Mute to Mute .How much is to much?

[crazy4chins]

I want to know everyones fellings on mute to mute matings. and how many generations of mute to mute mating is acceptable and still considered "improveing the breed" "herd improvement" "quality breeding" ?

1. How many generations of mute to mute mating are acceptable before mating to a quality standard ,from two quality standard parents?
2. What about hybrid mutations ? Is it ok to mate hybrid mute to hybrid mute? For how many generations?
3 How many mutations are accepatable in one chin? 2,3,4 or the more the better? what about the ped.? How many different mutaions are acceptable with in the previous three generations?
4.How many of the 14 chins in the prior four generations should be quality standards from quality standard parents? How many mutaions are acceptable in the ped?

[crazy4chins]

Since no one else has posted I will give you my opinions.

1. Only one genration of mute to mute before mating to a quality standard. any more then that and you are not "improving". Although I prefer mute to standard mating ,you can continue to improve with this mating faster then any other.

2.I see no advantage to breed hybrid mute to hybrid mute. Might produce interesting colors to some but again I don't see how you can" improve" with this type of mating.As far as the number of mutaions in a single chin. any more then two and you aren't" improveing"
As far as mutes in the pedigree. I want no more then two. any more then that is going to cause you problems with quality.

3. I don't want any more mutaions in a chin then two. There are enough multiple mutation hybrids .I see no need to breed more.
4. In the a dominant mute (this includes ebs.) ped I want at a minimum 10 of the 14 to be standards. If the chin doesn't show a particular mutation i don't want it in the ped.With recessives they should be mating to standards at least every other generation. and ideally carrier to carrier. there are enough lower quality mutations around especially recessives. I see no reason to breed more. I don't see how that is "improving " the species. or "breeding for quality"

[SilverMoon]

1. That depends on the mutation. If you're breeding a white line, it always should go back to a quality standard. If it's a hetero beige line or black line, it should be the same. If it's an eb line, and you have two very high quality ebs (say, one dark and one extremely light, huge, almost standard-ish) and you get a huge, light, almost standardish female, I'd take her back to eb again (although I myself do blacks to ebs, and generally not eb to eb - though I have a single temporary case of this currently). If you get a very dark eb female out of that mating, I'd go to standard (or in my case, black). Violets and sapphires should always go back to standards or higher quality standard carries of that color. I don't see any reason to do homo. beiges other than for the color, as well as the rest of the funny bunnies. And in my hetero. beige, black, and eb lines, I don't want to see anything but their color (only hetero's in the case of the beiges) in their pedigree (except in the eb line I'm fine with blacks).
2. I don't do any of this, my one almost exception being a beige x tov eb to get tov tans. This is my "funny bunny" mating, and is not meant to produce show winners. Same with my one standard x tov tan white mating.
3. I think I kind of answered this in the first question. Only the color that I want as the end result can be in the ped. w/the exception of eb (which can include blacks).
4. It should always be high quality standard x mutation color of choice that you're trying to get. The ebs have an exception, but real dark ebs that have real dark offspring should always be taken back to standards/blacks in the F1 offspring.

[Vyxxin]

1. How many generations of mute to mute mating are acceptable before mating to a quality standard ,from two quality standard parents?

One generation of mute to mute is plenty. And for standards, I not only want one that has standard parents...I want one that has standard parents, grandparents, and at least great grandparents. IMO,if they do not have that, they aren't PURE standards

2. What about hybrid mutations ? Is it ok to mate hybrid mute to hybrid mute? For how many generations?

Zero generations. I really see no benefit to this and would not consider it "improving the breed" at all. What can be gained? What would be the point?

3 How many mutations are accepatable in one chin? 2,3,4 or the more the better? what about the ped.? How many different mutaions are acceptable with in the previous three generations?

I think 3 mutations in one chinchilla is more than enough...4 is too much...3 is really too much to improve the breed. Within a three generation pedidgree? 5 (one double mute parent, two single mute grandparents, and two single mute great grandparents)

4.How many of the 14 chins in the prior four generations should be quality standards from quality standard parents? How many mutaions are acceptable in the ped?

At MOST, the animal should have one PURE standard parent (meaning, good pure standards all the way back as far as the eye can see) and one double mute parent. To get the double mute parent I like to see it's parents being single mutes...same for grandparents and great grandparents...I like to see as many standards in a pedigree as possible...to me, this helps improve the breed to the best of it's ability. But again, you can't use just some shoddy standard even if it is PURE. They have to be top notch (1st place or better) standards.

[wallride]

1. How many generations of mute to mute mating are acceptable before mating to a quality standard ,from two quality standard parents?

Personally, I plan on crossing back to herd improment standards after at least 2 generations of mute to mute breeding. Whether that be a standard v/c to a violet, a violet to a violet, a violet to a white violet, a white v/c to a violet, etc, etc. Or, if I see that I am losing clarity, if I see that i am losing conformation that i need to get from a bulky standard, if i see that i am losing my bellies, if i see that i am losing anything, i plan on crossing back to a nice, well put together standard. Just because they are the backbone of maintaining your fur.

On another hand, I can see where some breed mute to mute until they see problems. For about 4 generations back on a female i just purchased, i see a TON of Violet x Violet pairings, and she did pretty decent this weekend for a 5 month old female.. she got reserve champion color section. She has good clarity. She has good color. She still has her baby fur, so you can't tell so much there, but so far, it seems that all of the mute x mute breeding has not undone much.

2. What about hybrid mutations ? Is it ok to mate hybrid mute to hybrid mute? For how many generations?

Besides TOV, I personally do not plan on involving hybrid mute to hybrid mute. When you see about every mutation in an animal, it just gets complicated, and I really do believe you're losing a lot of quality. All those recessive (and dominate) genes are sending so many things, youre just losing anything that animal might have. As some people call it, sure, it can be a "fun line" for your breeding program, for pet owners. (Though, I myself, DO NOT breed for pet quality animals. I breed for improvement and better animals. Nothing less.) I think nothing is gained from this.

3 How many mutations are accepatable in one chin? 2,3,4 or the more the better? what about the ped.? How many different mutaions are acceptable with in the previous three generations?

As Rachel said, what is acceptable is what is needed in YOUR breeding program. Ebony mutations are not acceptable in my lines. It would be useless to carry sapphire. I have a male that is a possible TOV, but other than that, I am not going to go out of my way to find an animal that also carries it. I myself am trying to better violets (and white violets), pure, white bellied, good furred violets. I see no need to carry any other mutations.

4.How many of the 14 chins in the prior four generations should be quality standards from quality standard parents? How many mutaions are acceptable in the ped?

I would prefer to see at least 4 pure standards in my backgrounds.. however, half the time, you never see 14 animals in a pedigree.. sometimes people only go back 2 generations... this really disappoints me though. However, I have no knowledge if they were good quality pure standards. Assuming whoever bred them would have put them there for a reason, but that far back, you just don't know. Pedigrees can only tell you so much.

If the animal you're working with has good clarity, good color, nice tight dense fur, good size, what does it matter any more if there are X-amount of standards in the background? Obviously something was done right.



Overall, I do agree with pairing back to standards. As I said earlier, they are the strongest of all. Mostly you see standards take best of show. They are the strongest, period. It's only sensible to cross your weaker mutations back to them SOMETIME during your lines, to maintain what makes standards so strong in the first place. Doing this, is one of the only things that may make mutations stronger. I won't lie when I say I believe that a mute x mute can make perfectly good offspring as well, as long as you make sure you have all your eggs in the right basket.

[Shuboyje]

Outside of reccessives I feel anything is too much. I am not saying mute to mute matings cannot yield top notch animals, because they can when done correctly, but I just feel if you have such a high quality mute that you could breed it to another mute and produce good animals, you would be better suited crossing it to a standard and trying to create more like it, because we can always use more top quality mutes. Even with reccessive I feel more could be done. If I began a line of violets or sapphires I would be mating carrier to standard and using a microscope to identify the carrier offspring, and repeating. After a few generations of that I would then cross two of my carries together to see what I get and start all over again. It would be slow, but no slower then the progress most are making currently.

[Brea]

But what about the colors that need a mute to a mute? Like homo ebonies and homo beiges.

[Vyxxin]

Well, it has been my experience that such animals really aren't necessary...sure there is a demand for them...but on the show table, they just plain out don't look as nice. And genetically, what do they have to offer that their heterozygous counterparts don't?

[Gcc]

This discussion is occuring similarily on the other thread... but I wanted to comment that:

1. How many generations of mute to mute mating are acceptable before mating to a quality standard ,from two quality standard parents?

If I had a mute to mute offspring, I would use a standard with that individual. Every rule has an exception, and if I had a GSC white violet fro example I might consider one more generation of mute to mute... but I would rely on the vc of an excellent standard to throw violet offspring... it's worth the wait.


2. What about hybrid mutations ? Is it ok to mate hybrid mute to hybrid mute? For how many generations?

I would try to avoid this, and again use a carrier for the recessive's, to maintain a strong background


3 How many mutations are accepatable in one chin? 2,3,4 or the more the better? what about the ped.? How many different mutaions are acceptable with in the previous three generations?

I personally CRINGE when I see more then one consecutive mute to mute pairing in the pedigree, and would avoid such animals if this were the case, unless agin we have THE GSC mute, mute, mute mute etc. Ideally I want a standard (or in the case of recessives, a carrier) in the mix every other generation AT LEAST!

4.How many of the 14 chins in the prior four generations should be quality standards from quality standard parents? How many mutaions are acceptable in the ped?

Again, I'd ideally like to see a standard in there every other generation ON BOTH sides at minimum... and IF a mute to mute is used I want to know why and I want to know those chins personally... what their get has achieved etc.

[crazy4chins]

You don't need to breed eb. to eb. for endless generations. Some ebony. mutations are dominant and can be breed as any other dominant. Wich means you can breed to standard every generation without loss. I have a hetro. eb. that is the result of at least six generations of hetro. eb. to standard mating. He is darker then his hetro. eb. dad and his hetro. eb. grand mother. Ebs. would be much improved if they where breed like all mutations should be. Mute to standard every generation. If not at least every other generation. But this is very rarely done due to the common misconception that all ebs. are accumulative or recessive and need to be breed to other ebs. or the mutation will lighter with each generation of non- eb to eb. mating.