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[MootWorm]

Hi all,
I just picked up my first two fancies and I had some questions regarding genetics and whatnot. From what I've gathered, there are two types that are called 'albino'... Is that right?And if so, how do you distinguish between the two?
Anyway, here's my two new babies



She looks a lot less demonic IRL lol


Sorry about the poor picture quality, they're wiggle worms.
What is my boy considered? And what would the offspring look like if bred to the 'albino'? Also, I'm open to all suggestions for names for these guys.
My apologies for the barrage of noob questions

[Pythonfriend]

albino is recessive, so the offspring would look normal.

however, if you breed a few albinos into your colony, you will have these genes floating around and will hit an albino every so often.

ive seen videos recently of a very large rat breeding operation to feed a very large BP breeding operation, and they had a few partially hairless and hairless rats. and these recessive genes just moved around randomly in the colony, so every now and then they would hit a partially hairless or hairless. and if they dont feed these off but use them as breeders or sell them as pets, over time they would hit more and more as the frequency for that gene in the colony gets more frequent. in BP-speak, from using hairless breeders every now and then they have a bunch of het hairless and possible het hairless moving around in the breeding operation.

You can do the same with albino. how big is the colony, how many female breeders do you have?

[satomi325]

The first looks like a mink or lilac hooded. I'm leaning toward lilac. The picture is dark so its hard to tell for sure. The second looks albino(pink eyed white), but Id like to request better pictures. Maybe in natural sun light.

There is just albino. But triple dilute rats looks similar. They also have the redish eyes. They are offwhite though. If they have a pattern, it is easier to distinguish since you can see the white and offwhite together. But your boy looks albino from the pictures.

Most colors in rats are recessive except for the wildtype normal color, which is agouti.

If your rats don't carry any other genes, they should just produce black or agouti offspring that are het for the parent colors. For example, breeding an offspring back to the first colored parent will give you more offspring of that color and pattern.

Hooded is also recessive. So they may produce solid colored babies depending whether or not the other parent carried the gene.

If those 2 rats are carriers for other genes, you may get other types of offspring.

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[MootWorm]

Thanks for the input guys! I'll definitely take some better pictures in natural sunlight. The breeder I got these guys from said the PEW was the first she had produced. I'm not sure how well documented their genes/birthing records are, or how large the breeding operation is. I'm thinking very small lol. She was feeding pet-store rat food, which would get mighty expensive for anything more than a few rats. I gave her some of my lab block

[MootWorm]

As requested, pics in the sunlight:

[MootWorm]

I just noticed that my boy has a two-tone head. Is that normal? I'm pretty excited to see what he looks like when he's an adult.



The camera doesn't show it very well, but it's really noticeable in person.

[sorraia]

That two-toned head means one of two things:
He's a mink or mink-related color (i.e. cocoa, lilac, havanna, mocha, etc...) and he's moulting, OR he's actually Burmese, and that second color is his nose point coming in. It's hard to tell from the pictures. In that second set taken in natural light, he does resemble mink, but the color is just "off", and I can't quite place my finger on it. I'd be interested to see some more pictures in a week or so when he has a full adult coat in!

The other one looked like a Pink-eyed White or albino in the first set of photos, but in the second set I see a shadow of color on her head. That makes me think she's either a pink-eyed dilute color (champagne or amber) or she's a triple dilute with the PED.

There's only one albino, but I think you might be thinking of Pink-eyed White. All albinos are pink-eyed white (PEW), but not all PEW are albino. Albino is a simple recessive that masks all other colors. To get albino, you need two recessive copies of the albino gene. "Underneath" that albino you can have any other color though, but you can't see it because the albino covers it up. (Hope that isn't too confusing!) So when you breed an albino to something else, what you produce will depend on what other genes the albino is hiding underneath the white.

Most PEW's are albino, but you can get PEW in other ways too. Sometimes you can get PEW by adding enough white marking to a pink-eyed rat (either an amber or champagne, or even to a Siamese or Himalayan). You can sometimes get PEW through multiple dilutes, but usually these multiple (triple or more) dilutes have some shadow of color.

[MootWorm]

That two-toned head means one of two things:
He's a mink or mink-related color (i.e. cocoa, lilac, havanna, mocha, etc...) and he's moulting, OR he's actually Burmese, and that second color is his nose point coming in. It's hard to tell from the pictures. In that second set taken in natural light, he does resemble mink, but the color is just "off", and I can't quite place my finger on it. I'd be interested to see some more pictures in a week or so when he has a full adult coat in!

The other one looked like a Pink-eyed White or albino in the first set of photos, but in the second set I see a shadow of color on her head. That makes me think she's either a pink-eyed dilute color (champagne or amber) or she's a triple dilute with the PED.

There's only one albino, but I think you might be thinking of Pink-eyed White. All albinos are pink-eyed white (PEW), but not all PEW are albino. Albino is a simple recessive that masks all other colors. To get albino, you need two recessive copies of the albino gene. "Underneath" that albino you can have any other color though, but you can't see it because the albino covers it up. (Hope that isn't too confusing!) So when you breed an albino to something else, what you produce will depend on what other genes the albino is hiding underneath the white.

Most PEW's are albino, but you can get PEW in other ways too. Sometimes you can get PEW by adding enough white marking to a pink-eyed rat (either an amber or champagne, or even to a Siamese or Himalayan). You can sometimes get PEW through multiple dilutes, but usually these multiple (triple or more) dilutes have some shadow of color.

Thank you soooo much! Very helpful and not confusing at all (biology degree helps lol). I'll definitely take some more pics next week if its sunny. I wanted to get a few of them in the grass (for the cuteness!!) but one of my dogs was a little too interested in the ratties . Thanks again for all the insight!

[MootWorm]

Ok so it's been awhile and I'd love some input now that the two rats have grown up some. My little albino 'girl' has started developing points on the nose (side note: albino is definitely a male lol. Next time I'll check instead of taking the breeder's word for it. To be fair, he didn't have prominent testicles like my other boy. Lesson learned haha).
Anywho, here's some updated pics




Do you think his coat will stay kind of mottled with his current colors? The colors in the picture are true to what he looks like in person



Thanks guys

[sorraia]

Looks like your albino turned out to be a himilayan instead!

The mottling on the other rat probably won't stay, or at least not in that pattern. It looks like molting or rusting. Mink colored rats are very very prone to funny molt and rust patterns.