Any axolotl people out there? I have a few questions on color morphs & genotypes:
I’m working on an axolotl dragon Backerkit project for later this summer to create a small production run of hard enamel pins. I would like to use real axolotl color morphs in these little guys. Alongside each pin I wanted to include information about the real-life color morph below each dragon’s personality/character. Example:
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Pearl:
Pearl loves swimming just below the water’s surface each night so that she can gaze at the moon. She likes to imagine there might be axolotl dragons who live there in their own pond domains, gazing back at the earth with wonder.
Pearl is a leucisitic axolotl dragon. Leucisitic axolotls are pinkish white with dark eyes. This color morph is caused by a combination of a homozygous recessive dark genotype, homozygous recessive albino genotype, that lacks expressed melanoid, axanthic, copper, or GFP genotypes.
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I’m not sure that I’m phrasing things correctly. What would you say is an approachable way to phrase something like this so that I’m being accurate, but not plopping punnett squares all over the dragon description? I would like to have some fun facts about the color morphs so that there’s a bit of science to enjoy alongside the whimsy.
For color morphs, So far I have a golden albino, leucistic, lavender, and am probably going to make the laying pose be an axanthic. (Admittedly for the pins I did make the colors a bit more vibrant and candy colors than in real life, but they should still be somewhat in the same wheelhouse.) I’d love to draw up a couple more poses as stretch goals, and potentially use pied, melanoid, or copper colors for them.
Additional question: I’m a bit unclear on what exactly the combination is that produces a lavender. I’ve seen some that are described as melanoid axanthic copper. Is this the same thing as a lavender? Or is lavender an inaccurate term that’s being thrown around, and is not present in axolotls like it is in some of the snake morphs?
Any help is appreciated!