# What type/color is this little girl?



## ccoryjohnn (Jul 2, 2010)

Hey guys, sorry I haven't been on here in MONTHS but one of our mice Phreckles is going to be giving us a litter and I just wanted to know what type/color she would be considered. She's a pet store mouse, but she's adorable and super friendly.
Sorry about the poor quality but here she is! :3 I'll try to get better photos later if needed.








































The pictures make her look a little darker than she actually is. She's brown with white spots on her belly.


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## WillowDragon (Jan 7, 2009)

She's just a black that carries/shows a little bit of white spotting. 

She looks old, I wouldn't get too many litters from her.


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## Roland (Aug 17, 2009)

ccoryjohnn said:


> ... I just wanted to know what type/color she would be considered. She's a pet store mouse, but she's adorable and super friendly.
> 
> 
> 
> ...


Some white spots on the belly (and /or a white tail tipp and/or a headspot) are typical signs for piebald with little K-factors. If you want to read more about piebald and K-factors go to http://drofi.repage7.de/ and open -> piebald.

Regards, Roland


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## ccoryjohnn (Jul 2, 2010)

She's definitely not old, she's rather young actually. And I also really dont think she'd be considered black. Im gonna have to take some better pictures with my god camera the next time I get a chance. But thanks guys... I knew I should have just waited to post once I had decent photos... silly me.


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## ccoryjohnn (Jul 2, 2010)

This is the color she is:








Which is chocolate. So I'm guessing she's just a broken chocolate?


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## Rhasputin (Feb 21, 2010)

No. She's poor black.


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## moustress (Sep 25, 2009)

Also known as sepia. Not a standardized color yet, but it's listed in some places.


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## Jack Garcia (Oct 9, 2009)

Yeah, very poor blacks are often "washed out" like this, almost like you're looking at them through a sepia lens.


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## Roland (Aug 17, 2009)

moustress said:


> Also known as sepia. Not a standardized color yet, but it's listed in some places.


sepia is a/a cch/cch


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## Jack Garcia (Oct 9, 2009)

Roland said:


> moustress said:
> 
> 
> > Also known as sepia. Not a standardized color yet, but it's listed in some places.
> ...


This is right. Sepia is lighter than black, but very poor black (like the original poster has) and dark sepia can sometimes look similar.


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## Rhasputin (Feb 21, 2010)

I've got a picture coming (I hope) of a Sepia mouse who is just a reeeeeeeally freakin' poorly coloured black. 
I just recently sold the mouse, so I've asked the owner for photos.


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## Jack Garcia (Oct 9, 2009)

Black mice that are bred poorly (carrying chocolate, Siamese, albino, or recessive yellow) often appear lighter than they would if they were more purebred. It's a real headache sometimes!


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## Jack Garcia (Oct 9, 2009)

These are some ugly light sepia mice I bred. They were either a/a cch/cch or a/a cch/c.


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## zany_toon (Apr 3, 2010)

She looks lovely - whatever colour she is


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## ccoryjohnn (Jul 2, 2010)

What is the a/a gene? This is all good info, thanks guys. If you think she was mated with a broken black male, what is your guess the offspring would look like? Here is the father of the to-be offspring.


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## Rhasputin (Feb 21, 2010)

You will get more broken blacks. Maybe solid blacks.

Are the pair related? If they are, there may be some recessives that show up.


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## ccoryjohnn (Jul 2, 2010)

Nope not related to each other... Could I possibly get more poor blacks/sepia?


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## Rhasputin (Feb 21, 2010)

There's a chance. you would be more likely to get poor blacks if they were carrying chocolate or some other kind of recessive.

Chances are high that you'll just get black and piebald black.


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## WillowDragon (Jan 7, 2009)

I still say she looks old, if she genuinely isn't, then her condition is very poor for a young mouse. She needs some good food


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## Jack Garcia (Oct 9, 2009)

a/a means the mouse has two copies of the "a" (AKA "non-agouti," aka "black") allele.

A mouse who is a/a is black. Even if a mouse is sepia, it's still black, just black _along with_ chinchilla. So a sepia mouse is a/a cch/cch.


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## bethmccallister (Mar 5, 2010)

Here are a few more examples of sepia mice. These are sepia fox at/a cch/ch. In these pictures the doe is only 3 weeks old. She's much older now, has gotten darker and has points like a himilayan. I'll get updated pictures tomorrow but here are the other ones. Not standardised but still pretty.


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## WillowDragon (Jan 7, 2009)

I wouldn't say that was sepia myself, looks more like a biege point siamese fox. All of the c dilutions ch, ce, cch... will dilute a tan belly to white


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## Jack Garcia (Oct 9, 2009)

Willow is right. That's not sepia. The presence of a "ch" allele means it cannot be sepia.


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## bethmccallister (Mar 5, 2010)

I guess that could be too. I am doing backwards guesses from breedings  I think when I punched it into a calculator it said Burmese Fox...is that closer? I know the gene code but not the name that matches.


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## CatWoman (Jun 19, 2010)

I get a ton of those dark brown-tinted blacks out of one of my poor black tan bucks. When the pigment first comes in, they always look like they're going to be black. Then when the hair starts to come in a bit more solid, they start looking like they're going to be agouti. Then when the coat comes in fully, they look like black, but have a reddish brown tint that makes them look a bit chocolaty when the light hits them just right.



WillowDragon said:


> I still say she looks old, if she genuinely isn't, then her condition is very poor for a young mouse. She needs some good food


I agree. If she's not old, then I'd guess she's rubbing her face a lot for some reason that needs to be tended to. It's most apparent in the very first picture. You can see the hair loss around her eyes and going down her nose. Also, in this last photo, you can see the varying degrees of hair loss in a ring around her eye.


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## ccoryjohnn (Jul 2, 2010)

The ring of missing hair has almost all grown back, not sure what it was. But anyway, I've noticed that her belly is a couple shades lighter than the brown on the rest of her body too. I know this isn't a great picture but you can kinda see it here. I'll try to get a better one.
Could she possibly be a very diluted fox? I don't much about coloring/markings. Figured I'd ask.


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## JustMouse (Jul 23, 2010)

What color is her stomach? Orange, faint orange, or yellow at all?

edit: I looked at your older photos. Her stomach is grey, isn't it? I have no idea what that would be.


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## ccoryjohnn (Jul 2, 2010)

No her stomach isn't orange or yellow at all, just a lighter brown than the rest of her body. I'd get a better shot of the belly but I can't cause she's in with her babies and I wouldn't want to disturb her right now :?


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## ccoryjohnn (Jul 2, 2010)

I'd love to hear any other opinions if anyone has them. I am very curious. I'm hoping her babies will give us some answers. Also, I'm going to try to get a better picture tomorrow.


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## WillowDragon (Jan 7, 2009)

Its natural for a mouses belly to be lighter than the top colour.


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