Breeding of Tootsie and Ninja

By Charlotte

I bred Tootsie and Ninja August 30 and 31, late at night and early in the morning. 

Tootsie as a first time mom lost eight out of nine of her kits.  This is actually a common occurrence with first-time moms.  I anticipate that she will be a much better mother this time.  She wants to be a mother, and knows she will be having kits soon.  You can tell she wants to be a mother with her gaining almost two pounds in a week and a half.  The kits are due October 1^st.  

 

Tootsie, ecstatic mother-to-be

From breeding Tootsie and Indy together, we learned that Tootsie is double steel.  Meaning, unless with bred with another double steel, the whole litter will be some sort of steel.  Because Tootsie is a double steel, and we don’t have a double steel buck that she isn’t related to, I bred her with Ninja to produce steel (black steel).  There will definitely be black and chocolate steel and possibly blue and lilac steel.  

Ninja, proud dad-to-be.

Bunnies for Sale

Maple

 "Maple" and "Stanley"

Maple and Stanley are now three months old with good conformation .  They are both chocolate steel and their wool is finely crimped, with good density and good texture.  They have been handled since birth and would make mighty fine show rabbits.  Both have been vaccinated against Pasteurella (snuffles).

Stanley

The differences between them?  Maple weighs 4 lbs 10 oz, and Stanley is one pound more at 5 lbs 10 oz.

They are $70 each, with a $20 discount for 4-H.  

Chocolates into Steels? Or Crazy Rabbit Genetics?

A chocolate kit was born and fifteen days later it turned into a steel. Chocolate steel.  Crazy.

Rabbit color genetics is really hard to understand, especially when you are nine.  My mom says it's not that bad.  She's nuts.

Anyway, both of Cookie's parents are steel, one lilac steel and one a broken chocolate steel.  The genotype for both of them is EsE.  Es (steel gene) is dominant to E.  But!  If you have two Es genes, then sometimes the steel phenotype disappears, and the rabbit appears to be EE.  We believe this is what happened with Cookie, who is very clearly a broken chocolate. A most adorable broken chocolate.

What this means is that all of Cookie's offspring will be steel.  In this case, when bred with Snowball, chocolate or lilac steel.  Every single one. 

So all the chocolate and lilac kits are chocolate and lilac steel, and all the broken chocolate and broken lilac are broken chocolate steel and broken lilac steel.  Except that the brokens aren't looking very steel-like.

We are so confused.

Self chocolate (left) and chocolate steel (right)