Steel chin with points?

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beepboop

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Y'all I am so close to tearing my hair out over this buck lol. He's a meat mutt, dam appeared to be self black and sire appeared to be self chocolate. I've been raising for a few years now but only recently gotten interested in genetics. He throws mostly what *look* like self black babies when paired with my chocolate himi, the occasional self chocolate or himi babies. He and the himi are related so... what am I dealing with here? Are the blacks actually super steels? Why does this chinchilla-looking fellow have points, is he just extra smutty? He has a greyish white belly too, I'm so confused. Please help me before my brain melts lol.
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Y'all I am so close to tearing my hair out over this buck lol. He's a meat mutt, dam appeared to be self black and sire appeared to be self chocolate. I've been raising for a few years now but only recently gotten interested in genetics. He throws mostly what *look* like self black babies when paired with my chocolate himi, the occasional self chocolate or himi babies. He and the himi are related so... what am I dealing with here? Are the blacks actually super steels? Why does this chinchilla-looking fellow have points, is he just extra smutty? He has a greyish white belly too, I'm so confused. Please help me before my brain melts lol.
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Handsome boy!!!

That looks like a sable steel to me. Sable isn't exactly a "pointed" color, rather it's called shaded (in fact the sable allele <cchl> is also known as the shaded gene). Yeah, it sounds like the "self black" doe was either a supersteel or a self steel. Steel isn't usually expressed unless it's paired with an agouti gene, so I'd guess she's a supersteel, since a self steel doesn't have the agouti <A> to produce a proper steel like your buck is. The test would be to breed the "self black" doe to an agouti - if she's a supersteel, that should produce all steels; you'd get some steels if she was a self steel, too, but probably not the whole litter.

Sable is in the C series, and steel is in the E series, so you can get a rabbit that's both steeled and shaded. The silvery nose markings and grayish white belly are marks of a steel, which is genetically an agouti and retains a bit of the agouti markings (in varying amounts, I've found).

Himalayan is on the same locus recessive to sable, and he could very well be carrying himi <ch> along with a sable <cchl>. In fact it's likely, since you're getting himis from him with a himi doe. It's either that or he's carrying REW <c>, since if he was <cchl cchl> he'd be seal.

I did have a sunburnt chinchilla with a nose like that, but his ears and feet weren't clearly sepia-toned like your buck, and your buck is definitely steel, not chin.
Here's Groucho, named for his "mustache," not his temperament! :)
GrouchoFace.jpg
 
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Handsome boy!!!

That looks like a sable steel to me. Sable isn't exactly a "pointed" color, rather it's called shaded (in fact the sable allele <cchl> is also known as the shaded gene). Yeah, it sounds like the "self black" doe was either a supersteel or a self steel. Steel isn't usually expressed unless it's paired with an agouti gene, so I'd guess she's a supersteel, since a self steel doesn't have the agouti <A> to produce a proper steel like your buck is. The test would be to breed the "self black" doe to an agouti - if she's a supersteel, that should produce all steels; you'd get some steels if she was a self steel, too, but probably not the whole litter.

Sable is in the C series, and steel is in the E series, so you can get a rabbit that's both steeled and shaded. The silvery nose markings and grayish white belly are marks of a steel, which is genetically an agouti and retains a bit of the agouti markings (in varying amounts, I've found).

Himalayan is on the same locus recessive to sable, and he could very well be carrying himi <ch> along with a sable <cchl>. In fact it's likely, since you're getting himis from him with a himi doe. It's either that or he's carrying REW <c>, since if he was <cchl cchl> he'd be seal.

I did have a sunburnt chinchilla with a nose like that, but his ears and feet weren't clearly sepia-toned like your buck, and your buck is definitely steel, not chin.
Here's Groucho, named for his "mustache," not his temperament! :)
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Oh my goodness, thank you so much! I never even considered for a second he might be a cchl steel instead of a cchd steel, which feels silly of me now. I had just never been able to find a picture or combo that looked exactly right. That would actually make so much sense because his last chocolate son had a lighter coat and had dark ruby eyes, so he was probably actually a chocolate sable. I have been driving myself crazy over this, I'm not breeding for anything in particular but I just find the genetics so fascinating and confusing! Thanks again!

also aww, Groucho's lil mustache! 😍
 
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