Raising our New Zealand Meat Rabbits *Start to finish - Birth to processing* Possible Graphic pics*

[Beekissed]

Wow. One part of me wishes I had all that knowledge packed into my head and another part of me is telling me it would probably hurt.

I can't even absorb any little bit of it without feeling a strain. Thank goodness God has designed some people to be smart and some to be...well...like me...just average or not so smart. Thank you for the detailed information but I can't make heads nor tails of it with my brain capacity.

So...to the original question: What do you get when you cross a WNZ with a solid color or broken color NZ? Say red x white or black x white...what comes out?

 

[ChocolateMouse]

So... What I said was totally accurate except for the bit where I said I wasn't sure about my info. 9_9 Also, your info on the genetic colors of rabbits... Conveniently is exactly the same exact things used in dog coat genetics and so if I'd fallen back on my dog coat genetic knowledge to extrapolate I would have had the correct answer as opposed to the things I've heard from rabbit breeders. Ironic, considering you scolded me for using dog genetic info when I was using rabbit info.

I think the reason people say breeding in a NZW will cause white hairs is because stray white hairs can be EVERYWHERE on a NZW and never cause a problem, so nobody has weeded them out from the NZWs.

And so basically you are quibbling over semantics, just as you said (although, I WAS wrong about the allele that the albino trait shows up on because a rabbit breeder told me it was E once... Again, if I'd fallen back on dog genetics I would have been fine, but I didn't since you'd snapped at me for that in the past). I'm not writing a book here nor am I trying to. I don't think most of that info has any relevance to the average rabbit breeder. The thing that's relevant is that breeding two colored lines together can bring bad traits into the line from a color standpoint but really have no bearing on the actual rabbit, especially if you're trying to breed mostly whites, and even so it can be bred out by just breeding out a few generations.

Bee, broken is pretty simple. A rabbit is broken (one broken gene, one not), Charlie (two broken genes, typically expressed by lots of white) or not broken (no broken genes, no spots). So if a rabbit has broken spots it always caries broken, and will make spotted babies. The color of the spots are whatever the rest of the genes say.

So in laymens terms, a broken rabbit will pretty much always produce some broken kits, and whatever color they would otherwise be if they were solid shows up as the color of the spots. That can be anything, even albino (REW) so a white rabbit can be broken and you'd never know because it's white on white.

 

[Bunnylady]

Wow. One part of me wishes I had all that knowledge packed into my head and another part of me is telling me it would probably hurt.

I can't even absorb any little bit of it without feeling a strain. Thank goodness God has designed some people to be smart and some to be...well...like me...just average or not so smart. Thank you for the detailed information but I can't make heads nor tails of it with my brain capacity.

So...to the original question: What do you get when you cross a WNZ with a solid color or broken color NZ? Say red x white or black x white...what comes out?

The simple answer is Chestnut and/or Steel. However, if the NZW has Steel genes (and a lot of them do) you could get solid black, even if the cross is Red x White. Of course, if the NZW is hiding broken, you might see broken babies; if the "other" rabbit has a REW gene, you could get white babies. If the NZW has the non-extension genes (ee), you could get red babies from a red x white cross.

 

[Beekissed]

So the answer is "It depends."

We bred red to white and got brown each time, so I just figured that was what you get when you breed the two, but it was merely my individual rabbit's genetics and I could have easily got any number of colors or patterns from that pairing. The real answer is that it's a grab bag and you won't know until you try!

 

[ChocolateMouse]

Bee, I have heard from several NZR breeders who threw in other colors for funsies that they got a muddy mix as well, so it's not unreasonable for you to think that.

 

[Bunnylady]

So the answer is "It depends."

We bred red to white and got brown each time, so I just figured that was what you get when you breed the two, but it was merely my individual rabbit's genetics and I could have easily got any number of colors or patterns from that pairing. The real answer is that it's a grab bag and you won't know until you try!

Yes, that wild-type brownish color is a Chestnut (sometimes called a Chestnut Agouti, or if you are British, simply "Agouti"). It was what I expected when I bred a NZW doe to a Harlequin buck; when all of the babies turned out solid black, it really had me scratching my head!

 

[ChocolateMouse]

As it turns out my "black" kits from my muttXNZW litter have a brown patch behind their head that is agouti (black, brown tips), so I am thinking I will be seein more gold tipped steels once they develop their coats fully. Kind of disappointing if that's the case. It will mean both my NZWs probably just carry black and steel.

 

[guineagirl23]

So it depends entirely on what your NZWs carry and your colored does carry. Some colors of rabbits can carry the "e" gene for albino, which is recessive, but expresses the dominant "E" gene so it's like this;

EE Not albino
Ee Not albino
ee Albino

I have my Otter rex rabbit that when bred to a NZW produces albino kits that means she's a carrier of the little "e" gene. My buck for those breedings carries steel. So if I breed my NZW buck to a solid rabbit I get steel rabbits sometimes. Some white rabbits hide other patterns too, like broken.

As far as I'm aware, mixing NZ rabbit colors produces just that, a mixed color. A white bred to a red will produce a lighter red with a few white hairs scattered in... Plus whatever pattern your white carries. A red to a black will produce a dark, messy brown color. Not sure about black to white but I imagine it's similar to whiteXred.

Technically these are mutts now... But rabbit breeding is funny... Basically you can ruin your color lines that way by having a recessive gene like the "e" gene hiding in their code, making disqualifying white hairs pop up in otherwise solid colored rabbits... However, any rabbit that has three generations of parentage (parents, GP, GGP) all saying "this breed, this color, the right weight" and they're all the same color (for NZ and other rabbits that are picky genetically), breed and meet the adult weight for that breed.... They are a "pure" rabbit... Regardless of what was in the parentage from generations 4+.... Which for albinos is really easy to get them all back to the same color again!

I like keeping colored rabbits because if you're going to have a farm... Why not make it beautiful!? People know that they're cross breeds and buy them anyhow. The outcrossing I do always has a purpose (my mix breed is huge 13lbs, my rex produces giant litters, etc) so it's never willy-nilly and it always adds something positive to the genetics even if it creates a mutt. And having a GOOD rabbit means more to most people than having a "pure" rabbit. If you want some color, I suggest seeking out a really high quality doe, stick it into your herd and see what happens!

I hate to correct, but e is the extension gene, not color depth. The c series deals with color.
C is full color, such as castor, otter or black.
cchd is for color except for the middle bands such as ermine chin ect.
cchl is shaded in extremities and it's colors such a sable.
ch is pointed such as Himalaya or Californian
c is albino/no color

E series
E allele: Determines Extension of middle band color.
The dominant allele allows normal banding of agouti fur and the recessive allele allows only the middle band color to be expressed.
The alleles (in order of dominance)
E: normal extension ex.) castor, black, black otter
Can show up in genotype as EE, Eej, or Ee
ej: random extension ex) harlequin, magpie, tricolor
Can show up in genotype as ejej, or eje
e: non-extension ex.) red, tort, fawn, ermine
Can show up in genotype as ee only

So depending on what your white is, it can produce different things. Think of the white as a blanket that covers any other color up. They can be agouti, (AA, A(at), or Aa) tan, at(at) or at(a) or they can be self such as black blur or chocolate (aa only)
If your REW is agouti genetically, and hides another agouti gene, the litter will all be agouti when bred to a colored unless the colored carried c gene. If it hides self and is bred to self, 1/4 would be agouti 3/4 would be self. So it all depends on what the REW is hiding under that white blanket of theirs

 

[guineagirl23]

Oops I apologize. Didn't read down enough to see it was corrected I can simple it down. For the question what would it produce, it really does depend.

Say the REW is genetically brown (agouti) which is of course dominant, and she is bred to a black buck. If she hides the gene for black, most babies will be black and some brown. If she doesn't hide black and just has another brown gene, all babies will be brown unless the black carries the REW gene; then some will be brown and some REW.

The same rule applies for a broken. The REW can genetically be a broken, so when bred to a solid can produce 1/2 solid 1/2 broken. If the REW is solid there is no chance of broken unless bred to a broken that is colored. If two broken are bred 1/4 will be charlie, 2/4 will be broken, and 1/4 will be solid hope that helps!

 

[Bunnylady]

Oops I apologize. Didn't read down enough to see it was corrected

I can simple it down. For the question what would it produce, it really does depend.

Say the REW is genetically brown (agouti) which is of course dominant, and she is bred to a black buck. If she hides the gene for black, most babies will be black and some brown. If she doesn't hide black and just has another brown gene, all babies will be brown unless the black carries the REW gene; then some will be brown and some REW.

The same rule applies for a broken. The REW can genetically be a broken, so when bred to a solid can produce 1/2 solid 1/2 broken. If the REW is solid there is no chance of broken unless bred to a broken that is colored. If two broken are bred 1/4 will be charlie, 2/4 will be broken, and 1/4 will be solid

hope that helps!

By "brown," I am assuming you mean Chestnut?

You seem to be overlooking the Steel gene (Es). Steel is the most dominant allele in the E series, even more dominant than the normal extension allele. Steel is really weird; when it is paired with the normal extension allele (E), the rabbit is a visual Steel. When paired with any other allele in the E series, the rabbit looks like a black self. This is what was so puzzling when I bred the NZW doe to the Harlequin buck. The buck was a pedigreed Harlie; I knew that he didn't carry a self gene. So, how could not just some, but every single one of the 20 or so babies that I got from the pair wind up being black selfs? Answer: the Steel gene. Steel paired with Harlequin (Esej) looks like a black self, even if the animal is a homozygous Agouti (AA). (note: I have seen animals that I knew couldn't be EsE that were visual Steels, so that part may not be set in stone). Two copies of Steel (EsEs) makes a black rabbit, too. I suspect, but haven't confirmed, that the black New Zealands don't carry self (aa); they carry Steel (I don't know anybody who breeds the NZ blacks, and have never actually seen one in the flesh). From my own experience and that of a number of others, I can confirm that a lot of NZW's carry Steel. There aren't a lot of rabbit breeds that work with Steel; it seems to me that the most likely place for a bunch of pedigreed NZW's to have acquired the Steel gene would be the black NZ's.