Examples of “Illegal” Offspring

A card is a “Illegal Offspring” of two other cards (a buck and doe) if it is one that could NOT be produced from this mating, given what is known about the genotype.

Illegal Mating: Blue Californian X Chocolate Marten Calofornian => Lilac Otter

meld-bad-1The genotype for Lilac Otter is: at– bb C- dd

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

  1. ONE parent must have the Tan allele (at), and the other must have either Tan (at) or self (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)
 We are OK on everything except the ‘C’. Neither parent has a dominant ‘C’ to pass on, so there is no way these parents could produce this offspring.

Illegal Mating: Blue Cal X Chocolate Silver Marten => Opal

meld-bad-2bThe genotype for Opal is A- B- C- dd

It is a Blue 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. ONE parent must have the Black allele (B)
  3. ONE parent must have the full Color allele (C)
  4. BOTH parents must have the Dilute allele (d)

Neither parent has the dominant ‘A’ OR the ‘C’ to pass on, so there is no way these parents could produce this offspring.

Illegal Mating: Blue Cal X Chocolate Silver Marten => Squirrel

The genotype for Squirrel is A- B- cchd– dd

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

  1. ONE parent must have the Agouti allele (A)
  2. ONE parent must have the Black allele (B)
  3. ONE parent must have the chinchilla Color allele (cchd)
  4. BOTH parents must have the Dilute allele (d)

Neither parent has the ‘cchd‘ to pass on as both have alleles below chinchilla on the dominance hierarchy, so there is no way these parents could produce this offspring.

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