Champagne critique

[akane]

Finally remembered the camera so here are the (5) 8week olds. I think there are 3 does and 2 bucks. I may keep a doe but I was gonna offer someone who wants a buck a trade for a doe since my buck and doe are already half siblings.

MD1

I forgot to get top pics on 1 and 2 and after tattooing they were too upset to sit still so I threw them in an empty feed container.

MD2-I think looks the best in pics despite trying to run off the table. Took 2 attempts to tattoo and rolled around upside down thrashing until I pinned her down for several minutes.

MD3-Hands on I liked this doe best. She feels the most solid and is the only one that didn't scream murder and become nearly impossible to handle after tattooing. She ******, wiggled, and bounced right back to normal. In pics she doesn't look quite as good but it may be a lack of good posing. If her back feet were more under her and her front feet were under her head I think she might look rounder and fuller in the hindquarters.

Bucks

MD4-I like this buck best at this point.

MD5-Feels very thin and rangy but maybe he just got shoved out of the feed and will catch up since he is only 8weeks old.

Some 3 week old kits

Quick question I forgot. Is small tear in the ear enough for a DQ? MD5 tore a triangle in his ear as a kit which healed to have a little 1" line as a hole in the middle.

 

[Thundrr]

i have ZERO education on champagnes... i wasnt expecting them to be black.. what is the color cycle like on a champagne? are all the young ones black and then they "silver out" later in life?

 

[DevonW]

MD2 is my favourite out of the bunch.

However at that age they should definitely be more balanced and smoother in overall type more like this, silvering differs for everyone, my lines silver very quickly but as long as they're fully silvered by Sr's it's all good:

 

[tailwagging]

MD2 is my favourite out of the bunch.

However at that age they should definitely be more balanced and smoother in overall type more like this, silvering differs for everyone, my lines silver very quickly but as long as they're fully silvered by Sr's it's all good:

nice looking bun!

 

[akane]

You know even the winning rabbits at shows and the rabbits I've handled that everyone has talked up consistently I have never seen even close to the depth I see in rabbits online. I don't know if it's the local area or what but no breed of commercial or compact type has anything close to the height of body I see in pics online. I wouldn't even think it possible if I hadn't seen lots of pictures online and we've been to shows from Wisconsin through central and eastern Iowa to western IL. So I'm not that concerned about it. Both my MR and my champagnes are average or better for around here.

Updated pics now that they are 3 months old. They held still a lot better now that they are a month older but noone wanted to tuck their hindlegs.

MD1

MD2-shows the difference slightly different posture makes

MD3

MD4

MD5-The weakest of the group. I might try to find him a pet home because he's always been underfoot and he's so much smaller and skinnier than the rest that he's no good for breeding or show (plus the tear in his ear) and I'd probably have to wait an extra few weeks to month to butcher him at the same weight.

For the heck of it Arinsu the Creme d'argent x mini rex buck I kept because he seems to have gotten a lot of rufus modifiers. He turned out fairly nice. I kept a black doe of the same cross to breed with him and see what all we get. Not sure they'll have much silvering. The doe is just speckled on her main body.

 

[eco2pia]

You know even the winning rabbits at shows and the rabbits I've handled that everyone has talked up consistently I have never seen even close to the depth I see in rabbits online. I don't know if it's the local area or what but no breed of commercial or compact type has anything close to the height of body I see in pics online. I wouldn't even think it possible if I hadn't seen lots of pictures online and we've been to shows from Wisconsin through central and eastern Iowa to western IL.

I have had much the same experience around here. I find it puzzling--and something to shoot for! But if there is some magic of posing I just don't know, I wish someone would tell me!!

 

[akane]

Part of that is posing I've proven that by posting pics of rabbits that look good or horrible because of the position they were in at the pic. I've gotten to the point I can see some flaws in posing and how they would change the dynamics to make the rabbit look better or worse. I also learned some of the tricks of head placement to make long or weird shoulders less noticeable online and to round up hindquarters better than they are. I still see absolutely no way any of the rabbits I've come across would make these towering bodies. Especially some of the MR. I mean look at this http://www.nmrrc.net/apps/photos/photo?photoid=28171777 , http://www.nmrrc.net/apps/photos/photo?photoid=28171789 . Those aren't even round rabbits... they are mountains. While these http://mccabesrabbitry26.webs.com/ are some of the best rabbits in my area with individuals selling for $100 or more and I have rabbits closely related to some of their good bucks like king's witchita and McCabes Luigi.

 

[DevonW]

Posing can be tricky but the way people pose to mask faults is rather obvious no matter what trick they use. I made a blog post about this a while ago. In order to hide low shoulders you push the ears back to hide the dip. To create the illusion of depth and shortness you over pose by pushing the hind feet much further forwards then the knee joint (again this is obvious masking). Another way to create the illusion of depth is to hold the head so the bottom of the rabbits chin is flat on the ground (this also makes ears look shorter). All obvious tricks that can be seen with a quick look at the photo.

More tricks that create the illusion of a better rabbit can be from re-sizing the width of the photo slightly but not the height. This makes the rabbit look like it is shorter in type and has more depth however the ears will look much longer. Also the photo tends to look off since some pixels are stretched. Edges will look slightly blurred as well. If you look carefully at a picture edited like this you'll start to notice it looks "off" in pictures from DSLR camera will look a bit warped. Also "landscape" photos most commonly are square from P+S cameras so if it is a bit rectangular without being a portrait style chances are some cropping was done.

Another way to create illusion is with camera angles. Shooting a rabbit at a downward angle tends to make them look like they have a ton of width, while shooting at an upward angle makes them appear to have more depth. To hide ugly shoulders you shoot the rabbit on an angle so it's hindquarter is closer to you, to hide a chopped hindquarter angle the rabbit so it's head is closer to you. Again these angles are rather noticeable. And can be a cause for questioning however sometimes it's just how the person is holding the camera.

There are photoshop techniques where you can fill things out etc but the average rabbit breeder is very unlikely to be that good at photoshop to make it appear seamless. It's hard and often times you'll see smudges around things like the tips of the ears or the hindquarter.

Then you have to look at the rabbit itself. If the rabbit is just plain bad you won't ever make it look like it's worthy of a BIS. However if it's a decent rabbit with a few small flaws the above techniques can be used to make it look even better. Just like with people photography you can get rid of blemishes, fix colour etc but if the person is just plain ugly no amount of photoshop will make them look like a supermodel. Like I always hear, you have to have the foundation before you build the house.

As for depth in rabbits looking like they have a ton online but not in person. I've actually never seen that. Usually it's the opposite the rabbit has twice as much depth in person as it does online because the owner doesn't really know how to pose right. A lot of rabbits that are posed in a relaxed way (no hand in the picture) usually look rather flat and long but when posed have incredible depth and shortness to their body. Some rabbits you see this a lot of conventions when you have a ton of breeders around, the rabbits are trained to maintain a pose without human help so when they're in a "relaxed pose" they still look like they have incredible depth.

I guess the point is people tend to try and make their rabbits look better then they actually are but no matter what they do if you look closely enough it is very noticeable all the tricks. However it is very hard to make a good rabbit look terrible.

As well as the quality of rabbits in an area depends on the competition. If there is a lot of competition in a breed the higher the quality because you want to beat X amount of people showing X amount of rabbits so you're constantly breeding to produce better rabbits. Where as in breeds with relatively no competition there is no need to be constantly improving your stock because you're just going to win no matter what. I've travelled to shows all over the place in Canada and the USA and I've noticed that in certain areas the quality of rabbits suck in others it's incredible. Take Southern Ontario vs Southern Quebec. In Southern Ontario we have a higher population of people showing rabbits, we have more shows, and it shows when we go to shows in Quebec they just don't have the quality or competition to compete with rabbits from Ontario. They're slowly getting better but I still wouldn't buy a rabbit from Quebec just yet. I know several Champagne breeders on the West Coast who are dying to get their hands on Champagnes from the East coast because of the difference in quality. I sold a Brun buck to one lady who was tempted to use him in her champagne program because he was so much better then any of the champagne bucks in her area. He was also given an "honorary BIS" at a show she brought him too because he was that good compared to the other rabbits because Bruns aren't showable in ARBA yet. This was a buck who had his flaws as well (which is why I didn't keep him). Which just goes to show the quality in the area that she lives is not the same as quality from the area where I live.

It's all superficial when it comes to shows. The best rabbit that day wins, and that rabbit may be the worst rabbit at a show somewhere else.

 

[eco2pia]

I think I was referring to the local lack of quality--at least the FEW local examples I have seen in person, or on local ads I should say.

Many of the online rabbitries I might be looking at are at the other end of the country, and those animals look like impossible super-rabbits. Your rabbits, Devon, sometimes look like impossible super-rabbits! Super-rabbits bear little resemblance to the breeds as I know them locally.

Even finding a purebred rabbit can be difficult. I have seen broken NZ often advertised as CG, I had someone try to sell me a Dwarf Hotot as a ND, I have seen some wacky things...I am sure there are lovely rabbits around, but finding them is often difficult.

I am in a tiny backwater town, miles and miles from a few annual shows. If you raise rabbits here, you are most likely either a meat mutt breeder, or a pet mill--and I am not really meaning that in a derogatory way. That is the market most readily available. No matter how good my stock eventually gets, those are the bulk of the sales that will be available to me. I would rather honestly compare my stock to other locations, as an idea of what is possible, and aim for that. (Of course, if I need a little better lighting and grooming and foot placement to help me out, that is good to know, too!)

I just know that some of our local rabbits are good, but I suspect they are never shown to the best advantage in local photo ads, and they are honestly not the quality available in other areas. The idea that rabbits have a SOP, as in dogs, is really not even well known, and judging by some of the dogs I have seen, some locals may not know dogs have SOP's either! :lol: