This article is from the WSSF 2015 AFRMA Rat & Mouse Tales news-magazine.

By Karen Robbins

Jozzette Hagemann, Jozzy’s Rat Pack Rattery, CA, e-mail
Q I am enclosing pictures of that rat doe that I told you about. This is the rat I will breed Flash Gordon, my Powder Blue, to in September. I was wondering what color you would say this is, Pink-Eyed Blue (Silver)? She does have fur about the same color as Flash’s was when I got him. Her parents were a PEW Satin and a Blue. I was told she is a Silver Satin.

A I would have to see her in person to tell for sure. Looking at the photos here on two different monitors, in one of the photos she has a creamy look—don’t know if that is from the lighting, two of the pics do look like Silver, and the last one is kind of grayish-white. She looks too gray to be Champagne, too warm to be Silver in some of the photos, and a plain gray rat is Platinum but she has pink eyes. Her coat looks curly, not Satin, but the whiskers look too straight to be Rex.

Update: Saw the rat in person and she looks like Platinum—just gray, though a little bit brown, with pink eyes, so a P.E. Platinum (Ashen). This rat also had a Bristle Coat and went on to make more Bristles as well as P.E. Platinum. This is why we don’t recommend getting your rats ID’d through photos as there is too much chance for an improper ID. Getting a hands-on ID is most accurate.

Update: Pink-Eyed Platinum was accepted into the Unstandardized process October 26, 2013. It was standardized March 7, 2015. The final standard reads: Pink-Eyed Platinum - Color to be an off-white with a grayish cast, not too light (medium shade), not to be confused with Silver, Beige, or Champagne. Eye color is red. Genetics: recessive

The Bristle Coat was standardized December 6, 2014. They have a curly coat as babies similar to Rex but it becomes a messy, very harsh stand-off coat as adults with whiskers that are straight to curled on the ends. As babies, the whiskers are the way to tell a Bristle Coat from a Rex or Satin.

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