Rabbit Babies!!!! genotypes MilleAM

[tamberchick]

Rabbits have a better chance of survival if their weaned at 8 weeks of age, just like any dog or cat. Do you offer hay as well? Rabbits need 24/7 hay to keep a healthy digestive system.

Those are some cute bunnies!

 

[MilleAM]

Rabbits have a better chance of survival if their weaned at 8 weeks of age, just like any dog or cat. Do you offer hay as well? Rabbits need 24/7 hay to keep a healthy digestive system.

Those are some cute bunnies!

I just took each out for pictures. I plan on keeping them in for 6-8 weeks at this point. The adult rabbits have a pellet diet along with natural greens we grow in the garden. Would that be enough? Some of the babies have already taken interest in the greens and pellets.

Thanks

 

[tamberchick]

Hay is a necessity. It's keeps them healthy, and helps to prevent GI stasis, which can kill rabbits within hours.

 

[MilleAM]

Here is an update on our first litter of rabbits. We had 5 boys and 2 girls in the litter. Here is some pics of them at 8 weeks. We also have Carrot Cake's 1 and a half week old litter at the very bottom but they are all jet black except for 1 of the offspring.

 

[MilleAM]

I have had a litter with carrot cake that are now 3 weeks old. I had 5 consisting of 3 blacks and 2 chestnuts. Does that show any other genotypes of Clyde?

This is what you started with:

Lil' Miss - A_B_C_D_ee; it's hard to say what she may be doing as far as wide-band and rufus modifiers (the wide band gene is what allows the red/orange color to appear on the belly, and rufus is what ramps up the amount of the yellow/red pigment to create that deep red color)

Clyde   - ____cc____

Carrot Cake - aaB_C_D_ee

So far, what I'm seeing in the nest box all look like Chestnuts; the baby on its back might be a wide-band chestnut, but I can't be sure. So at this point, the only thing that the kits are showing that you know they didn't get from their mother is a normal extension gene. So at this point, you know that Clyde must be ____cc__E_; not a lot, but it's something.

 

[Bunnylady]

Yes, actually, it does. Carrot Cake has only self genes (a) in the A series. If she and Clyde have Chestnut babies, the Agouti gene (A) had to come from him, so we now know that Clyde is A___cc__E_

The Black babies are telling us something, too, though it's not absolutely clear what. The most likely way for a rabbit to be black is two copies of the self gene (aa). We know they got one copy of self from their mother; if this is why they are black, it means that Clyde has a self gene, too - which means he's Aa in the A series.

However! There is another way for a rabbit to be solid black, and that involves the Steel gene (Es). Steel is a kinda weird gene. You can only see it on Agouti patterned animals, and how it looks depends on what other member of the E series it is paired with. Two copies of Steel (EsEs) is solid black, just like a black self. One copy of steel, and one of normal extension (EsE) looks like a very dark chestnut - even the belly and bottom of the tail are black. One copy of steel, and one of either non-extension or harlequin (Ese or Esej) can be solid black, or it can be more or less a black rabbit with gold or silver ticking (almost like the silvering on a Silver Fox, but not quite). If Clyde does have Steel, I'd think that he'd have had at least one Steel baby with Lil' Miss, but the numbers are low enough, the fact that it didn't happen isn't conclusive.

Normally, I'd go with self (aa) as the reason that these babies are black, but we are talking about New Zealands here. Steel seems to be pretty common in New Zealands, so any time there's a NZW in the mix, I feel like I can't rule Steel out. So Clyde is either Aa__cc__E_, or A___cc__EsE.