Silvered Agoutis...

I crossed a Champagne D'Argent with some of my lovely meat mutts and got 7 silvered chestnuts. They were gorgeous. But now I want to try to get other versions of silvered agoutis. I have the capability to work towards all colors of agouti and chinchilla (I have a squirrel doe carrying chocolate, a lynx doe and an opal doe) but I don't know if the result will be worth the effort (since I'll have to line breed or sibling breed to get those colors after introducing black through the Champagne buck... while also keeping my fingers crossed at not losing the silvering when pairing his offspring to each other or the diluted agouti dams.)

What I'm wanting to know, is if anyone has a photograph of silvered chinchilla or silvered opal or silvered lynx? Not steeled... Silvered. I can't find any on the magical interwebz (just get lots of irrelevant results).



^^Sent those guys off to butcher, so I can't use any of them, but one of them managed to breed my lynx doe (his mother!) before the trip and I'm waiting to see how her kits turn out (looks like I got REW, chesntuts and a lynx or opal?)

Let me look. Silvered chestnut are called "saint Hubert", I believe

__________ Thu Feb 02, 2017 12:31 pm __________

Couldn't find any opals or lynxes (though they are out there), but I did find some other odd silvered varieties: http://imgur.com/a/56lwe

Those mutts are really lovely rabbits. Makes me wonder how the silvering would look on rex fur.....Not like I need another project...

^ im planning be doing that exact project this year :mrgreen: for science. if i can find an argent buck. i have a silver fox and rexes, but i prefer the heavier silver...

those rabbits are gorgeous. they look like argente brun until you notice the very subtle chestnut markings<3

Have you heard of Silver - the breed?

http://www.silverrabbitclub.com

I did some st huberts and some silvered tort when crossing my champagnes and cremes. It can get interesting.

Interesting. I am hoping to get some fun things with my Silver Fox/Californian line breeding.

You should just get blacks with less silvering. Another generation in along with the black you might get some white rabbits with odd white hairs on their feet or rew is possible after the 2nd generation which can't show silvering. A californian is nearly always a black rabbit with the himi gene and a silver fox should be a black with light to medium silvering. The silvering dilutes with generations away from silver in a somewhat unpredictable pattern. However, silver fox are often not pure and hidden steels are common in some which could alter the results a little.

Dood":2c98ge5y said:

Have you heard of Silver - the breed?

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Yes, actually. Seeing their pictures actually encouraged me to go ahead and get a champagne buck, knowing I'd get whole litters of silvered chestnuts. And I'm quite happy with the result... BUT... I want to know what a silvered chinchilla will look like, and I can't find a photo of one anywhere. I really love frosties, but can't get one out of my herd - everyone is almost guaranteed to be EE in my herd. I'm wondering if a silvered chinchilla would have a similar appearance to a frosty... I mean, I know it won't be identical, because none of the guard hairs are going to have black tips, but I really like the snowy white coat and dark eyes that frosties have. Champagnes don't look frosty enough to me because they have dark gray/black outlines around the eyes and nose. I just want to be able to drool over some pictures....

akane":2c98ge5y said:

The silvering dilutes with generations away from silver in a somewhat unpredictable pattern.

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^^I know the rest of your comment was for someone else, regarding the Cali/SF cross... but... is that true that the silvering "dilutes?" How does that work?!?! I thought it was either there or it wasn't. My silvered babies, who only have one copy of the Champagne Silver gene (S3 according to most sources) are just as silver as their daddy, who has two copies. Are you saying that even though the S3 gene will continue to be passed down, that somehow it gets weaker? If so, that's different than how the other color genes work... and I'd really like more information on how that works. (if you can point me in the right direction to find it, please)

LPH_NY":3gairbuj said:

My silvered babies, who only have one copy of the Champagne Silver gene (S3 according to most sources) are just as silver as their daddy, who has two copies. Are you saying that even though the S3 gene will continue to be passed down, that somehow it gets weaker?

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Generally rabbits with one silvering gene don't get as silvered. It's incomplete recessive. When I bred champagne netherland dwarfs, the ones with one gene were called "mid-champagnes" and usually varied in color between silver fox shade and a dark champagne shade. The si(3) gene is heavily influenced by modifiers (other genes that only slightly affect color) - champagne d'argents have been bred to have modifiers to produce a light, silvery shade, and while you may easily retain the si gene itself, if you keep breeding away from the champagnes, more and more of those modifiers will be lost, and the color may become different than the purebred champagnes (usually darker, with weaker silvering)

Silvering isn't a simple recessive. It's also not 1 gene makes some silvering, 2 makes a lot, and the last option is none. The range is far greater and may cover many more generations than what it would take to eliminate a recessive normally. I can't speak for the light silvering of silver fox which may reduce and eliminate more predictably. I used argents so in my experience if you start with heavy silvering to a not silvered you can get really anything. It's unlikely it will be as heavily silvered as the very silver parent and it will *probably* have more silvering than the weakest marked ones out there but nothing is impossible. The odds are it will reduce more with every not silvered parent cross but like I said it drops unpredictably. Not every 50/50 cross offspring will have the same amount of silvering in most cases and when you cross those half silver offspring to a non silver you won't get 50% silver and 50% not like you would with simple recessives such as agouti/self and black/chocolate. You will get another range with possibly some not silvers and silvers that go from a few stray hairs to near the silver of the heaviest marked parent.

Honestly, the gene only seemed to get more complicated the more I worked with it and looked into it. I don't know if it's a result of a mix of multiple silver genes in the heavy silvers or if it's just a mix of modifiers like the amount of red (rufus) in a chestnut/castor and reds versus the amount of dark color or brown tint in red is often referred to as smut. Adding a darker red clean of smut to your chestnut/castor should make more red and certain other colors make less red with more brown or black to the bands on the hair but it doesn't just go to it's minimum amount in one generation of crosses. You keep continuing to get a range until you make very dark or very red rabbits and you can keep making it stronger or weaker depending whether you cross in better red or other colors. Silver works somewhat similar although it's easier to get an obviously zero silvering animal since the line of bands is set on an agouti and you are just changing the width or amount of each while silver is separate of other genes and can be bred out of any color eventually. It won't just happen with a specific part silver cross though. The more heavily silvered rabbits you use the more it increases and the more non silvered you use the more it decreases but not in a perfectly set pattern like other known genes. Like I said eventually you do get to no silvering. It's just not as simple as selecting the silver to non silver crosses and breeding it out. If you cross a self to an agouti and then cross the offspring to self you get some self and some agouti. Unless the agouti already carried self and threw some in the first generation resulting in all selfs until you reintroduce agouti. Silver doesn't happen that way. At least not the heavy silver in argents I had. It stuck around in a variety of amounts for many generations of non silver and low silver crosses before I got fully unmarked rabbits.

My meat mutts in the end were chocolate mini rex, creme d'argent, several crosses back to champagnes, and then having lightened the bone structure too much in the line I wanted to use for dog food I added some nz x checkered giant does to make a broader boned rabbit. The mini rex is great for meat to bone ratio in human destined meat animals if you cross it up so you get some at least dutch size. The standard meat rabbit used to be closer to dutch size or if you've ever seen a standard chinchilla instead of the american or giant. They are often more efficient rabbits and like I said the lighter bones resulting in more meat to bone. Of course if you are crossing for other purposes you will have different goals to select for.

ya Silvering with SF are somewhat simpler. I am expecting to get a lot of blacks and gold tipd steels are quite likely. I am hoping to breed back to the SF buck (75 SF, 25 cali %) and then from that generation probably pick a buck to cross back to the 50/50 does. I want to see if I can get any blues or chocolates, and what other colors or patterns may pop up.

I would be selecting for meat type, color, and silvering. It would be fun to see how the silvering looks over any colors or patterns I may get.