Cross Breeding

[tierlakay]

Hi

We currently have 1 broken tort buck and 1 frosty point doe and a REW doe... we kept x2 broken from the first litter (females)... and are selling all the males..

I was just wondering if there are rules about breeding as in can a father breed with daughter/sister/mother/cousin etc

or is it the same as Guinea Pigs you can breed all except brother and sister???....

We really were hoping not to get another male as our enclosure's are all in the same shed and we used to have 2 males and there was to much fighting and wee spraying happening....

Thank You

 

[Karlie]

Hello,
I would say its safe to breed anything besides brother x sister. I have safeley had brother sister litters as well (These were shelter rabbits that were bred by their previous owners) but I don't recommend it.

Karlie

 

[Bramblerose]

Its called inbreeding(immediate relatives) or linebreeding(cousins aunts uncles etc) Rabbits can handle quite a bit of inbreeding and it can be done, even brother/sister although I would not suggest it for a novice. Show breeders use it to set desirable charateristics all the time, and thats the rub, you inbreed very good rabbits to create rabbits that are prepotent for their good qualities, inbreeding also doubles up on the bad as well, so unless you have exceptional rabbits your better off cross faulting with unrelated rabbits.

 

[OakRidgeRabbits]

Linebreeding can be done. However, it's not something that you just want to randomly do. It is only done by knowledgable breeders who are selecting for a certain trait, and generally you can cement it by linebreeding. But if you do it wrong, you can cement in bad traits just as easily.

If you're interested in line breeding, I'd suggest researching it before you even consider giving it a try. There are particular patterns to use, not just whichever rabbit you want to breed.