Why can't I choose!

A lot of people have that problem, and that's why they breed 10 or 12 varieties and get nowhere with any of them. So good on you for choosing, even if it's taking a while!

Rumpwhites are a marked variety and as such usually aren't as typey as the larger, pale selfs, although some that I've seen (of Cait's in particular) are not bad at all. They, like any marked variety, require a lot of room and large numbers of mice be kept, though.

If by cream you mean chinchillated red, they also have problems with type since reds are by default less typey due to their problems breeding.

Chocolate tans and siamese both have potential for good type. I've seen some really nice chocolate tans on the show bench but it's always a challenge (at least in the US) to keep type up while aiming for that deep red belly color that's required.

Jack, cream in the UK is most commonly what Finnmouse calls BE Bone, made with one copy of the albino gene and one copy of the extreme dilution ('ce'). These mice tend to have superb type like the PEW

Mouseling, I found it incredibly difficult to choose as well. I spent months pouring through books and websites looking at pictures and learning all the genetics and I thought BE Creams were the variety for me. Then I got some doves in a litter and I was hooked, dove is the most beautiful of all mouse colours (not that I'm biased or anything ). I never gave dove a second thought before when I'd only seen pictures, they were just boring grey mice. Black is another one I didn't think I'd like from pictures, but when I actually saw a black, it was very, very beautiful. The best thing to do is go to shows and see lots of different mice and talk to their breeders.

Sarah xxx

Not necessarily, no. This is because black tans aren't "black mice with a tan belly" like you might think. In other words, black tans are not a/a with some sort of "tan factor" built in. The tan is a part of the top color, at/*.

To phrase that another way, a black tan is not just a black mouse with a tan belly. The "black tannness" is separate from the "blackness," if that makes sense. The A-locus hierarchy goes like this: Ay, Avy, Aw, A, at, am, a, ae. Tan (at) and black (a) are in separate places and produce separate phenotypes.

The best outcross for black tan is probably blue tan or chocolate tan (I'd choose blue tan, personally). You still have to be careful, though, because blues and chocolates often have modifiers lurking around, modifiers that will compromise the top color of the black tan.

I think a too-dark sable would also work as an outcross for black tan, but only very carefully and rarely. It's best to breed black tans to only black tans if you can help it at all.