American Sable Cross?

[Cspr]

So my rescue rabbit, Anwen, is all healed up (Otomax is magic) and in good shape after her former home. She's even getting better with being touched and handled, which is fantastic.


She's also a lovely American Sable. Her fur is amazing (silky, nice length, very little signs of molt--just a less than penny spot here and there) and while she could be more meaty, she has a nice overall shape and proportion. She has a great ruby-cast to her eyes, too, and a nice tone (still light for being almost a three-year-old) to her coat. Great head and ears. She, however, has mismatched toenails.

I've just bred her to a MR.

I have no other males at the mo' (the male she was bred to was very molty and she had no live kits) and I didn't want her getting out of habit. I'm not sure if it'll take, because while he tried his best, his best wasn't very good because she was about four times his size. :? I'm pretty sure he thought she was two rabbits and he was confused about which end he was supposed to pay attention to. :lol:

The buck is a meat brick, though. Great thick fur, too. He's a booted black. With luck, they'll be a nice-furred (nice and thick on the hocks), meaty, and large solid black buck kit.

I figure it'll be useful for a moderate-sized meat mutt, anyway, and the pelts should be fantastic. I am curious, though: Would anyone suggest breeding the buck back to his mother, to try and get some seals, sables, and/or whites? I hope to continue to breed AS, but, as it is such a rare breed, it's almost impossible to find stock, much less good stock.

Since I already have a pretty fantastic doe, I was wondering if I should just use her as a basis and outcross completely? Use Mini Rex crosses and maybe bring in Am. Chin and/or Cali? The first two would be more likely to have rollback fur and a better form, but Cali could add in better depth and proper color.

Thoughts, everyone? I'd of course be very honest about the crossing, but I don't want the AS blood to go to waste. She's a very efficient animal and a good mother. It's just impossible to find a buck who isn't constantly in molt.

 

[akane]

Cali is what was used to bring back the breed here in Iowa. Currently we're just breeding out the flyback coat but we're getting 50+ entries a show from central to eastern Iowa. I finally got a good buck and doe in all 3 colors with rollback coats although my nicest young sable doe has a flyback coat. The pointed whites have given quite a headache. I started with 2 seal bucks (one was free) and a very nice pointed white doe. 5 litters later she hadn't successfully raised anything and then she died. He gave me an even nicer but younger pw doe and she dislocated her front paw a week later. It's healed sideways but she's getting around so we're trying to breed her. This heat wave ruined a lot of my breeding plans though for probably the next month.

 

[Cspr]

Good to know.

I'm going to give the doe a chance to carry a good litter, but three strikes and she's out. First litter had a stuck kit, too large. I think it was buck heat sterility, but I don't know for sure. I'm hoping that if she takes with kits from a Mini Rex buck, she'll have a larger litter with smaller kits. If she does all right with them, I might keep a kit from the litter, just as a backup, and breed Anwen to an Am. Chin buck and maybe a Cali buck after that. Try to get a few 50% American Sable rabbits, the interbreed them with each other and the bucks with their mother/grandmother.

Good to know that somewhere the breed is having a stable comeback. I'm one of two breeders in the state, and I don't think there's any breeders in the surrounding states. I love the breed, from the coat color/silkiness to the gleaming eyes (makes me think of The Secret of NIMH) to the mousy personality. I just wish there was a way for me to get decent stock. I'm pretty sure this is the best doe I'm going to get for a long while, which is worrisome. She's already almost three and, as I've said, lost her last litter. :c I wish she'd been used early on in life as a good brood animal, but instead she was left in the hands of a person with a half a dozen breeds and no focus. :/ The sort who would breed a dwarf doe to a giant buck. O.O

Don't know if I can do much. In the least, I have access to American Chinchillas if Anwen strikes out two more times. Maybe eventually I could get another American Sable later on and interbreed the two OR just try to introduce a sable Rex. Could work. Maybe. -crosses fingers-

Anyway? Good luck, Akane, and I hope you have sable, rollback furred kits sooner rather than later. Also? Ship some down South, will ya?

 

[skysthelimit]

There is a lady in Ohio who breeds them. When I could not get Sable Rex, I considered using one of her does.

 

[akane]

The problem with using chin or rex is that they carry recessive genes. You will spend all you life getting rid of the chin color or rex coat.

 

[Cspr]

No, they don't? Rex do, of course, but chinchilla is dominant over seal, Himalayan, and REW. Therefore, once you have sables, you never have to worry about chinchillas again. I'm more worried about recessives brought in by Rex and Californian. I'm not sure if flyback is dominant or recessive. It's recessive, that's another thing you'll never get rid of completely.

 

[skysthelimit]

Well you need two copies for the Rex gene to get a Rex coat, so no big worries. Once you mix and match, even if you get a Rex coat from subsequent line breedings, it's not like going to be anything like a real Rex coat, you need other modifiers. And it's not easy to get a good coat from two Rex parents, and there are prominent guard hairs in the gene pool, probably from crossing to Cal/NZ at some point.

 

[Cspr]

True. Thanks for the bit of cheer, Sky.

 

[akane]

If you use chin you will have to be careful not to lose the himi gene while breeding out the chin or all you'll ever get is seals. That's probably why cali was used. You need a good source of himi to make a good sable. Rex sables are too dark for American sables.

 

[Cspr]

True. This is why I'll probably use both. Try to get a great American Sable stud if I can or at least breed a buck back to his mother and cross my fingers for a good 75% American Sable or two. Try. Then bring in Californian and American Chinchilla. Breeding from the American Chinchilla and buying of a Californian to keep as a brood doe.

What would you suggest for sable if a) my doe doesn't produce and has to be pet homed and b) I can't find a good American Sable anywhere close and might as well start from scratch by creating mostly-American Chinchilla sports? Would you suggest just dropping the project for now and moving on?

I don't know what to do. :/ I wish her first litter had been okay. Bad luck for a new breeder. I dunno. I'll just be hopeful. In about a week, I should know if she took. If she didn't, I'll try to take her to Ken Turner's for a studding (AS x Cali). Might actually take her to Ken's when I pick up Jade. Basil tried to breed her, but he never fell off spastically with a drunk like Primrose. Pretty certain he never finished. Thoughts on this?

 

[Dood]

My 1/2 NZ and 1/2 Flemish has rollback fur so perhaps it is dominant over flyback.

There are enough people on the forum with flyback breeds (NZ, Cali, D'Argents, Palamino, Harlequin, Florida White, Checkered Giant, Dutch etc..) crossed with rollback (AmChins, StdChins, Flemish, Satin, Beveren, Holland ND Mini Lop, etc..) that creating another post or a survey could help get a better idea of the genetics.

 

[skysthelimit]

If you use chin you will have to be careful not to lose the himi gene while breeding out the chin or all you'll ever get is seals. That's probably why cali was used. You need a good source of himi to make a good sable. Rex sables are too dark for American sables.

Good point. It was suggested to me to use my chins to breed to the seal after I culled my cal buck, but this is the reason why I would rather use the cal martens or a black. The chin will mask the himi every time, unless I get a c from one of the chins that carries white, I'll just get chins and more seals.