blonde and grey bodied guppies

Can anyone tell me the difference between blonde and grey bodied guppies? I'm not sure I can tell the difference visually but I see it referenced in a lot of genetic literature.

blondes usually have a lighter sort of yellowish skin. the blonde gene causes black pigment to be hidden or not expressed. sometimes in half blacks with the blonde gene you will see light shadowing of the skin where the black should be, for some reason the pigment is being partially expressed in spite of the blonde masking effect.
A grey bodied fish usually has a bluish or greyish/silver cast to it. when you see the photos of each side by side it is more evident.
Sometimes blonde can be hidden (it is recessive) and will not produce blonde offspring unless mated with another blonde-gene carrying fish.
Grey skin is the "normal" color for a guppy to have in nature.
i'll try to find some photo links to post to use as examples.

this is a red blonde female guppy. note she has black eyes but her skin is yellowish and transparent to a degree. this is because all normal black pigment is blocked from being expressed by the blonde gene.

https://www.youtube.com/user/xguppyxfreakx

this is a red blonde cobra snakeskin male. note how the blonde gene has masked all his black stripes and turned them into blank/negative spaces?
pretty cool! http://www.all-aquarium.com/prod-Guppy_Male_blond_cobra_Unite-2-9-123-595.html

http://www.ebay.com/itm/Live-Grey-Full-Red-Moscow-HTD-Fancy-Guppies-2-young-Pair-ATFG-Line-/230917987426?nma=true&si=RM3616OGj7W7NxBjk2rcmlh%252Fe1A%253D&orig_cvip=true&rt=nc&_trksid=p2047675.l2557

hope that shows up... it is an old ebay listing i found using google. it shows a good example of grey bodied red moscows... i'll try to post another link just in case this one doesn't work.

http://swordtailguppies.blogspot.com/

you may have to scroll down the page a bit to find the image of 2 female swordtail guppies head to tail. the picture clearly shows the grey bodied type. usually the bodies look greyish and often have dark edged scales over most of the body. now to find a grey bodied male... look on the same blog, there may be several examples there... this looks like a nice site, i'd never seen it before but i'm gonna put it in favorites and go back for another look!

in exploring the above blog i discovered many clearly labeled images explaining in detail some of the colors and some articles on breeding which are quite detailed. a good site which i will enjoy digging into. didn't somebody here just get some swords? the swords on this blog are awesome!

Thanks for the info, that was helpful. Yes I've been to that blog and I bought blonde vienna lower swords from him. They came in this week, almost lost them due to the cold. They were floating upside down in the bag but they pulled thru. Very large and beautiful. Now I'm wishing I bought the green vienna swords too! Alan also sent me the link to his spot on guppy genetics on the under the sea radio show. I posted it earlier somewhere on this forum.

In looking at those pictures it looks to me like the grey our blonde is seen between the scales. Is this correct?

yes, that would make sense, though i never thought of it like that. In grey skinned fish the scale shows the black pigment more than the blondes (little if any) but other colors are still allowed to show. Look at pictures of red blonde males as opposed to the grey skinned ones... You can see through some scales more easily than others. then there are iridophores and all the other factors in the skin/scales. I do know the color is laid down in layers and that some colors come in before others as the young fish develop. some of this depends on the strain, sometimes it seems to be true of all guppies. much research has to be done to understand how color works in guppies. Did you ever see a frightened guppy minutes after he was putting on a display for courtship? it can look like 2 different fish... not just body language but actual percievable color differences. fascinating!

Gina, i'm jealous, this guy's swords are awesome. LOL re wishing you had ordered others with them... you can always re order, right? In a few months it will be interesting to take a poll of all the varieties of guppies we as a group are breeding. can't wait to see what is produced!