Contrary to what many believe, spots cannot be fixed or set or made to breed true. Neither can non-albino white (Editor's note--we know now that white in American donkeys is either what we call Albino--or is a variant of the spotting pattern called 'fully frosted spotted white" For further explanation ask the office for our color research paper). Albino x Albino is "fixed" or set and will produce 100% albino or "breed true". Not so with spots and non-albino white. Albino is recessive and two recessive colored animals can only produce recessive color and will breed true. Two gray-dun animals carrying the recessive albino gene can produce albino offspring. Most of the albinos today have come from two gray parents carrying the hidden recessive albino gene. Albino donkeys do not have pink eyes as in albino rats, mice and rabbits. Albino donkeys have pale blue eyes and very light cream colored muzzle, stripe and eye rings. Two spotted donkeys mated together will produce gray-dun, black, chocolate and spotted. A spotted donkey mated to an albino will produce gray-dun (or other solid color) and spotted but no albinos unless the spotted parent carries a hidden albino recessive gene.

A spotted donkey mated to a pure gray-dun will produce gray-dun and spotted. ~ the spotted parent is from a family of non-albino white donkeys (ed: Frosted spotted white) , a few non albino whites may be produced A spotted donkey mated to a non-albino white will produce gray-dun, spotted and non-albino white. A spotted donkey mated to a black will produce gray-dun, black, chocolate and spotted.

Gray-dun offspring will be produced even when two spotted donkeys are mated together and when a spotted donkey is mated with an albino. Spots cannot be set, fixed or made to breed true, so that no gray-duns appear in the offspring. Our experience has been that all matings except albino will produce some gray-dun offspring in Miniature Donkeys.

Many who contact us believe that all they need to do is get an albino jack or a spotted jack to breed to their pure gray-dun jennets and that they will then get all albino or spotted foals. Not so. An albino jack bred to pure gray jennets that do not carry a hidden recessive albino gene will produce 100% gray-dun foals. The best of spotted jacks bred to pure gray jennets seldom produces more than 50% spotted foals and some of them will be only lightly spotted. (Ed So far, we have found that spotted is heterozygous in donkeys - only one dose is needed for spots. A jack may be "Ss "0, and if the foal gets the "5 ", it will not be spotted nor will it's offspring out of other "5"animals.)

Color ratios never work out over small numbers of offspring so some will disagree with our experience since their experience is based on a small number of matings. These color expectations are based on a large number of various matings in exotic colored Miniature Donkeys.

  Reprinted with permission of The Brayer Magazine

Lucky S&L Ranch P.O. Box 18757 Corpus Christi, TX 78480-8757
Phone: (361) 949-7197(H) or (361) 949-6919(O) Fax: (361) 949-7405