# Blue eyes, chance of getting them in babies



## Arabiansnob (Aug 11, 2012)

Hello, I have a question about the blue eyes?  I have always wanted a goat with blue eyes, preferably a Nigerian dwarf, and so when the chance came apon to buy a Nigerian/fainter cross, I thought well whats the hurt in looking.  When I saw her I eminently wanted her!  She is just over a year old and still tiny and has Crystle  blue eyes.  Anyways I plan on breeding her to my Nigerian buck, who dosent have blue eyes, but I notice this year that one of the bucklings that was sired by him this year almost had a whiteish kinda blue eye that faded  to a real light brown.  So would the chance of getting blue eyes in there babies be higher?


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## Straw Hat Kikos (Aug 11, 2012)

I really don't know the odds on it but I do know that blue is dominate, so I think the odds are good.


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## Blue Dog Farms (Aug 11, 2012)

I have a blue eyed doe that has freshened twice since Ive had her and boh times sires where brown eyed and we got one blue one brown


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## Pearce Pastures (Aug 11, 2012)

This site well explains how the alleles for eye color in goats work.  It depends on the whether the buck is heterozygous or homozygous blue and that is something you will find out in time after charting the eye colors of his kids over the years.  

We have a buck who we believe is homozygous (meaning 100% of his kids will have blue eyes).  If he was heterozygous, the number of blue eyed kids would depend possible would depend upon the dam's allele set.


http://nigeriandwarfcolors.weebly.com/eye-colors.html

Edited to add that this is the opposite of humans in which blue eye color alleles are a recessive trait instead of dominate.


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## Goatherd (Aug 11, 2012)

It is my understanding that blue is a recessive allele when it comes to eye color in any species of mammal.   Should your buck with the brown eyes carries a recessive allele for blue, then 25% of your kids will have visually blue eyes.  I may be off on my percentage estimation, but not on the theory/premise.


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## Straw Hat Kikos (Aug 11, 2012)

Pearce Pastures said:
			
		

> This site well explains how the alleles for eye color in goats work.  It depends on the whether the buck is heterozygous or homozygous blue and that is something you will find out in time after charting the eye colors of his kids over the years.
> 
> We have a buck who we believe is homozygous (meaning 100% of his kids will have blue eyes).  If he was heterozygous, the number of blue eyed kids would depend possible would depend upon the dam's allele set.
> 
> ...


Very nice. I believe that sums it up. I have one of those that describes the polled genes in Nigerians. If these ones have this then these will this and all that good stuff. It's is somewhere in the favorites.


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## Goatherd (Aug 11, 2012)

I stand corrected.  Very interesting.  Thanks for the info.


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## that's*satyrical (Aug 12, 2012)

Yeah there are 2 possibilities here. Heterozygous blue which is blue eyed phenotype with a recessive gene for brown eyes can be passed down (Bb) where B is the gene for blue eyes (dominant) b is the gene for brown eyes (recessive) and homozygous blue (BB). Obviously if the goat is homozygous & blue eyed the only type of baby you will get is a blue eyed baby since the goat has no brown eyed gene to offer up and the blue eyed gene is dominant. If heterozygous there are two possibilities when bred to a brown eyed goat. Bb and bb. The chances would be 50/50. All babies would be either homozygous brown (the only possibility with a brown eyed phenotype) or heterozygous blue. If you know who the parents are to the blue eyed goat you can possibly figure out if he/she is heterozygous or homozygous blue & the chances are even better to tell if you know the grandsire & granddam's eye color.


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