what is this colour/pattern?

[shazza]

not any of mine, unfortunately, but i was watching a video of a woman feeding rabbits on okunoshima (rabbit island) in japan and noticed this one dark rabbit with really odd markings. it looks like when a dog has ticking over large white markings, but i'm pretty sure that sort of thing doesn't really happen in rabbits. any ideas from our genetics experts?

he only shows up a couple of times and seems rather shy compared to the others.


also am i the only one that looks at videos of rabbit island and get a little sad that some of those beautiful genetics will never be in my herd? most of them are just chestnuts, but there's also several harlequins and really interesting VM buns too. unfortunately i can also tell that it seems people are still dumping pets too, since there's some tans and at least one really pretty magpie angora cross that i'm pretty sure didn't get randomly popped out.

 

[SableSteel]

I'd guess that it was just a steel in the middle of a bad molt. The fur (especially in the black sections) looks pretty ragged; maybe the steel section is where the new coat has come in, and the black sections is where the molt has exposed the dark undercolor. If I saw it in person it would be easier to tell undercoat from guard hairs. Maybe it's a young rabbit with silvering just coming in (the silvering comes in in patches like that) - but while I remember seeing steels from pictures of that island, I can't recall seeing any silvering/champagne colored. It's hard to tell from a picture.

If you got one with permanent color like that (just as food for thought), though, i'd call it a harlequinized steel (Esej) which usually show up as self black but can sometimes show up with harlequin-like stripes of ticking, though usually not this noticeable or bright.

 

[Dood]

I also think it's a harlequinized silver tip steel = A_ B_ cchd_ D_ Es ej

 

[LittleFluffyBunnies]

what a beautiful rabbit! I did the same thing watching those videos, "the genetics! the colors!" :lol:

In fact, I do that whenever I see an interesting rabbit and often my mom has to convince me that I can't buy it. "But the genetics!"

Wouldn't rabbit island be such a fun experience!

 

[shazza]

I also think it's a harlequinized silver tip steel = A_ B_ cchd_ D_ Es ej

fascinating! what kind of cross do you think would be required to achieve this? i have harlequins and silver tip steels so of course i'm sitting here like :mrgreen:

LFB, i do the same thing, but my mom isn't around to talk me out of it ;P my husband doesn't really care either as long as i can still feed it, haha. my justification is that i make most of my money back from the rabbits by selling the pelts, and people love interesting furs so the more diverse genetics i have the more fun bunnies i can make, and the more money i can make from them haha

i want to visit rabbit island someday but it's gonna be REAL hard not to bring a suspiciously large handbag with me and stuff a few pretty ones in it to bring home

 

[twr]

FWIW my money is on this being a temporary pattern due to moulting into silvering.

If this is harlequin based it is a very dark pattern overall combined with a large light area with no visible brindling and a mismatched leg. I think that is a rather unlikely combination.

In principle, mosaic and chimera could cause this sort of pattern, but are very rare, so also unlikely.