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[Joyce]

   OK here I go again on the COLOR thing!  Of all the colors to keep straight & identify I think the hardest for me have to be the beiges & tans.    I have a few chinchillas that are somewhere in these catagories but still don't know for sure exactly what they are.     Can someone please elaborate on what exactly the following colors as well as their sub categories look like?  And when you blow on the fur in the belly & back area what color fur down to the skin it should be to fit the following categories.  What color eyes can these colors have?  Bellies?  Paw pads?  Tails?
BEIGES and TANS, some of the sub categories are Pastel, Homo Beige, Hetero Beige, Light Tan, Dark Tan.....any I forgot.

I have a new female chin that is 6 months old.  I thought she was a beige but who knows!  Her belly is not very white and her tail is very very light.  Much lighter than her coat.  She could be a pastel (lt. tan)?  Her eyes really have a blue to them!

[chinclub]

OK, First we have beige.  Fur can be anywhere from light (almost pink colored) to a dark brown look.  Bellies are white.  Eyes are red.  Hetero Beige means the chinchilla only inherited 1 beige gene.  Homo means the chinchilla got two beige genes (one from mom and one from dad)  Homo Beige chinchillas are lighter beige and their eyes are very light red.  They have a blue ring in the eye when you look in direct light. 

A tan is a chinchilla that is beige and ebony.  The ebony gene will make the beige color wrap all around the body (which is why they are called wraps sometimes.)  I'm sure you are used to seeing all different shades of ebony that go from jet black all over to a standard colored chinchilla with a grey belly.  Tan chinchillas are no different.  They can come as very dark brown all over to a beige looking chinchilla with a creamy, off-white belly.

A pastel, in my understanding, is a homo beige chinchilla that is also carrying ebony.  So it will have the lighter fur and the light eyes just as you would expect from the Homo Beige but the underbelly fur will also be beige.  The problem with pastels is that the fur is already so light anyway it can be hard to tell sometimes if the belly fur is white or beige.

So Hetero Beige has no ebony parent.
Homo Beige must have 2 beige (or beige carrying, ie pink white brown velvet) parents and no ebony parent.

Tan must have an ebony parent

Pastel must have two beige carring parent and at least 1 ebony carrying parent.

[chinclub]

I should also mention that beige chinchillas can have a dirty belly just like a standard can so you can't call a chinchilla a tan just because the belly is not pure white.  Sometimes you just have to know the genetics or breed them to be sure.  A tan chinchilla will eventually produce ebony babies.  A beige can not.

[Stacy]

I don't see how you keep all that straight.

[Joyce]

  "WHEW", wow!!!!!  OK, I need to print that whole thing out and read it a few times to digest it all. 
THANKS SO MUCH Jamie!     I really appreciate your wonderful & very thorough reply.  We'll try to get some pictures of my little Mochi to post.  Sounds like she is a homo beige, because of the blue eyes!  But I could be totally off base!

[ChinchillAZ]

Tan must have an ebony parent.

I think you meant to say that a Tan must have an Ebony carrying parent in addition to a Beige carrying parent.  After all, a Standard to a Tan can throw a Tan kit.   

[Debbie.nl.ca]

Joyce I'm with you, the beiges and tans are hard to see.
I'm thinking now my little 9/11 beige/tan is a beige.
I had a homo born here once and he was so light with just the tips of his fur a golden brown.
The 9/11 kits has gone to a mousy hetero beige color with a lighter chest, but no barring can be seen YET!
I think he is a hetero beige now.
I've been looking and looking at so many pics and find they are all so different. Some could be lighting problems.
I think some of them have become so muted, and I have been guilty of causing some of it in my chins.
I should never have put a hetero beige and an ebony together, but they fell in love so I had no intros.
The kits are just not a good color.
To me to look at a hetero it looks just like a standard but beige.
Some have very definite barring while others seem a more solid color.
In the standards and the heteros should you have distinctive barring?
They talk about lights,med, and darks, so what's desired on the show table?
Do you see standards with distinctive barring, or are they more of a solid coloring?

[Jo Ann]

Keep in mind ... any time you put an ebony with any color, that the ebony influence will stay with that line and may pop out at any given time down the line.  Unless you want a wrap, do not put an ebony in the line.  Once you do put ebony into the line, make sure every kit born to that line is shown as a possible ebony carrier, even if it does not show. 
    When you breed your beiges to beiges, make sure they have white bellies, your beiges to standards with white bellies and your beiges to pink whites or white mosaics that do not have any ebony in the background.  White bellies meaning white fur all the way to the skin!
    If it is not a wrap and the belly is not white, adopt out as a "pet only", not as a breeder.  This is the only way we can get back to the true colors each mutation chin should be.  The more colors that are blended together, the more bland the color becomes, contaminating the lines. 
    We're constantly telling newbies to breed back to a good standard to keep the genetics strong.  We often fail to tell them to breed to a pure standard, or if you can not find a pure standard, breed it with a standard that has the same color in it's background, because that standard comming from a tan is also carrying beige and ebony in it's background, or the standard born to a white is also carrying the white and beige genes.
    Before we knew better, most of us messed up, so it is up to us to get it back to where it needs to be.  Breed for the truest colors, not the most colors you can get out of a pair.  Know your backgrounds on your chins, or do not breed them.
     Tans can show as a light beige (most call a pastel) to a dark tan, eyes can be dark red to almost black and do not have any white on the belly or around the iris of the eye.
     Beiges come in various shades and have pink to dark red eyes and should have white bellies.
     The homo beige carries two beige genes, is usually a creamy light beige fur and has what looks like a milky haze around the iris of the eyes.  At least, this is what I have been told over the years.

 
Jo Ann

[Debbie.nl.ca]

I can see clearly now the rain is gone...............   
Thanks so much Jo Ann.
Yes I want tans, but nice ones,true Clear colored tans.
I'm working on it and learning.
Thanks to you guys.