Colours/genetics

I hope somebody can answer this question as my knowledge of genetics is limited. I have an adult male melanoid, he is courting a leucistic female and a wildtype female(wildtype/leucistic cross), what morps can i reasonably expect from these pairings, thanks.

since you don't know the lineage of your male it will all really come down to the unexpressed recessive genes that your axies have.

you should most probably expect a majority, if not all, wildtypes from these crosses; however if other reccesive genes come into play you can get all kinds of colours.

considering two crosses at once is tricky so I will mainly focus on the melanoid - leucusitc cross that you are proposing.

if your male has a reccessive copy of the leucustic gene, half the offspring will be leucustic
if your leucustic female has a reccessive copy of the melanoid gene then half will be melanoid
and if both hold a reccessive copy of the T- albino gene (golden albinism) then a quarter will be albino
due to independent assortment all of these ratios will be intermixed so you wont simply get half melanoid and half leucustic for example, but rather a variety of wildtype, melanoid, leucustics, and melanoid leucustics

for your wildtype cross if you wish i can calculate probable percentages again; however quite simply from a wiltype melanoid cross you would expect a much greater proportion of wildtypes than other colour mutants, so if you are looking to produce greater numbers of "mutant" larvea then i would recommend crossing with the leucustic as it shows a higher (probable) potential.

hope that helps,

Thanks, i am hoping to get a few melanoids, they are hard to source in my area of the UK.

All your offspring will be carriers of melanoid, so just breed them back to the melanoid parent.

Kaysie said:

All your offspring will be carriers of melanoid, so just breed them back to the melanoid parent.

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Thanks but i always find that slightly distasteful lol, a prejudice that probably has little place when line breeding healthy amphibians.

That's the problem with placing human emotion/norms on other species. It's icky for us to do it, but they don't have the issue of what to do at a family reunion.

Kaysie said:

That's the problem with placing human emotion/norms on other species. It's icky for us to do it, but they don't have the issue of what to do at a family reunion.

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That comment made me cringe and laugh at the same time!

More than likely all your Axies are already related.

BillYannone said:

More than likely all your Axies are already related.

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Seeing as they all originate from one area in Mexico and the UK population has been isolated because of CITES that conclusion would be correct, however i am trying to breed recessive colour morphs and by breeding closely related animals i would be increasing the chances of inbreeding genetic weakness. I am trying to avoid this as there are enough crappy axolotls on the market as it is and i want to avoid culling weaker animals, for though i make a point of culling i hate killing animals i have invested time and effort into.