animal hoarder 2 hours from us who does anything in her power to get some exotic looking rats and she sells them for top dollar. They are kept in their own crap and fed bread and scrap foods and she sells them for top dollar. They are bred round the clock in tiny cages. And people still buy from her because of her rare collections. I would die inside if she managed to get her hands on my mice or rats.

And we have a petstore in FWB, Florida with a nutcase owner who is just as bad with his care of the rodents. They are in dirty cages, fed bread and scraps of food, kept in small cages in large numbers. Heck, their ASFs were all TUMOR infested with masses of infection literally forcing their mouths open.

I have to be careful as to where I get my mice, and then as to who I sell them to.... see my point? May be extreme, but I want to protect my babies, I do care for them


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## moustress (Sep 25, 2009)

It's sad that there are folks out there that don't care for their animals properly. But it's impossible to control what happens to your stock once it's out of your hands. I've placed a few of my mousies over the years, but just a few. Some I've let go to to a shop that supplies feeders, where I could be sure she'd put them into the CO2 chamber. I much prefer that (or doing that myself) to placing any of my stock in pet stores.

The last time I checked on the mousies at that shop (she bred for feeders), I was unhappy that her meeces had mites, and told her so. She no longer keeps meeces at the shop, so I no longer have any input, and I will not give over any of my surplus to that shop any longer.

I'd really like to place more of my stock with other breeders or keepers; I mean I really, really would like to do that. Culling is the only sensible option for me, unless I decide to start keeping reptiles, something that is far from far from impossible, since I love critters in general. It's better, though, to cull than to try to maintain a large population of mousies that you will never need for breeding and have minimal time to handle. I keep more than I probably should, but I do cull when I need to make room, choosing by my own quirky criteria which ones get to stay and which ones get to 'go'.


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## kisha (Apr 8, 2011)

So I'm not the only one who has the same feeling then. I know that if I let some go that I will not have control of the outcome, but that's why I'm so strict and tight when it comes to my mice. :/


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## moustress (Sep 25, 2009)

kisha: I'm not strictly age-ist, but I saw so many really young kids posting in one of the forums sponsored by a national pet store chain, and it was horrible to read their posts. first, one week of 'I got a new mouse', then a week or two later, 'my mouse is sick what do I do', then another agonizing week of 'OMG my mouse is really really sick' and folks saying 'treat it or take it to a vet if you don't know what to do.'

Inevitably this was followed in a day or three with, 'WAH! My mouse died! I'm heartbroken!'

Then after a few days, or a week, comes the 'I got a new mouse.' You, I should think, get the picture. It's one thing to say, I got a new coffee mug' 'I broke my coffee mug' and 'I got a new coffee mug', cuz inanimate stuff is meant to be replaceable, don't have feelings, and can't suffer like a living thing.

I'm sure there are a lot of youngsters out there that can handle the responsibility of having a small pet just fine, and have adults who also care enough to be sure the pet is well cared for. There are too many people who view meeces as 'practice pets' or just plain 'disposable'. To my way of thinking mousies are a bit disposable, as long as you take great care of the mousie while it lives, and cull humanely. Letting them just get sick and die without treatment or euthanasia is cruel.

I still regret giving most of the first litter I raised to a Petco. I was involved in another forum that was oriented towards those who had mousies just as pets, frowned on culling, and so forth. I yielded to pressure but changed my mind later on as I became more and more involved in the breeding aspect and got into developing my own lines. If one wants to breed seriously,m one needs to be smart enough to know what to do, or get smart enough by joining a forum like this one and reading everything.

I'm preaching to the choir, I'm pretty sure. Sorry for venting on you.

Thanks, I needed this.


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## kisha (Apr 8, 2011)

Another reason why I will never sell to petstores. I try to get to know and meet with people who come to me for pet mice, and I do humanely euthanize rodents, it's for the best. I wasn't sure if "contracts" existed in the mouse world like they do with other types of animals, even though it's quite impossible to spay a mouse. I'll stick to culling for now.

I'll be posting updated pictures soon in a new topic, maybe by this weekend. They've really grown and there are some really nice colors in this litter


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## Shadowrunner (Sep 26, 2011)

That's so cool that you managed to get those by accident.<3
I've been trying for what feels like ages to get just one tricolor, but luck never pans out for me.

It's my personal opinion that rex makes any mouse look adorable too.


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## kisha (Apr 8, 2011)

If only I could get rex to really come out in my rats! These are some super curly mice indeed. One has a wicked set of curls with longer fur, but she's a bit undersized. She's on the cull list :/


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