I was told that visible traits don't pass but carried traits do but When I test breed none of the carried traits from a parent show up.

who on earth told you that? And WHY would they do it


Sylestia trait genetics work on punnett square basis;
each parent has two letters per trait slot (eg, NA, AB, CC) with the first letter being the 'visible' slot (if N, no vis) and the second being the carried (if preceded by N) or hidden (if by any other letter) (or nothing, if it's also N).
A pet needs to be genetested to reveal what is in the second letter slots- without being genetested their info will just show two of whatever the first slot shows, regardless of the actual genetics

Trait dominance is N (nothing) > A > B > C > etc.down the alphabet, with the more dominant trait of the two letters always preceding the less dominant

When bred, each parent passes down one of the two letters from each slot at random at a 50/50 ratio.

so:
Parent 1 is G1 AC
Parent 2 is G1 NB
offspring could be any of NA, NC, AB, BC at a 25% ratio (50% being no-vis, 25% showing A, 25% showing B)

A parent with NN bred to a parent with AA will always make an NA offpsring
an AG with a BH = AB, AH, BG, or GH

etc

I know traits can be hard to get a grasp on when you first join, it was the same for me ^^

Assuming you are breeding two pets with the same trait in the same slot:
Visible traits always get passed down to offspring as at least a carried trait.
If both parents have a visible trait in the same slot, the baby will also have a visible trait there.
If one parent has a visible trait, and the other a carried trait, the baby has a chance to be either carried or visible.
If one parent has visible and one parent has nothing, the baby will have a carried trait.
If both parents have a carried trait in the same spot, the baby can have nothing, visible, or carried.
You cannot see carried traits.

There is a difference between hidden and visible:
Hidden traits simply mean there is a visible trait, but there is also a carried, per say, in the same spot together. This happens when you breed two pets that have different visibles in the same trait spot. (Or a different visible and carried, or two hiddens, etc) You will see the visible trait, but there is a chance when you breed that the hidden part (the part like a carried) will pass down instead of the dominant visible trait.

Scath is 100% accurate, and it's great to know this for any breeding you'll do. It's just difficult to get the hang of it so I was hoping a simple explanation might help you understand the basics better, or at least help you understand what Scath means if you don't already <3

Thank you this helps explain better