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paul2641

paul2641

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limerick , , Ireland
Hi I want to produce lionheads that have the same pattern as suki my beautiful doe!

she is Like thisall her markings are on her back witch you can't see but I will get some more pictures of her later.

suki to get babies like this?
 
Breeding a buttfly with 'perfect' markings is VERY hard to do. You can see that I have them, and they are all not marked ideally, with the possible exception of Moon. They do have a very good genetic history as well. Given you don't know Suki's, you have no idea what her relatives look like, so that could make the outcomes even more diverse. To be honest, it's a bit like a lottery, with minimal guarantees, but obviously, the more perfect the markings of the parents, the better the chance of perfect markings in the kit (generally).
 
I'm trying to get the broken gene integrated into my Satin Angora lines too. From what I've gathered so far the broken pattern is expressed via modifiers which can be inherited without necessarily inheriting the broken gene as well.(at least this is the theory)

For example, even my beautifully marked buck threw mismarks when I tried to integrate his broken gene into a line of SA that had no broken ancestry. However when I bred him to a solid who came from the same breeder she produced perfectly marked babies. So in order to get the right markings, you'll need to do some line/in breeding to accumulate the right modifiers. Or you'll need to invest in some solids brood stock who have brokens in their ancestry.

The breeder who has the COD for broken Satin Angoras told me your best bet for getting the right pattern is to make a charlie and continually select for the coat you want through charlie/solid pairings.
 
clevername wrote:
I'm trying to get the broken gene integrated into my Satin Angora lines too. From what I've gathered so far the broken pattern is expressed via modifiers which can be inherited without necessarily inheriting the broken gene as well.(at least this is the theory)

For example, even my beautifully marked buck threw mismarks when I tried to integrate his broken gene into a line of SA that had no broken ancestry. However when I bred him to a solid who came from the same breeder she produced perfectly marked babies. So in order to get the right markings, you'll need to do some line/in breeding to accumulate the right modifiers. Or you'll need to invest in some solids brood stock who have brokens in their ancestry.

The breeder who has the COD for broken Satin Angoras told me your best bet for getting the right pattern is to make a charlie and continually select for the coat you want through charlie/solid pairings.
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Presumably, for an incredibly novice breeder, it would be worth working with a mentor when it comes to working out the breedings you should do? To avoid too much inbreeding and problems like that?
 
Flashy wrote:
Presumably, for an incredibly novice breeder, it would be worth working with a mentor when it comes to working out the breedings you should do? To avoid too much inbreeding and problems like that?
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Totally, if you can find one. I forgot Paul was from Ireland where people don't keep pedigrees or show that often...this would make things a bit hard.

Paul2641, any chance you breeders over there plan on changing this? I honestly can't imagine how you could keep a good breeding program without keeping track of your animal's ancestry.

Anyway, anytime you line/in breed you need to be aware of what you're passing on. You'll need to be fairly picky about who you keep for breeding because if they have any serious faults the are much more likely to passed on to future generations.
 
I doubt Paul would find many people to mentor him if any, no one keeps big rabbitrys like they do in the states or the UK, people usually just have a handful of rabbits that they would breed every so often, and I doubt many people would be willing to mentor a person unless they knew them, plus, most of the breeders here haven't got a clue and you wouldn't want them mentoring you.
 
I think there are other ways to find someone to mentor you. For example, if you could find a decent breeder over the internet they could potentially mentor you and that would be far better than thinking you knew enough to go alone and stuffing up the breedings and rabbits that you did create.

No, that's not exactly how it works Paul. She will need to be bred to another butterfly (which might result in charlies- those who have two butterfly genes) or she needs to be bred to a colour (such as tort). You would only want to breed her to a REW if you knew what the REW was masking, and a BEW would bring in a compeltely different ball game because of the weirdness of those genes. But the way, this is a very limited, layman term explanation, lol, because that's the best I can do.
 
Als, if you want brown with white spots, then you are looking at what type of brown you want, i.e. tort, chocolate, agouti, etc.

Do you really think you can handle this when you struggled so much emotionally with the last litter?
 
Flashy wrote:
Als, if you want brown with white spots, then you are looking at what type of brown you want, i.e. tort, chocolate, agouti, etc.

Do you really think you can handle this when you struggled so much emotionally with the last litter?
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Well I bred Roger(tort) to suki(white with brown spots), does this bring the likelyhood of nice brokens?
 
paul2641 wrote:
Well I bred Roger(tort) to suki(white with brown spots), does this bring the likelyhood of nice brokens?
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Paul I think the most important thing is to select for is health and type. You may get a beautifully marked kit out of this pairing (unlikely unless Roger has brokens in his background) but if that kit ends up having poor type, bad teeth or any other genetic health problem you will have to cull it in order to preserve the quality of your herd-especially if you'll be breeding closely related rabbits.

I'd say that if Roger doesn't have any brokens in his background you will probably get mismarks--Rabbits that carry broken, but don't have the right markings. It will take you a lot of mismarks and a lot of culls to get that nice pattern (my last litter was 90% mismarked.:rollseyes) ....but even then you can't call yourself a responsible breeder if you select good pattern over the quality of your rabbits.

Bottom line is breeding for brokens is tough. You'll need to keep pedigrees and you'll need to be able to spot what makes a good/healthy rabbit first. If your area makes this difficult, perhaps you'll need to do some traveling or start with an easier project?
 
I think that we need to review our policy again on anti-breeding sentiment in the "Rabbitry and Show Room". It was my understanding that breeding questions were allowed to be discussed under this particular forum, but yet we continue to have non-breeders discouraging breeding and harassing those asking questions about breeding.

I promote responsible breeding also, but the question asked was not "Should I breed my rabbit?" - It was "How do I get a particular variety?"


Paul, if your rabbit is atort butterfly (I don't actually know what variety your rabbit is because you didn't post a photo on this thread) and you want to get more tort butterflies, then breed to a solid tort.


Pam

 
clevername wrote:
paul2641 wrote:
Well I bred Roger(tort) to suki(white with brown spots), does this bring the likelyhood of nice brokens?
Click to expand...
Paul I think the most important thing is to select for is health and type. You may get a beautifully marked kit out of this pairing (unlikely unless Roger has brokens in his background) but if that kit ends up having poor type, bad teeth or any other genetic health problem you will have to cull it in order to preserve the quality of your herd-especially if you'll be breeding closely related rabbits.

I'd say that if Roger doesn't have any brokens in his background you will probably get mismarks--Rabbits that carry broken, but don't have the right markings. It will take you a lot of mismarks and a lot of culls to get that nice pattern (my last litter was 90% mismarked.:rollseyes) ....but even then you can't call yourself a responsible breeder if you select good pattern over the quality of your rabbits.

Bottom line is breeding for brokens is tough. You'll need to keep pedigrees and you'll need to be able to spot what makes a good/healthy rabbit first. If your area makes this difficult, perhaps you'll need to do some traveling or start with an easier project?
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Whycouldn't things be easy broken to broken produce brokens not charlies:rollseyes:cry1:
 
Because nothing about breeding rabbits is easy. Nothing about breeding any animal is easy, lol.

Pam, can you just clarify which of us you mean please? I hads this conversation with Peg recently, and if I personally am not welcome here, that's cool, but I'd like to know for sure.
 
LOL! Do you want the long answer or the short answer?

Short: You're placing a very artificial standard on a natural process. Nature will not select this pattern for you, you will have to.

Long: Broken/butterfly is controlled by the En gene . One copy of the gene is all that is needed to have a broken rabbit, two copies will give you a charlie.

Broken to Solid litters will yield a 50% chance of getting brokens and a 50% chance of getting solids.
Broken to Broken-50% brokens, 25% solid and 25% charlie.
Charlie to Solid- 100% brokens.

Now a broken rabbit is not necessarily a well patterned rabbit. It takes a lot of other modifiers to get that pattern right but you can increase your chances of getting it right by breeding brokens to brokens and charlies to solids with broken ancestry--but it will take some time and meticulous selection on your part.

 
clevername wrote:
Broken to Solid litters will yield a 50% chance of getting brokens and a 50% chance of getting solids.
Broken to Broken-50% brokens, 25% solid and 25% charlie.
Charlie to Solid- 100% brokens.
Click to expand...

Excellent explaination! It's not easy getting a "perfect" pattern... (and you will produce a lot of rabbits trying to achieve that artifical standard).

As Pam mentioned a solid buck would be the best option for you to start with. (And probably easier to find than a Charlie!)


 
Omg clevername that is the first thing I have understood this whole thread and it's what I wanted to know! Thanks clevername and bluegiants!
 
paul2641 wrote:
Omg clevername that is the first thing I have understood this whole thread and it's what I wanted to know! Thanks clevername and bluegiants!
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ok hold on. That's just the first stage.... Doing that will give you a charlie for another breeding.

I said a lot of other things. If you don't understand feel free to ask questions.:)


 
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