Question about Gracie's colour.

[Caroline]

This is Gracie, who is supposed to be extra dark ebony, which from what I understand is homozygous. Yet as you may be able to see from the photo I uploaded into my album, she has a gray stripe across her nose. Any ideas as to why that is? Sorry for inconveniance but my phone won't allow me to attach photos to threads.

 

[Caroline]

Sire ebony, heterozygous dark
Dam violet (ec)

 

[jags]

X Dark is a color phase that will have every hair shiny black in color. Their is no homozygous for ebony in chins. You can breed two X Darks and end up with a standard appearing offspring. You can also breed two lighter animals and have X Dark offspring.

 

[Caroline]

X Dark is a color phase that will have every hair shiny black in color. Their is no homozygous for ebony in chins. You can breed two X Darks and end up with a standard appearing offspring. You can also breed two lighter animals and have X Dark offspring.

Ok, now I am confused because both Rittersbach and the Chinchilla genetics Punnet squares refer to the color as homozygous ebony.

 

[Caroline]

X Dark is a color phase that will have every hair shiny black in color. Their is no homozygous for ebony in chins. You can breed two X Darks and end up with a standard appearing offspring. You can also breed two lighter animals and have X Dark offspring.

Ok, now I am confused because both Rittersbach and the Chinchilla genetics Punnet squares refer to the color as homozygous ebony.

 

[Caroline]

am trying to upload photos of Gracie and the gray on her face, stilll having challenges doing so. Any suggestions?

 

[momenteller]

Are you uploading your pictures to another site, such as photobucket, and inserting the links from there?

 

[Caroline]

I just put the photos in an album titled "Gracie's colour".

 

[Caroline]

Gracie will be 3 next month.

 

[Dreamlite]

She is not what is considered a **** ebony. She is a dark or extra dark ebony. **** ebony is when every hair is perfectly back, no grey barring of any kind. She apears to have some barring under her ears and by her eyes in the pictures. Its almost impossible to get a **** eb by breeding a ec to any color.

 

[Caroline]

I understand that. My question is about the fact that in the past few months the gray has become more pronounced. Is this normal?

 

[RDZCRanch]

She is not what is considered a **** ebony. She is a dark or extra dark ebony. **** ebony is when every hair is perfectly back, no grey barring of any kind. She apears to have some barring under her ears and by her eyes in the pictures. Its almost impossible to get a **** eb by breeding a ec to any color.

Using "****" or "hetero" is incorrect terminology for the ebony coloration as JAGS pointed out. Those refer to the genetic state of the animal which is unknown for the ebony coloration. This is because there are multiple genes that contribute to the color, some of them are recessive and some dominant. So knowing whether you have a truly homozygous animal for all of those genes is not possible with ebony.

You should classify an ebony by color phase. Some ebony chins will fade with age, some will get darker or stay the same. I find that extra dark ebony chins tend to not fade, but dark and medium dark ebonies sometimes fade with age.

 

[Caroline]

So what you are saying is that a dark ebony can look like an extra dark ebony and then start to gray out as it gets older. As I look at the first photo of her I had not really noticed the gray on her nose as it only was obvious when a flash was used. Now over the past little while it has become very obvious, even under normal lighting.

 

[Spoof]

It's normal for some lines to fade, yours looks like the type that will continue to fade with age. Mine are born very light and darken with age, but ones that are born pure black will stay that way. You know when you get one, there is no fading anywhere just a deep, deep black from the second they come out.

The white line could be a birthing injury or skin trauma from when she was young. Birthing or kit fighting injuries that cause skin damage usually start to show up at that age. By her first prime it may come in much whiter. Wether or not it makes a difference at show depends on the judge as some ignore it as damage and some tell you to pluck it and knock them down a place.

 

[Caroline]

She is three so not going to any shows. Am planning on breeding her to my gorgeous standard male that I got from Craners.