My French Angoras Ears Lopped which way to go

[ckcs]

My 9 week old French Angora Bucks ears have lopped. He is about 3 - 3.5 lbs. His sisters ears haven't done this. I have seen the parents in person and their ears were fine. They were also 8-10lbs so no chance it is a Fuzzy Lop. I don't know what is in the line but the adults looked like you'd expect a French Angora to look like.

My dilemma is whether I want to breed for it, breed it out or possibly both. I'm assuming the buck just has a wider crown. I gather lopping ears are not super uncommon in non lopped breeds. Am I correct on that? Since almost all of my breeding has been with Lionheads that have shorter ears, I am not real familiar with this. Here are his pictures. The bald spot on the neck is an ongoing issue. His two sisters have regrown their hair in that area, he is regrowing it much slower. I've been treating them with DE for possible fur mites despite no real evidence to support that besides the balding. None the less it has been getting better.

 

[ladysown]

I'd honestly give him some time and see what happens with those ears.

Sometimes bunnies do odd things with their ears....

 

[skysthelimit]

Sometimes ears go down with growth spurts. I have a Rex buck with heavy ears and they don't stand as tall as the other Rex.


But...the ears of his kits were like that too, even at 7-8 mos old, they were heavy and never quite stood up.

Id' wait, but I would not want that in my lines.

 

[Dood]

What are your plans for your Angora kits ?

If you only want to sell for pets then it might be cute

But

If you want to sell breeding stock or for show then most buyers won't appreciate their supposedly purebred Angora having loppy ears or producing loppy eared kits.

 

[ckcs]

What are your plans for your Angora kits ?

If you only want to sell for pets then it might be cute

But

If you want to sell breeding stock or for show then most buyers won't appreciate their supposedly purebred Angora having loppy ears or producing loppy eared kits.

I will likely be selling to pet owners or people who want to spin. I wouldn't market them for show unless the ears didn't lop for several generations and do well on a table. I will likely be adding new stock by then. I'm curious if it is a genetic abnormality or another breed in the line. If there was a lop in the line am I correct that they would have had to breed 2 crosses to regain the Angora Wool? Something like this.
FA - Lop (will produce 100% kits without wool)
FALOP - FALOP (both without Angora Wool but would produce 25% kits with wool)
FALOP (with wool) - FA (would produce 100% kits with wool)
and so on.

Here is another question. I wouldn't show the lop ear FA but.... Would the ears disqualify him? I see that ears are only 4 points so he could potentially do well if everything else was good. The ears may tend to bias a judges opinion of him in other areas.