# How common are black-eyed white rats?



## Minky (Apr 4, 2013)

This is Baby:








She's all white with black eyes. I found her at an animal shelter. She came from the home of a backyard breeder-turned-hoarder. 

I notice that I don't see a lot of BEW's on this forum. I also haven't seen any breeders producing BEW's. I'm wondering how rare they are. Do breeders try to avoid producing BEW's? Would she considered "high white"? Just wondering. . .


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## applekiwi1992 (Aug 3, 2012)

BEW's are considered high white. I do know they aren't the most common. I've only run a crossed a few in my area.


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## nanashi7 (Jun 5, 2013)

BEWs do have awful health issues and are dangerous to breed, so they're a bit rare. 
Instead of being a white rat like a PEW, she actually is a white marked rat -- she could be hooded or capped, but the marking is white on a white coat. 


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## Isamurat (Jul 27, 2012)

They can also have issues with audio generated fits and epilepsy. It's weird they are banned from being shown here in the UK. The breeders hear have been able to get high white type markings to be safe in well bred lines here but those issues seem intrinsically linked with the genes that causes bew. It means they are pretty uncommon here to


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## Minky (Apr 4, 2013)

Audio-generated epilepsy? Does that mean certain sounds could cause her to have a siezure? 

She does have a very faint spray of light grey spots behind one ear. She's about one year old and so far appears to be perfectly healthy. Hopefully her health will continue because she's my favorite.


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## Rat Daddy (Sep 25, 2011)

Are her eyes natural dark brown or black-ruby? The high whites I've seen with black eyes have all been of the black-ruby type as their black eyes flash red in certain light.


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## Phantom (Apr 4, 2012)

Pastoolio is almost white in the face, but he isn't a BEW. His eyes are blackish reddish in certain lights though.


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## Rat Daddy (Sep 25, 2011)

I'd love to have an all white rat with natural eyes, but to be honest I've never seen one, even the ones in photos seem to have the black-ruby variety. My high white has the black-ruby eyes and she's fine indoors, but a real mess outdoors. Black-ruby might be the best of the red eyes, but so far both rats that I've trained as shoulder rats have had good vision and natural brown eyes.


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## Isamurat (Jul 27, 2012)

Minky said:


> Audio-generated epilepsy? Does that mean certain sounds could cause her to have a siezure?
> 
> She does have a very faint spray of light grey spots behind one ear. She's about one year old and so far appears to be perfectly healthy. Hopefully her health will continue because she's my favorite.


Yes some BEW do, its linked with being marked around there ears, it affects there development. I had a couple bew and they used to have extreme panic type attacks at the noise of the hoover, werent bothered most of tbe rest of the time. One had a couple of tiny patches of grey as well.


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## Daniel (Jun 24, 2013)

Rat Daddy said:


> I'd love to have an all white rat with natural eyes


Yes, and there was an attempt by breeders to keep the BEW from developing its poor health issues that has failed. I agree that it would be very desirable to have whites with black eyes.


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## Rat Daddy (Sep 25, 2011)

As a shoulder rat trainer, I always have to consider what people will think when they see my rat for the first time. Snow white is good, no pink eyes is better. And shoulder rats need to see well so ruby isn't very good for the purpose. A natural colored black eyed white is a dream rat if it has the right personality.

But as most rat strains are pretty much fixed in their traits, I can see where one would try to start making a BEW from a high white. High whites have somewhat variable markings to start with. The day may come when a legit BEW exists, but I suspect it won't be anytime soon as the genes might not be available in the fancy.

I have a friend who is a world class fish breeder. He explored the jungles for fish long ago and even has two species named after himself. Over 20 years ago he found a single A. Riggenbachi with a gold splotch and he spent 20+ years trying to create a sold gold fish. With selective breeding he eventually got lots of very splotchy fish some of which were nearly perfect, but he never got them to breed true. He never released any to other breeders because they weren't perfect and had the only population of "Gold Riggenbachi in the world. A few years ago a solid gold Riggenbachi was found in the wilds of Africa. It did breed true. There was a gene for solid gold, that my friend just didn't have. It existed, but you couldn't get from splotches to solid. Sometimes we think we can make genes do what we want to, but in reality genetic mutations are very rare in nature. The solid gold Riggtenbachi may have been around for a million years, but the precise combination to bring it about only occurred in one if a few million fish so it may not have shown up for generations. Basically what we need is a bareback rat to turn up with a white head or some such similar morph that isn't descended from the high whites. Perhaps the safe UK high whites might throw a legit BEW one day, but as they are very likely descended from a pretty small gene pool, I have my doubts.

I might add that the US high whites are making a strong comeback... megacolon being forgotten it's time to breed badger blazed rats here again. With the demand for high whites being so great in the US, I really can't see why the UK variety hasn't made it over here yet. Maybe you folks from the UK can tell us, is there something tweaky about the new safe high whites that's keeping them from getting distributed?


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## Gannyaan (Dec 7, 2012)

It's my dream to own a BEW, but I don't like the idea of having to pay for vet bills.....sigh...


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## Isamurat (Jul 27, 2012)

As far as im aware (and I dont breed for them so not an expert) badger blazed rats over here are fine, ive not come across any real problems, but to be fair they arent common and so far the pet shop rat farms havent got hold of them which may be why people are keeping them close, knce that happens it can ruin a lot of good work.

No good for your bew theory but there are pleanty of blazed essex rats around, they do pop up in our lines regularly so I can say they definitly dont get megacolon or any specific health issues. I have a head spotted essex here who is wonderful. Hes very good for winning people over to rats as he is so pretty, then after he softens them they meet my 4 agoutis just tk show wild looking rats are no different. I love my agoutis


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## Rat Daddy (Sep 25, 2011)

People always asked me what kind of an animal Fuzzy Rat was. Yup... I introduced her as "Fuzzy Rat" and people assumed I have a strange sense of humor calling my what-ever-it-is a rat. So I'd tell them she's a trained "fancy rat" which is a friendly domestic animal that just happens to look a lot like a rat and hence the similar name. I actually had a smart-alec kid who followed me around once for about 15 minutes asking questions suspiciously.... Don't her whiskers look like a rat? Isn't her tail a lot like a rat? Does she eat the same foods as a rat? After a lengthy thought process he concluded that fancy rats were very much like rats and I finally broke down and admitted that fancy rats really are very much like real rats... 

The other day a woman jumped back and apologized, she said she was sorry for a moment she thought Max was a rat until she saw Max's white flanks. I told her the confusion was understandable. She skritched Max and got a couple little rattie kisses and I decided to let the whole rat thing go.

Other people recognize our rats as rats, especially when they see the tail, but as long as our girls don't look like rat rats, they seem to deal pretty well with them. I couldn't even imagine the trouble an agouti rat would bring upon itself.


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## Mouse (Aug 13, 2013)

I don't know, from when I talk to people about my rats, they always get a little bit calmer when I tell them tht they aren't PEWs. I think the pink eyes sort of scare people.


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## Rat Daddy (Sep 25, 2011)

If I were to make a list of what freaks people out about rats, I'd start with the name "rat" and then the tail. But red eyed anything puts people off. I suspect if you had a red or pink eyed cat or dog, it would disquiet people too. Fuzzy Rat was always pudgy and never looked rat-like except for the tail. People would always ask if she were a gerbil when she was small and a guinea pig when she got bigger. I actually have a friend that would refuse to call her a rat out of respect.


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## Minky (Apr 4, 2013)

Baby's eyes look black in the light, not brown or ruby. I didn't realize she was so rare, and rarer still for having good health and temperament.


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## Daniel (Jun 24, 2013)

Minky said:


> Baby's eyes look black in the light, not brown or ruby. I didn't realize she was so rare, and rarer still for having good health and temperament.


My understand is that BEWs are also often deaf, any sign of that?

Lovely rat btw. I'd like to get a BEW in the future despite their problems.


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## Rat Daddy (Sep 25, 2011)

You know if you count the number of folks on this forum who own healthy high whites, you would think there's no problem with them, if you read the articles about high whites you would assume they are all defective. Usually there's a disconnect between reality and perceived reality. I suspect that black eyed white rats are similar, there are good ones and ones with health issues. It comes down to the luck of the draw as to my knowledge there aren't any breeder lines currently available that have been extensively documented. Just like here in the US there appear to be few if any reputable breeders working with high whites, but they somehow continue to pop up in such significant numbers that someone is breeding them on purpose. So rather than one single high white morph, there are likely many making the rounds with some most likely far superior than others.


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## Minky (Apr 4, 2013)

She appears to hear just fine - she comes up to me when I say her name or make a fuss over her, which is always. She is exceptionally mellow and lovey-dovey, not a zippy energetic thing like her PetSmart friend. She will lay still while I pet her, or rest her front paws in my hand while I pet her. Her movements are slow and gentle, and her fur is so soft and white, it sparkles. 

She came from a hoarding situation - the guy was breeding rats for pets and feeders, along with a broad variety of other animal species, and his rat population got grotesquely out of hand. But I often wonder where the hoarder got his breeding stock, because all the rats from that house (well, at least the 3 that I took home) are quite special.


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## Phantom (Apr 4, 2012)

Rat Daddy said:


> You know if you count the number of folks on this forum who own healthy high whites, you would think there's no problem with them, if you read the articles about high whites you would assume they are all defective. Usually there's a disconnect between reality and perceived reality. I suspect that black eyed white rats are similar, there are good ones and ones with health issues. It comes down to the luck of the draw as to my knowledge there aren't any breeder lines currently available that have been extensively documented. Just like here in the US there appear to be few if any reputable breeders working with high whites, but they somehow continue to pop up in such significant numbers that someone is breeding them on purpose. So rather than one single high white morph, there are likely many making the rounds with some most likely far superior than others.


The breeder who I got Pastoolio from (who is a high white rat) actually had a male rat, who is Pastoolio's father, who would always produce really high white offspring regardless of the female. All the babies were always perfectly healthy and had no health problems. It was usually a mix of 25% high white babies to 75% normal marked babies.


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## Rat Daddy (Sep 25, 2011)

On the flip side, my high white was part of a litter of two rats dumped into a feeder bin at 3 weeks old, anyone wonder what happened to the rest of the litter? She's a nicely marked badger blaze high white and he brother was a lightning blaze dalmatian. 

I suspect that the genes are out there for low or lower risk high white or high whites might be successfully crossed to produce mixed litters, but I tend to think that most are coming from BYB's that see the cash opportunity and are going to strive for as many high whites as possible through homogeneous litters.

High white is the foundation for some of the most beautiful and unique rats. They are just a very dangerous game for breeders to play. One has to wonder how many UK high white litters went south before they got a morph that doesn't suffer from megacolon.


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