how inbred...? long!

[pinkpink33]

hiya

well today i was pretty bored and started pondering about ham-related things, and as i know a little about genetics it suddenly hit me - when i bought mitsy from the pet store, she had 3 sisters and 3 brothers there at the same time (separated by sex dont worry). all were exactly the same platinum argente colour. and i know there were 2 more boys the same colour, as my friend's girlfriend had bought them a few days before.
so that's 8 platinum argentes from the same litter. chances are the pet store got the whole litter, or most leaving one or 2 for breeding by the breeders.
now i know platinum, or any patterns on dwarf hams, are dominant, but the argente gene is recessive, as are all the colours (bar agouti). so do you think little mitsy is severely inbred?
im worried at the mo that she has diabetes, plan to get some strip tests from the chemist tomorrow. is it likely that her siblings will also develop this (if she has it)? i feed her healthily, harry hamster with 3 sunflower seeds a day. should i give my friend's girlfriend the heads-up? not really sure how bothered she's be (one of the reasons i dont call her my friend).

well, those are my ramblings, any insight would be nice :)

[CookieDough24]

That's a good question. I don't know much about genetics, other than argente is recessive and normal (agouti) is dominant. She might not be severly inbred.

She would need a argente gene from both parents to get the color, so her parent's were either agente or carried the gene. I think it's uncommon for a whole litter to be a recessive color, but I could be wrong.

Maybe someone else could help you more than I could, as I would love to learn more about genetics.

[pinkpink33]

yes i would have expected at least a couple of agoutis! when i bought my pair of girls (one's passed now) there were 3 agoutis, 2 argentes, 2 greys and 1 satin agouti.
so it seems for the whole litter to be argente they must have pure-bred a whole lot of them in a row. hmm....

[Wendell]

i used to breed dogs and mine is a black and tan tuxeto color. this color is a resesive color and in her first litter 4 out of 6 were the black and tan and the other two where off the wall colors, her second 6 of 6 where the black and tan. the sire in both litters was white tri colored which is the most dominate color gene in the breed. weird things happen

[pixibubbles]

OR it could be the pet shop only bought the platinum ones... and the banded / more normal colours went elsewhere / were already sold. 6 is VERY small a litter for syrians. i would expect that the others may have been different. BTW me and all my siblings all have red hair and green eyes. not the same as hamsters... just saying sometimes it happens lol

[pinkpink33]

hmm well it's my local, so i go there a lot, and usually they have agouti dwarfs only, with maybe 1 or 2 greys, so it was pretty weird. i know they get all their hams from the same breeder, so...
theyre campbells dwarfs, and there were 8 argentes that i know of!

[Moosley]

Its not unusual to have a whole litter of the same colour really...

If both parents were argente and both of the parent's parents (you ones grand parents) were all argente etc etc... the chances of there being a non argente in the little get slimmer and slimmer. It just deprends on the genetics...

Its very well saying Argente is recessive to Agouti, everything is really, but is it recessive to all the colours?

Just because there was an entrie litter of the same colour, i definately wouldnt say this was because they were inbred at all... and certainly not a cause for a panic ;)

[pinkpink33]

cool lol! it just seemed to me that they dont usually breed for colour (and it's not for temperment either lol).

[palmbreeze]

My couple had five baby dwarfs and only one of them has shown diabetic signs. They are still young though, 7 months old.