[Apple Eyes]

I've had three banded litters over the past year, and originally kept on the babies with the best bands.

The last litter had one buck with an excellent band, and one doe with what starts out to be a good band, but it doesn't join. Just a small gap on the side.

I really want to continue this line, but have never bred from a mouse without (what I consider) a good marking - hence the question I'm about to ask.

If I breed from the girl with the fault, am I likely to just get more faults? Or is there a chance that given the background (doe's mother with an absolutely fantastic band) that I might end up with a decent band?

 

[Cait]

In any litter the theory is that you will get some babies not as good as the parents, some about the same quality and (hopefully) some better. When breeding marked mice although I do as you say select the better mice to breed from, none will ever be perfect and in fact some of the best babies come from does that you wouldn't look twice at. You may get a nice surprise from breeding her to a good buck or you may not get very well marked babies but I wouldn't discount her without trying by any means.

When you start breeding any marked variety you usually have to keep all does for a while although only the best bucks as you keep far fewer, so the bucks are usually better marked than the does. Eventually the quality of the does' markings will creep up to the level of the bucks but at the start you need to breed numbers to start that process off.