Examples of “Legal” Offspring

A card is a “Legal Offspring” of two other cards (a buck and doe) if it is one that could be produced from this mating, given what is known about the genotype.

Legal Mating: Black x Lynx => Amber

The genotype for Amber is: A- bb C- D-

It is a Chocolate Agouti. In order for this to be a legal offspring, the following must be true:

1. ONE parent must have the Agouti allele (A)
2. BOTH parents must have the Chocolate Allele (b)
3. ONE parent must have the full Color allele (C)
4. ONE parent must have the Dense allele (D)

If this were a real mating, we could also fill in a few additional alleles on the offspring because of what we know about the parents. Since one parent was a Self (‘aa’) we know for sure that the second allele on the A-locus HAS to be ‘a’. Also, since one parent was Dilute (‘dd’) we also know that the second allele on the D-locus HAS to be ‘d’.

Later on, if we were to use this Amber in a mating, we would be able to predict the colors of the offspring with more accuracy.

Legal Mating: Black X Lynx => Lynx

The genotype for Lynx is: A- bb C- dd

It is a Lilac Agouti. In order for this to be a legal offspring, the following must be true:

1. ONE parent must have the Agouti allele (A)
2. BOTH parents must have the Chocolate Allele ‘b)
3. ONE parent must have the full Color allele (C)
4. BOTH parents must have the Dilute allele (d)

If this were a real mating, we could also fill in a one additional alleles on the offspring because of what we know about the parents. Since one parent was a Self (‘aa’) we know for sure that the second allele on the A-locus HAS to be ‘a’.

Later on, if we were to use this Lynx in a mating, we would be able to predict the colors of the offspring with more accuracy.

Legal Mating: Black X Lynx => REW

The genotype for Albino is: — — cc —

It is a Red-Eyed White. In order for this to be a legal offspring, the ONLY thing that must be true is:

BOTH parents must carry the albino allele (c)

If this were a real mating, we could also fill in a few additional alleles because of what we know about the parents. Since one parent was a Self (‘aa’) we know for sure that one allele on the A-locus HAS to be ‘a’. We also know that one of the alleles on the B-locus HAS to be ‘b’. Also, since one parent was Dilute (‘dd’) we also know that one allele on the D-locus HAS to be ‘d’.

So in fact, the known genotype of this offspring would have to be:

-a -b cc -d

It is often written with the unknown (‘-‘) in the first position here because we can’t be sure that the recessive allele is not paired up with one that is dominant to it.