What kind of rats do I have!

[satomi325]

thank you very much niki. Looking online it is hard to determine they say different things on different sites, also the last two are sisters and I am pretty sure the dad is a dumbo. I will post a better pic for you.

Ok. Then the last girl is probably a Russian Blue too since the last two are sisters. It's just difficult to tell since she has very little marking.
If the father is a dumbo, the two girls carry the dumbo gene (het). So if you breed them back to dad, you will get some dumbos in the litter.

[the_knot]

It kinda looks black in the pic, se is small and it is hard to tell but in person it is really light. She lso has two or three random colored hairs on her back but you can barely notice.

[the_knot]

so I think she is a capped then. I bought these two off a guy who is breeding for feeders he only had a few rats, he said thats my big stud! it was white and grey and also a dumbo. when I told him he was a dumbo he had no idea what I was talking about, I'll message him to see if he was the father for sure. Also if they were het dumbo and she had a litter could I raise a boy and breed back to get dumbo?

[sorraia]

Colors might now be coming out really well on my computer screen, but I'm not really seeing blue or mink in the second one. Looks instead like a faded black, or maybe what is called "charcoal". This could mean one of a couple things: The white markings are influencing the color (happens sometimes, depending on what genes are creating the markings) and fading it, OR there are recessive dilutes being carried and diluting the color.

The third one is hard to tell too. MIGHT be a nice dark Russian blue, OR I'm leaning more toward "charcoal".

Note: Charcoal is NOT a standardized color, you will not find it on any of the AFRMA websites. Based on what I am seeing on my screen, AFRMA would basically call all of those rats bad black and practically disqualify them from the show. HOWEVER "charcoal" is a term referred to a faded black due to white markings or modifiers. There is genetic basis to it. Once, years ago when I first started breeding rats, produced a charcoal rat. He was produced by a beige from a lilac (mink) who were half siblings by a fawn father out of a black female and lilac female (who was produced from two black parents). I never did get a litter sired by him, but a black brother of his produced Russian blue when bred to another Russian blue. Markings from that line did vary a lot, with a few decent Berkshires, but the "hoodeds" were crazy, fitting half way between hooded and variegated, but not truly fitting either standard. Blazes and head spots were also common in that family.

[the_knot]

On my big female the second one I'm thinking it is a faded black. but the third pic is grey, or maybe charcoal. But she is lighter in person the flash seems to over expose the pic's.
so if she was a charcoal that would be rare?

[satomi325]

Colors might now be coming out really well on my computer screen, but I'm not really seeing blue or mink in the second one. Looks instead like a faded black, or maybe what is called "charcoal". This could mean one of a couple things: The white markings are influencing the color (happens sometimes, depending on what genes are creating the markings) and fading it, OR there are recessive dilutes being carried and diluting the color.
.

Yeah. It looks brown(mink) on my screen. Guess its charcoal or faded black if you are seeing the same color as the op.

Sent from my DROID RAZR using Tapatalk 2

[Capray]

Yeah. It looks brown(mink) on my screen. Guess its charcoal or faded black if you are seeing the same color as the op.

Sent from my DROID RAZR using Tapatalk 2

There's also another colour called chocolate that's that similar rusty/black color. How old is she though?

[the_knot]

I am not sure she was already an adult when I purchased her from a pet store.

[sorraia]

I wouldn't say charcoal is rare necessarily, but not too common either. Since it isn't standardized, it is hard to say one way or the other, and sometimes other colors (such as true blues) will get called charcoal too, especially if someone is describing what they see (a "charcoal" colored rat) and not what the standardized name is.

I wouldn't say they are chocolate either. Chocolate actually looks clearly brown, resembling a dark chocolate candy bar. Sometimes black can be faded or rusted to a brownish-black color, but true chocolate is rich, and even throughout, not faded or patchy. My experience with chocolate was they didn't rust very much either, whereas mink, blue, and even black (especially black carrying recessive dilutes) seemed to rust ("brown out") a lot.