Question: Breeding colours

I've read over the genetics page several times and still can't really make much sense of it, so I thought I'd ask some questions here and see if I have any luck.
Basically, I have four axolotls, but I don't know their genetic details at all.
All are female:
-Golden albino
-Wildtype
-Leucistic
-Leucistic with black mask-like markings on face

Only knowing this much, is it possible to determine what colour babies they would have if matched with a male leucistic?
I'm guessing not but I wanted to ask anyway.
I'm eager to breed and a male leucistic is all I can find right now

Genetics are not my strong point at all but based on observations - without knowing their genetic backgrounds, you could end up with any combination of colors. Someone who truly understands this subject can probably break it down into probable outcomes based on the various mating combination possibilities you have above.

However, since you will most likely be providing your male with a "harem", you may not even know who "Mom" is unless you catch her laying the eggs. I have seen a wild and a leucistic resulting in all the color combinations - wilds, leucistics, goldens, albinos, and even melanoids. Good luck with your endeavor!

Thats an exciting prospect The main thing I'm worried about is if having a leucistic father will limit the different variations I can get. If it will, then I'd rather wait until another axolotl is available, because unfortunately I can't just keep buying more

Can't keep buying more?!? - Why not? lol jk I started out with one and now have 11...I don't even have the intention to breed! lol

I wouldn't be so sure about that either. It truly depends on their genetics. Another member out here had a golden and a leucistic breed and nearly all the offspring were wildtype. Since you don't know their backgrounds, there really is no telling what you will end up with.

Unless you plan on separating the leucistic female and proposed male from the others, you don't know who will be picking up the spermatophores. On the other hand, if you did separate them out, there's no guarantee she'd pick them up, sometimes that happens too!

Just out of curiosity... why do you want to breed them? It's SCARY!

It is possible to make a few predictions as to what the offspring may look like but not to give certainties!

If you mate a leucistic with a leucistic you will get 100% leucistic offspring but some of these may express other recessive genes if both parents have them. You could for instance find white albinos or melanoid leucistics. None of the offspring will be wild type.

If you mate a wildtype with a leucistic some, usually at least half the offspring will be wildtype and the other half will be leucistic if the wildtype carries the leucistic gene or all will be wildtype if it does not. Albino and melanoid recessive genes may show in a quarter of the offspring if present in both parents.

Golden albino crossed with leucistic may produce entirely wild type offspring if the golden does not carry the leucistic gene and the leucistic does not carry albino. If either does then offspring will include some wild types but also golden albinos or leucistics, and if both are carriers of the opposite trait then you will get a mix of wild type, golden, leucistic and white albinos!

Other recessive traits such as melanoid could also appear in any of these crosses.

Summary If you want wild types use a wild type parent and some if not all of the offspring will be wild type. If you want leucistics use two leucistic parents and some if not all will be leucistic. If you want albinos you would be better to get an albino male and cross it with your golden.

If you keep records of the offspring you will know which are carriers of recessive traits and this will allow you to make better guesses as to likely brood colours in future generations.

@Oceanblue: Now THAT I understood Awesome. Its cool to hear that each batch can have a variety of colours, I wasn't sure about that. Just talking about it is making me really excited.

@ A.Macxicanum: Mainly its because I just really love having them as babies. They are so active and cute, swimming around, but I cant afford to keep buying more. Also I have a lot of spare time so I'd love to give it a go. I love working with animals, one day I want to own my own (decent) pet store, where we fully research the care of every animal we sell, so breeding axolotls is good practice for learning more about them.
Not to mention, if I could become good enough to breed them on a regular basis, I could use some extra money.

@Shannon: I wish I could have eleven, although having my arm in the tank for long enough to feed eleven mouths during winter would be unbearable. Its hard enough getting the feeling back into my arm with the four I have.
I probably will just keep them all together and see how it goes, but if I keep getting the same colour batches then I will try seperation to see who makes what.

Thanks for the input everyone, I'm a lot more excited about it after reading all this and knowing there is a male there waiting to be sold I best continue my preparations
Thanks again!

Just thought I'd update on my situation.
Turns out my axies are very sneaky.
Turns out one of them (Im suspecting one of the luecistics) was
a male all along. I've seen no spermatophore, no seduction dance,
but today my golden started laying eggs so excited!
Of all my axies, I always thought the golden was the boy...

We had our leucistic female breed with our black wild type.We ended up getting after they hatched leucistic,white albino,brown wild type,harlequin,black wild type.Hoping they keep their colors,You just never know what color offspring you could possibly get.Just leave it up to mother nature she produces some amazing color schemes at times lol .

Oh wow thats exciting! Harlequin's would be cool.
My tank is currently at 15 degrees celcius, how long can I leave the eggs in there
before moving them to a warmer tank? I'm just not set up yet. If I have to heat the adults tank I will

vladimere said:

We had our leucistic female breed with our black wild type.We ended up getting after they hatched leucistic,white albino,brown wild type,harlequin,black wild type.Hoping they keep their colors,You just never know what color offspring you could possibly get.Just leave it up to mother nature she produces some amazing color schemes at times lol .

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You have parents who are carriers of albino and the wild type must be a carrier of leucistic. This cross should also throw up a few golden albinos in the offspring.

When I eventually get round to crossing one of my dark wild types with a leucistic I suspect I'll end up with 100% wild type or 50/50 wild / leucistic. A lot depends on ancestry and like most I don't have information as to history of my stock beyond parents. If you have parents which produce this sort of mix then fine, if you don' t then on repeated breeding of the same parents you will get the same narrow mix of offspring.

no golden albinos yet........ waiting for our golden atm to lay some eggs. Living in toowoomba queensland and in winter atm the temp drops to 2 degrees. so at times yes i am ordered to place two 50watt heaters in our tank to bring the temp back up to a nice 15 degrees.But as for the hatchlings ,when we first started we did have a heater in with them.But after they had all hatched the heater was taken out.It hasn't bothered them yet,We have lost a few i think round about 10 all toll.But the rest are growing so fast and big (still trying to get a good cam to put up some pics though)

Move the eggs straight away after she has finished laying. otherwise the adults will eat most of them.When we got our little surprise we raced around the house and gathered up all our 50/25 liter plastic storage containers and old air pumps.(was quite funny i was siting at there tank thinking i hope they lay. then after 5 mins i realized i was looking at god knows how many little white centered bubbles over weed and everything in the tank.)