Fancy Mice

[MerleMice]

Hey all! I am breeding mice for show, & just got back from an expo in Ohio. Brought back some lovely additions to the mousery, and want to share with pretty much everyone.


This is a blue tan texel manx. The manx gene is dominant, but it produces a wide array of taillessness ranging from a single vertebra to the whole tail not developing. It's nice, because the fully tailed offspring that are produced from this line can be shown as texels.



I also got some Runaway (a west coast mousery who shipped some to Ohio recently) line mice which is pretty exciting! They are super typey (large size, large ears, features which show mice are all bred to) and I'll probably use it to beef up my merle line.

One of the vendors had some lower quality abby that I snatched up for cheap at the end of the day. (Not to say she has low quality animals, just that these mice didn't have particularily good coats for the variety). Abby's were imported from the UK last year (or was it two years ago?) but in such a small quantity that they were out-crossed to save the gene. The American Abby's kinda suck right now, but with selective breeding can be brought back up to snuff.
http://www.hiiret.fi/eng/breeding/?pg=4&sub=2&ala=6

 

[lightchick]

So cool! I wish I had a mouse!

 

[LadyVictorian]

Late to the party but AWWWWWWW I miss having mice. I mostly have rats for the past 7 years but had mice before that. I loved the angora, rex's, gremlins, and texels. My fav colors are blue and lavender of course. Had a little tan girl with tons of health issues too. So cool to see a fancy mouse breeder only a state away from me. If you still breed I might have to get some babies from you some day. Got a big empty 20 gallon my little group of girls lived in with the reptile locking lid.

 

[MerleMice]

It's always nice to see more mouse enthusiasts! The club I'm in has several shows planned for Wisconsin this year, if you're interested let me know and I can get you details, and point you towards breeders.

 

[drumstick diva]

Many years ago (l970's) I knew of a person that raised and showed Cockers in California. She had the parti color variety. She also bred & showed mice. Often she produced mice marked very close in markings to her show dogs. In photos she would have a mouse on the dog to show the resemblance. I though that was very neat.

 

[MerleMice]

How fun! There are quite a few other varieties that have other look a like patterns on other species. Siamese, hereford, tans, and banded jump to mind. The mouse fancy in the US has always kinda wavered, but CA has maintained people okay, largely due to one of the active clubs being based out of that state.

 

[ShrekDawg]

Awesome! I love mice and rats and would like some of both one day but my parents HATE them so it will be a while haha

But the little mice are sooo cute! And I never knew there were so many patterns! I knew of big ears in rats but not in mice. Same for manx, etc. In rats the ears are called dumbo I think. Is it the same in mice? Or is it just a feature?

 

[MerleMice]

With rats, dumbo is a gene, whereas with mice, the large ears are something that has to be selectively bred for over time, as well as placement. I can't speak for labs, but mice in the hobby occasionally have gremlin ears (random (cranial?) deformity, no one has any colonies that I'm aware) and there is some work on "short eared" mice. I have not worked with them, but if you Google "short eared fancy mice", it should take you to a fb page with some pictures of them.

 

[ShrekDawg]

With rats, dumbo is a gene, whereas with mice, the large ears are something that has to be selectively bred for over time, as well as placement. I can't speak for labs, but mice in the hobby occasionally have gremlin ears (random (cranial?) deformity, no one has any colonies that I'm aware) and there is some work on "short eared" mice. I have not worked with them, but if you Google "short eared fancy mice", it should take you to a fb page with some pictures of them.

Oh wow, that's really interesting!!!

 

[LadyVictorian]

It's always nice to see more mouse enthusiasts! The club I'm in has several shows planned for Wisconsin this year, if you're interested let me know and I can get you details, and point you towards breeders.

That would be awesome.I really miss my little angora girls and my little rex lady.

As for mice and rats having similar gene's dumbo is just for rats but on the flip side mice have more color and coat patterns and fur types. It's also helps mice have been domesticated FAR longer than rats. Rats have only been domesticated since the 1800's by the rat catcher Jack Black who would keep black, white, and cream rats and breed them to get those colors more commonly and often sold them to the upper class as pets. Mice have been domesticated in China since 307-1641. Also little known fun fact there is a temple in India called the Karni Mata temple where the rats there are revered as the children of a goddess named Karni Mata. They are fed by the hundreds of people who come to visit the temple daily and by the caretakers of the temple who cook the food only for the rats. If you see one of the few rare white rats there then it is considered a blessing from Karni Mata herself.