Siamese Sable Lionheads pass first ARBA presentation by Gail Gibbons

[TinysMom]

For those who don't know - lionheads are not yet an established breed with ARBA. Arden Wetzel tried to get them passed - they failed last year for the final time (for his attempt). Now it has gone on to Gail Gibbons who presented earlier this week.

Gail presented in four of the five colors on her COD (Certificate of Development). I don't remember all of the colors - I believe it was REW (ruby eyed white), tort and siamese sable - not sure if sable point was the fourth one or not. I know she did not present in chestnut because the junior doe did not make minimum weight as she'd gone off her feed.

For those who don't know what the process is like - its tough. You go before the standards committee and have to have a junior doe, junior buck, senior doe and senior buck that pass the standard. The committee is pretty darn tough too. One year they examined Arden's black rabbits (I think it was black) and had to blow into the fur near the rear - to find something like six stray white hairs? I forget what all it was about it - but it took them over an hour to disqualify the blacks with all of the committee members going over each rabbit.

If one rabbit in the group does not pass - then that color does not pass presentation for that year.

In order to be considered a "breed" by ARBA - the rabbits must pass three presentations in a five year period. They are allowed two strikes...but if they don't pass the third year in a row - then that color is not allowed to be presented again.

Let me give an example of what I mean.

In 2008 - REW, Siamese Sable, and tort were presented. Siamese sable passed.

In 2009 if these three colors are presented and the only one that passes again is Siamese sable - then in 2010 - tort and REW MUST pass or they are done with presentation.

Let's say that in 2009- Siamese sable doesn't pass...then it must pass again two more times before lionheads are recognized as a breed.

The nice thing about it - is that shows will now have to allow lionheads to show again in the siamese sable color. The standard will be printed in the next issue of Domestic Rabbit by ARBA and it will be used for judging. Many shows have been allowing lionheads anyway - even though Arden Wetzel failed last year. Others have not allowed lionheads.

If I remember right - there are currently 17 colors on CODs with ARBA for lionheads....and a total of...maybe 6 or 7 COD holders? I know that Theresa Mueller is next if Gail can not get the breed passed.

Anyway - just some trivia for everyone!

 

[RAL Rabbitry]

That's awesome that the Siamese sable lionheads passed. I saw them there and they were very pretty.

I was sad to hear that the sable mini-rex did not pass their second showing. I guess the junior doe had a small white spot in her arm pit.

Roger

 

[gentle giants]

I didn't realize lionheads hadn't passed yet. I actually saw several of them at the last show I attended, which has been quite a while ago. Mabye this breeder had brought them for sale or something though, I didn't actually see them go on the table. These were a sort of a fawn color, and were not nearly as nice as a lot of the ones I have seen in pictures, they were too big for one thing.

 

[polly]

Jeez thats a heck of a lot of work to get a breed on the show table Peg makes me glad its easier over here!!

Great news though :biggrin2:

 

[TinysMom]

I have asked Gail Gibbons for permission to share this and haven't heard back yet - but she published it to two lionhead lists on the internet and she's usually fine with stuff like this being shared...so I thought I'd share it.

I think many of you will find it interesting. When she refers to May at the end of the email - she's talking about the annual lionhead show for the club.

[line]
Hello Everyone
First - this is LONG so if you are not interested hit delete now. Second - sorry I meant to do this as soon as we got back, but I came home with a horrible virus!I have been really down sick. My up time has been spent getting all the rabbits settled back in their cages coupled with a major move around in the rabbitry as we are settling in for winter. This is the first I have been out here.

As everyone is aware by now, only the Siamese Sable color passed the standards committee. I am very sorry about that.All the adult Lionheads I used had been shown at ARBA shows. Most had BOB or BOS wins to their credit. The only one that had not been shown was Atari, the Siamese buck (who was not my first choice as a Siamese buck). Next I arranged for 4 ARBA judges to look over the Presentation animals on Sunday before the final ear numbers were due in.I had back up sets in each color except Siamese and Chestnut. There was some concern among the judges about the over all light color of the junior Siamese buck's nails, but they all agreed there was color and all matched. It was decided to go forward with the color and see what the standards committee said. To a person they all felt the Tort junior buck had good nails. There was some concern about the size of the Tort senior buck, Marc is only 2 pounds, and a couple of the judges where not crazy about his hindquarters but his and Tangent's juniors were the strongest pair of Tort juniors (or so they thought!!) NO one, no one expressed any concern about the "wool on the ears"!!
I did have some reservations, in my own mind, about the Sable Point seniors but never about the REW doe Firebolt.

For everyone who was not there it took a LONG TIME!! AVERY LONG LONG LONG time. The committee did not come to the place they ended up at easily.When they had voted and had me come in to the table the FIRST thing they said was we have to get the DQ off the wool on the ears. At that point I was sure Sable Point and REW had failed. The DQ for wool on the ears is not something either Arden or I wanted from the beginning. It was something the original committee wanted. We worked hard in Indy and got it reduced to the top half of the ear. It is tough, as ADULT Lionheads tend to a longer fur on the ears. Thismatches the longer coat found on some Lionheads especially REWS and a lot of Sable Points. When at shows I have asked and asked any members of the standard committeehow they wanted fur on the ears.Everyone I talked to too seemed to not be too concerned about it. Again, I am sorry as I really did not think ear wool was going to be an issue. The up side is that it is now going to be gone as a DQ. It will still be a fault so it is still something to watch for. Especially the ones that have real wool up the ears. We have all seen them (there were some again at Convention this year).


Chestnut Agouti -not presented - It was my choice confirmed by some members of the club I conferred with to not bring up the Chestnuts. The junior doe had hardly eaten a thing while we were there. (this is a huge issue with presentation being so late in the week) She was not a big girl to begin with and was wavering at 1 .09 on Wed. morning, by the scale we could use in the vendor area. That was down from 2 pounds before we left. Everyone tried every trick they knew to get the little lady to eat! She eat and drank just barely enough to keep going.

Tortoise - Failed, comments were on the nails on the junior buck they showed me the one they did not like and when I said 4 other judges passed it they laughed. But nail coloris a judges call and not protestable. During the presentation process they did spend a lot of time looking at Tangent's ears (the senior doe) so Torts might have gone down in flames over ear wool as well??I do not know? Over all type on the Torts was very good.

Sable Points - Failed Wool on the ears. They also made comments about the color of the junior buck. He is going to be a very light in the body Sable Point. They said they talked it over and decided he was not a dilute but was much lighter then they preferred. As we all know he will darken, but next year I will choose the darker ones for sure. They really did not say much about type other then earlier comments when they saidthe senior bucks (both REW and Sable Point) could have been a little stronger in the rear.


REW - Failed Wool on the ears. They only seemed to look at the senior doe so I am guessing the buck was ok? I will try and post photos latter this week of the ears on my website (give me till at least Wed) the senior doe really has NO wool on her ears (in my opinion ) and her ears have not been "messed with" . She has very clean ears. (well that is what I thought) but if her ears did not pass then we are in deep trouble as a breed. So it is a good thing they are getting rid of the Wool on ears DQ. (on the Sable Points I can see what they were looking at but the REWsnot at all)

The REW buck managed to pull off a hind nail on Sunday when the judges were going over them! I was so happy when everyone decided that he had enough nail showing to go forward, as I did not like the back up set of REWs nearly as well. (remember when you change a senior you have to change all 4 as the juniors have to be out of the seniors this first year) There was no issue with that brokennail on the presentation table. They committee did say they would like stronger rear ends over all. The does were solid but the bucks were a little weak, with thejunior buck the most I think.It did not sound as if type was enough of an issue to fail any color, which made me happy.

Siamese Sable - passed. They were mysecond string of Siamese. The best Senior buck got a yeast infection (who knows how!) on his one ear and lost hair in a spot about a month before Kentucky. That meant I had to leave home the best Senior and the best juniors (in my opinion). The Senior buck I usedwas a son I kept out of GameBoy mostly because he had very nice type and I was not sure how many more GameBoy kids there will be. He is sort of "old school" in the head and ears for sure. We were lucky I had a pair of juniors out of him as I had bred him to Pewter Doll and kept both of the resulting offspring as breeding stock. The committee felt the junior buck lacked some evenness in his mane development (they are about 5 months and starting to molt so I was just happy they had decent manes at this point!) Type seemed good on the Siamese. No comments on nail color (??) or body color.

I spoke briefly with the committee about adding a better description of wool and a point shift to allow a wool section in the fur/mane area and they all agreed that would be workable. I will be sending the committee all the recommendations I have for changes. (mostly just language changes to help clarify for the judges who have to use the standard understand better just what I want) As soon as I get approval I will post the new standard to my website but it will NOT be offical till it is printed in the Feb. Domestic Rabbit.

Overall it was a positive event. We got one color and we took a huge step forward on the standard. If I can get the last of the language changes passed and make as much progress as was made in Indy this should turn out to be a good step forward for the breed.The committee did say that the new presentation rules which are coming soon will also get rid of the juniors out of the seniors rule which will make this easier for those of you who follow after me. Then youwill be allowto take the BEST two seniors and the BEST two juniors you have.


To everyone who sent emails to wish me well and everyone who came up to me in Kentucky I would like to say thank you! It was a super stressful time and those well wishes did help. (alot) I knew from helping Arden the last few years that the stress and pressure is huge but until it is on your own shoulders you have no idea. Even when you sleep you dream about it. It consumes your waking and sleeping time. We left the Lionhead area and watched Belgian Hares show on Tuesday or I think I would have gone mad for sure. Hopefully we can now get out of the house and do a few shows this late fall/early winter and life will return to a more normal flow.
See you all in May. Gail Gibbons

 

[JadeIcing]

I read every bit of that and wow. I want to know more. Tempting to join some of the list just to learn.

 

[BSAR]

That is really neat! I would love to see a Siamese Sable Lionhead! They must be gorgeous!