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In this Discussion
- bluchrystals September 2019
- kgstable September 2019
- LCorona001 September 2019
- MasterStablesMS September 2019
- Taliesin September 2019
- Wolvevenfrost September 2019
Who's Online (3)
- Ammit 3:12AM
- annismyrph 3:12AM
- GoldenSpur 3:12AM
Snowflake
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What are the genetics behind it?
Can you get it from creates?
Best way to start trying to breed for them, in drafts specifically?Licensed for Onyx, Watercolor, Plaid, Mushroom, Splash M, Phantom Autumn, Ice 4, Ice 16, and Chinchilla - ID: 256300 -
The only create that has snowflake as of now is The Accomplishments of Like-Minded People (and for the life of me i can't remember when it was, but it's only a special event herd helper)
The genetics for snowflake specifically I'm pretty sure are hidden but I think the horse has to have a copy of lp (appaloosa) to show the snowflake. Someone better at breeding snowflake would have to verify
The best way to start breeding it is to maybe buy it when it comes on the Roving Gene Sale or maybe find some studs and brood mares to breed to. Or of course buying snowflake horses directly from the sales
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Actually random creates can have it too. I know of two very lucky creates that have been homozygous snowflake and had the lp gene to show it. Normally you have to have a homozygous stud/mare to test the creates against to see if they share the gene.
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So it’s recessive. Anything from a homozygous parent will carry it but it needs two copies of the gene to express. Correct?Licensed for Onyx, Watercolor, Plaid, Mushroom, Splash M, Phantom Autumn, Ice 4, Ice 16, and Chinchilla - ID: 256300
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To sum it all up for you as best as I can...
Snowflake needs 2 copies AND 1 copy of the appy gene (Lp) to show.
It Will Not Show without ALL those requirements.
Snowflake can be created although it's rare (it's even more rare when they show it [Hom]). Mostly because in order to find out if said horse has the gene it needs to be tested by breeding them to a Hom Snowflake Appaloosa mare/stud.
When breeding Snowflakes together who don't show their Snowflake because they miss 1 gene you risk the chance of getting one who doesn't show it. Never just get rid of them unless theres something about them that don't meet your requirements (minus the fact that they don't look to be Snowflake). You never know unless you breed them to a Hom Snowflake (except if both parents were Hom the you know they are). If you don't have a Hom Snowflake but you do have a Het, try breeding them for 5 or more seasons just to give them a good chance. If you don't want to or don't have one just ask here! I'm 100% positive that there will be someone to help you get what you need.
If you need examples I have a lot of Hom, Hom that don't show, Het, maybe Het, ones who aren't Snowflake in my barns.Post edited by Wolvevenfrost at 2019-09-12 04:02:21 -
Alright, here's an info dump for you! Hopefully this makes sense. Feel free to ask more questions, especially if it doesn't!
The genetics behind it:
Snowflake is a hidden gene, which means it doesn't show up in the genetics test (KP, DP, and GP are other hidden genes). It is recessive, so a horse has to be homozygous to be a snowflake, and a horse can carry it and not show any sign of it. Since it modifies appaloosa, a horse has to be appaloosa for snowflake to show at all, so it needs an lp as well to express. A horse can be homozygous snowflake, and if they don't have the appaloosa gene they'd look just like a normal solid colored horse.
Can you get it in creates?:
Yes! It shows up randomly in creates. It's pretty uncommon, but not super rare. I think it pops up randomly about as frequently as DP, if that helps. Usually you don't know it's there until the horse throws a surprise snowflake foal or you go to GMT snowflake on with the Roving Gene Sale and see that they already have one! The only two confirmed 'natural' homozygous snows I've ever heard of are the two blu mentioned. It definitely could have happened in horses that aren't appaloosa and therefore didn't show it and nobody knew though.
As far as Herd Helpers, only one makes snowflake, and it will never happen again: The Accomplishments of Like Minded People. It was this year's celebratory anniversary HH, so it showed up on H&J's birthday and that's it. So currently there are no HHs you can get that make snows. You could try to get your hands on a TAOLMP, though. They're also het tiger eye, which is fun.
Best way to go about breeding for it:
The best way ultimately depends on how much money (real and hbs) you want to spend on founding your line, and how you want to play the game. There's no right way, lol. Bone weight doesn't affect snowflake, so the advice for any type horse applies to drafts equally.
The easiest and most efficient (and most expensive) way is this-
-GMT a snowflake stud and mare (or a few mares) to be ideal for your line- hom snow, the right height and bone weight, and with all the other genes you want in the line as well. Hom lp is super useful too, and cuts down on the number of horses later in the line that are snows but don't show it because they aren't appies. Remember though that hom appies tend to have more white on them and bigger blankets, which means less room for snowflakes, and don't tend to have leopard spots. If you like big blankets along with your snows this works out nicely, and if not it is possible to get hom lp's with almost no blanket. I'd get all that worked out before I start paying real money to put snow on horses though.
-Get several non-snow appaloosa mares with everything else you want in the line (again, hom lp helps. As does lucky het snow creates, if you can find them for sale or are lucking enough to create them yourself.)
-Pull eggs from the hom snow mare(s) and use straws from your hom stud to make as many gen 2 hom snow babies as you can (You can also just breed them w/o pulling eggs, of course, but that's less chances at the right babies. You could get pasture bonuses that way though)
-Breed the stud to the non-snow mares and get as many het snow fillies as you can
-And in the second gen breed your nicest hom snow colt to all your fillies. All will be at least het snow, since the sire is hom, and those with hom dams will all be hom whereas those with het dams will have a fifty-fifty chance of being hom.
Yes, they will be half siblings if you only have 1 stud, but inbreeding doesn't do anything in the game. Some prefer to avoid it, and then you would need multiple studs (or to buy straws from somebody else)
This method is the fastest, but is also pretty expensive with all the lab breeding, and requires real money.
Snow doesn't show up in the GMT lab, so to do this you need to buy it with real money in the RGS. It's $7.50 a copy, so a hom snow foundation is 15 bucks real money. Adding an lp as necessary/desired is 2 GMTs, so that's 500,000 hbs or $10 real money. You won't often find people willing to sell their snow foundies, and you'd be ridiculously lucky to find one for sale that fit all your other wants for your line, so you about have to make them yourself.
Also, adding an lp to a lined horse that missed it is 1 GMT, so $5 or 250,000 hbs. Since snow isn't in the GMT lab, you can't add it on to a lined horse that missed it at all.
If you want to start your line with less real money spent and can be patient, there's this method-
-GMT a snow stud that's exactly what you want in your line
-Gather up non-snow mares that fit your line as well as possible, as in step two above.
-Breed your stud to all those mares and get as many het snow babies as you can
-In the second gen, breed the best colt to all the fillies. Half the resulting gen 3 foals will be het snow, a quarter will have no snow at all, and a quarter will be the hom snow you want.
-In the third gen, breed your best hom snow colt to the mares. The challenge here is that you can't tell which are het snow and which have no snow at all, so you end up test breeding the gen 3 mares to your best gen 3 hom snow colt to figure out which are carriers and which aren't.
This method is a lot slower, but this game is all about patience and playing the long game, so if you can be patient it's really rewarding to get those gen 3s and 4s that are exactly what you've been working for! It will be a minimum of four months before you start getting snow babies, probably longer.
If you don't want to spend any real money, then you can hunt down gen 2+ horses for sale. Finding a het snow gen 2 colt is pretty easy because we've usually all got them in excess, but finding hom colts for sale is harder, and finding mares is really difficult. It can be done though! You wouldn't have foundations to start your line from the ground up exactly how you want it, but you could absolutely start in gen 2.
Buying straws and eggs from other people can help immensely too. If you can get a hom snow gen 2 colt by buying an egg, that would let you speed it up without GMTing your own mare. And if you get those non-snow appy mares that fit your line I was talking about before and use straws from the best stud for your line that you can find and buy straws from, that basically puts you into method 2 up there ^.
It's more time and difficulty to get exactly the line you want using these methods, since you didn't design exactly the perfect foundations, but working for your ideal is kind of the point of the game, and this can be challenging in a fun way!
Mixing generations can make all this easier, if you don't care about evenness, but usually less of your foals pass BA/SBA, and it decreases the value of any you try to sell by quite a bit.
Spiderweb Stables
ID Number: 238452
He/Him pronouns -
Great explanations everyone!
Just chiming in here about the breeding part:
You can also always start breeding homozygous foundation appy mares to public homozygous snowflake foundation studs (bonus if they are homo LP too!). That way you'll end up with 2nd gen het Snowflake het LP horses, and from there on you can cross them and hopefully get some hom snowflakes in your third generation.
If you get het snowflake hom LP 2gens and cross them, the odds are even higher to get a homo snowflake showing: 50%!
That way you can start experimenting with it without having to GMT/RGS a stud of your own.
And who knows, maybe one of those foundation mares might carry snowflake! I've had a few surprises like that myself, so you only know it if you try!
Anyway, I'll send you some straws at cost from some of my snowflake foundations, that way you can expirment with it a bit! :)
(I've also sent you some straws from my 2gen homo SF het LP stud for the future)HJ1 160524
HJ2 136 -
@Master StablesMS the odds of a horse with two het snow parents being hom snow is 25% regardless of which lp genes they have. However, if one or both parents are hom lp then the snow will definitely show if it does happen!Spiderweb Stables
ID Number: 238452
He/Him pronounsThanked by 1MasterStablesMS -
Sometimes I really wish that whoever came up with the words 'homozygous' and 'heterozygous' had chosen words that don't sound and look quite so similar to each other! I tend to read too fast and then have to blink, back up, reread slowly...Spiderweb Stables
ID Number: 238452
He/Him pronouns