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Black Otter or Black Silver Marten

ILSMarki8

New Kit
Hello. Until recently, I was 100% positive Karo (my 3 1/2 old mixbreed boy) was Black Otter, but then I got interested in genetics and got all confused. Basically, Karo's mum is (I believe) Chinchilla, and I read that Chinchillas carry the genes for Silver Martens, and not Otters... And when I google it, it is impossible to see the propper expanation on the difference. I mean, it is the C or Cchd gene thet matters I guess, but in prectice, I can't tell one from each other. This is where I get confused. So, can you help me? Is Karo BO or BSM?
MUM:


DAD:


KARO:


 
Going by looks I would have said otter. I had a black other nethie that had almost the exact same colouring.
This page has an explanation of the difference between otters and martens. And going by this page it definitely looks possible for a chinchilla to have a black otter kit. According to the first link the C locus is the important one, and Karo could have got a dominant C allele from dad.

Either way, all your bunnies are beautiful :love:
 
Karo definitely looks like an otter, silver martens don't have any orange on them, I'll try remember to have a look over my genetics guide tomorrow and work the genes side of it out though, I wrote the guide years ago and rarely look at it so I'll need to re-teach myself when I'm less tired :lol:
 
Right okay, so the mum is chinchilla coloured, the dad I think is a chocolate agouti (or cinnamon whichever you want to call it) but even if he’s just a regular agouti this still applies

Chinchilla = A_B_Cchd_D_E_
Chocolate Agouti = A_bbC_D_E_
Black Otter = At_B_C_D_E

Right so firstly A (agouti) is dominant to At (tan) and a (self) so both parents must be carriers of At or a, cross the two together and you could get AA, AAt, Aa, AtAt or Aa. The black otter is either AtAt or Ata

B is the black allele, b is the chocolate allele so your black otter must have at least one copy of the B allele making the dominant black colour show through

The colour gene is more complicated. C (full colour) is dominant to Ch (Himalayan) which is dominant to Cchd (chinchilla dark) which is dominant to Cchl (chinchilla light/sable) which is dominant to c (albino). The dad has the most dominant allele, C and this is what your other has inherited.

So yeah the parents have an interesting mix of genes, mum could be AAtBBCchdCchdD_E_ and dad could be AabbCcD_E but unless you know the colours of the other babies or the grandparents it’s impossible to say. But black otter is definitely possible as long as both parents carry the At or a gene :)
 
We have a black Silver Martin and Sable Silver Martin , Mother and Daughter both rescues. The breeder didn't want them anymore as they were not quite perfect enough for showing, it was either us or they would have been necked :(

Here they are Katie( Mum Sable) and Koko ( Daughter Black ).

 
We have a black Silver Martin and Sable Silver Martin , Mother and Daughter both rescues. The breeder didn't want them anymore as they were not quite perfect enough for showing, it was either us or they would have been necked :(

Here they are Katie( Mum Sable) and Koko ( Daughter Black ).


They're gorgeous! I can't believe the breeder was going to kill them if they weren't "up to standard"! :cry::evil:


Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk
 
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