Pairing was “Other” het Pied x Vanilla Pied. Not ready to give up what “Other” is just yet, but it should be a fairly subtle morph at their age if they have it. Curious whether anyone familiar with Pied and Vanilla would say which probably have Vanilla, or at least are not normal Pied.
Somehow I managed to luck out with a het x visual and get all 4 of the 4 egg clutch as Pied!
oddly enough I don’t see any that scream vanilla pied to me… it usually has a very distinctive headstamp that I’m not seeing here… could the mystery gene be messing with the head stamp?
Are you positive that your vanilla is a vanilla?
The mystery gene should only add to any blushing on the head.
Honestly some doubt in my mind that the female is Vanilla and part of the reason I’m asking. I purchased as an adult and haven’t been able to pair with anything 100% definitive like Fire yet. (Breeder is adamant she is Vanilla Pied though.) Plan on pairing with a Firefly Clown next season to get some final proof there.
Can you post a photo of the female?
I can in the nearish future. She’s been a bit slow to get back on food consistently after this clutch so want to minimize any stress til she’s back up to weight.
Ok. I think it would be helpful to confirm her
The 3 other than the second to bottom are definitely much brighter and cleaner than that one. But it is possible that it’s from the mystery gene too, as it does tend to clean up normal pattern.
Is the mystery gene Black Head?
The one with the darker head would probably be a normal Pied most likely.
Honestly, they look enchi pied to me, not seeing vanilla at all. But I’ll admit, I have a ways to go with pieds before I feel confident on id’s without knowing the parent genes. Still, a nice group of lookers. 
Great luck on the odds. 
These are all low-white pieds, I really don’t see anything else at play here. I don’t see any fire/vanilla in there, and these certainly aren’t enchi.
OK, cool. I was just guessing the mysterious “other” gene. It seems to me like enchi in pied tends to produce a long section of pattern before the first band, and they mostly seem to low white as well. That was the whole basis for my guess. 
So he got lucky and hit pied for all of them, and then strangely got all low white as well. 
That’s pretty neat!
Wow, what a nice clutch!
Even if they don’t have vanilla, they’re all lookers.
As for the mystery gene, is it recessive or co-dom?
Or is it a gene you might have discovered? 
Thanks everyone for the feedback! After all the comments and looking through a ton of Vanilla Pied examples, plus all the hatchlings she’s produced, I’m pretty confident that the breeder made a mistake with her genetics. I think she is just a nice normal Pied.
The mystery gene is something that people are just now starting to have a few visual Pied examples coming out or have been secretive about from last season. So figuring that one out will take some time to confirm one way or the other. I should be updating this thread as I learn more and watch their colors come in.
It’s also the same odds that completely missed that other gene as odds I got these 4 visuals. So definitely a possibility although kind of unlikely.
Is it special then?
Regardless, I personally look forward to updates.
I love a good mystery.
This clutch has been growing and looking better every day! I’ve got an update for a few of them (one’s in shed right now.)
I took some photos of each of the ones I believe are [redacted] pied next to what is probably a normal pied. Let me know what you think!
Interesting crossbar patterns, what does it look like without the pied I wonder.
The last one shed last week and I got some pictures of him. He’s arguably the most bright looking of the clutch!
I finally got around to getting a nice pic of the mother to this clutch. I’m still on the fence to whether she’s vanilla or not without a normal pied to compare with. The brighter of the hatchlings these days really has me wondering too as she seems to be getting even lighter than her two brothers that I believe are the same 2 genes otherwise.
Here’s a picture of dad too just to show what I’m working with on these hatchlings. Anyone ready to guess the gene?
