| I am often asked what is the perfect chinchilla. That is one question I find very difficult to reply to. You may prefer a certain colour which I don't. If we all like the same colour? My goodness how boring the chinchilla world would be would it not?
Some do's and don'ts. Never breed with chinchillas who have the same faults, this will pass on any faults to the kits, Another golden rule to breeding is NEVER breed with chinchillas with teeth problems, or fur biters, or any other bad defect. This would be totally irresponsible and also give you a bad reputation.
A few of the early pitfalls in breeding come about through wrong pairing and wrong advice. I find all too many inexperienced breeders are not following basic rules. They are taking two mutation colour and as in paintbox fashion mixing and up pops X colour. They are not using the basics which many of us experienced breeders learned from older breeders and judges. At the shows if you listen carefully and I am sorry to say some come to shows and don't pay any attention to what the judge is saying. A judge will pick out the faults/good points in a chinchilla and offer advice on how to improve your line. The successful breeder always has lots of standards. They are the base colour of any colour you wish to breed. At the show there are three classes for standard chinchillas. Light, Medium and Dark. Mutations are nice to look at I grant you. However if you see a really good blue standard it is in my opinion a joy to see. It is a beautifil looking chinchilla. With good guard hair and good colour spread evenly over its body and sides, with a pure white belly.
The best pairings to get a good mutation comes from standard to mutation. Note at this point I mean true full bred standards, not a standard carrier for a mutation. These carriers bred from mutations are not 100% standard. Your standard should be the best you can buy. You need to look for one which is big, blocky , no dip to neck, strong blue fur which stands up. A good standard's fur does not lay flat, go in different directions or swirls as I call them. The fur when disturbed should spring back in place. This is why a judge will often shake the show cage. It is not harmful to the chinchilla, he only wishes to see your chinchilla look it's best. When he shakes the cage the fur should spring up. It should be thick, blue and have a bounce to it. Pictures of my award winning standards These are from the National Show at which Floppy my NCS National Grand Show Champion 2003 winner did well. She is one of the many chinchillas I have bred from my Eddie Crutchley and Tom Handford stock. They are breeders in England. Read Foppy and her sisters story here.
If not up to these standards it will not be any good for show class breeding. If your standards do not have this blueness they will not produce good mutations. If you look at a good standard, black velvet or ultra violet (Tov) in US. You will see this blueness I refer to. Remember too if you are doing line/run breeding your buck should be the best you can get your hands on. After all he will be breeding with more than one female as they do in the wild and any defects will be passed on via all the kits he sires. In the wild they they do not live in large groups. The male will live with all his females, yes, but when any male kits reach maturity, he will chase them off as happens in any other herd creatures.It is actually dangerous to have two males together if you have females present. Many breeders have found that out to their cost. Some males will fight to the death as they have nowhere to run off to if both in the same cage.
Black Velvet (TOV in UK) is one of many mutations. Should be very blue/black fur. With the black coming well down it's sides and a lovely pure white belly. Pair your black velvets with a really dark standard for best results. A black velvet with a lot of gray showing at sides is not desirable for shows. Some breeders do breed blk/vel to blk/vel., Blk/vel carry the lethal gene. I am sure you have all read up on that. In breeding blk/velvets I personally don't breed blk/vel to blk/vel. Instead I only breed them to a dark standard.
Violets and ultra violets? Again what the judges are looking for is that good strong blueness to the fur and giving good coverage which continues well down the body to a pure white belly. With all the other attributes of size and fur quality as described for the standards.
Beige is often a tricky mutation to breed. Any standards born from Std/Beige pairing will have an orange tinge, so it would be unwise to use this standard back to you standard line. Instead put it back to your beige line. Beige do not carry the lethal gene you may have heard of. Breeding homo beige to homo biege gives 100% homo biege kits. However out crossing to standards should always be considered for future breeding from kits from this pairing.. This keep strength, size and shape in your breeding line
email me kingdomchinchillas@hotmail.com |
