At the time of writing, I have been breeding Dutch mice for a little over a year and I have been fortunate to have enjoyed much success with them. I finished the showing year 2010/2011 with 17 points, 15 of which were gained with Dutch mice. I have come to love the specific challenges which arise from keeping this historic variety, and the mice themselves never fail to make me smile when I am pottering about in the stud.

Dutch were very rare in the fancy when I wanted to begin with them, and I must extend warm thanks to Keith Berry for my first breeding pair of Dutch and to Mick Shutt for kindly lending me an excellent buck for two weeks. I left Keith's pair together and put the only does I had available with Mick's buck. These were six big, fit dove self mice, the remnants of my line. I was concerned that the out-cross to my dove selfs would prove to be a failure, but also determined not to lose the variety now I had it.

One thing which I was concerned with initially, was that I didn't have enough space to succeed in breeding Dutch. Traditionally Dutch, and other marked varieties, have been bred in very large quantities. I keep a fairly small stud and I wondered if this would reduce my chances of breeding winners. I have had success whilst keeping only a dozen boxes of Dutch mice. Keeping so few had a rather pleasant side effect; my Dutch are calm and tractable due to regular handling.

As many of you know, when the mousework is done for the day I spend my time learning what I can about everything; husbandry, breeding, showing and, my favourite subject, coat colour/pattern genetics. When I began with this variety, I could find very little information pertaining to the genetics of the Dutch mouse. Some people speculated that it is simply the recessive spotting gene 's', as would make broken, while others say that it is caused by a separate marking gene (known as 'du' in rabbits), which is backed up by the fact that Dutch seems to breed true after a self out-cross. I spent many hours searching for information, and eventually came across some photographs of Dutch, broken and even marked mice from 1919. They were very similar, in fact I have seen Dutch mice which looked just like the 'broken' of the 1919! They were nothing like the superb brokens we see on the show bench now, with their good type and small, defined spots. These were patchy Dutch, at best; complete with poor size and cobby type. It seems that the recessive spotted mouse naturally has a saddle or rump patch, spots on the middle of the body and a coloured head with a white blaze, and these were selectively bred into either Dutch or broken. I have since experimented and can confirm that Dutch and broken are genetically the same.

So anyway, my first litters had arrived and I will never forget the excitement of impatiently waiting for those first markings to come through. I found myself with two fairly good chocolate Dutch bucks from Keith's pair, some average looking does, and about 25 black selfs carrying Dutch from the dove self out-cross. All were healthy, and I was on my way. By this time, Mick had given me a lightly marked Dutch buck which complemented the heavy markings on my existing Dutch perfectly. I bred this buck to a Dutch doe from Keith's pair and from this pairing my first section winner was produced, at Manchester on 2nd April 2011, and this mouse went on to win best marked again at Swindon three weeks later. Around this time my self out-cross Dutch were into the second generation, and had produced some good markings - but more than that these mice were larger, more typey and more attractive than the pure-bred Dutch. One doe from these litters went on to win best marked and BOA marked. The third generation produced a young buck which went on to win not only best marked but also BOA in show at Bromyard Gala, my best result yet.

I have learned that with marked mice, winners are produced due to 80% dumb luck and 20% common sense. I was lucky enough to produce three winning mice within six months, and all of these were bred from mice with very average markings. I have learned the breeder can influence the type, size and fitness, and this must never be neglected for markings. Breeders must not be afraid to take a step backwards for a couple of generations in order to improve their mice. The photograph below shows a 'pure-bred' chocolate Dutch mouse and a black Dutch mouse from the first generation of my self out-cross. Both are fully grown adults, but the black is the son and grandson of the chocolate. The improvements to type I have made are clearly visible in the length and strength of the body, the size of the head, the wider ear set and width of the muzzle:

I will be breeding my Dutch mice for a long time to come. This variety has become closest to my heart. I hope I am lucky enough to produce more winners this year! I also hope that people will consider taking up this historic variety which is, after all, the mascot of the National Mouse Club.