Thursday, April 20, 2006
Genetic Surprises
Would you believe after all of those non-fuzzy kits that Katee produced for me, on the very last litter, I have a fuzzy from her! Yes, it was Katee all along passing down the wool gene to my rabbits. If you have a Katee offspring, it has a 50% chance of being a wool carrier!
A friend wrote about a rabbit I used to own. He's a blue tort. Every rabbit in his pedigree is tort. That dilute gene was hidden for generations - at least the line that led to this boy. It's really a surprise; you can't see where it came from.
And I've produced some rabbits myself that show dilute or the sable gene when it was a total surprise. Sometimes I can ferret out where it came from and other times, I have no clue.
May recently threw a sable point, which was a surprise. Her parents, grandparents and great grandparents are all either tort or black. I'm guessing that she inherited the REW gene from her father. I learned about that genetic surprise on a previous litter.
I suppose a line breeding might prove out the theory, if I'm lucky. If May bred to Merlin produced a REW, it would be certain. But they could have a nice-sized litter of torts and it would prove nothing. She was bred to Anthony who is out of GC LL Brendan. I know for certain that Brendan carries dilute and I the sable gene. So I learned something about Anthony with this breeding, too.
Although I have an almost all-tort barn, my rabbits still do hold a few color surprises.
I think I wrote to someone once that chestnut was a very dominant color. I meant that, a homogenous chestnut will throw chestnuts with anything except a steel or BEW (it throws a sport with a BEW).
Then I got a note one day saying that a certain gene was "very dominant." I really couldn't complain because I had used that concept myself. But in reality, genes are subject to the laws of probability. They aren't more stubborn or flimsy or even more dominant than dominant (though some are incompletely dominant). And when you have very large samples, they behave in a very predictable way. But in small samples, we can be very easily surprised.
Color genetics are very simple.
Raise your hand if you disagree with that statement. I'm sure there are a lot of hands up (even though there is no one there to see you, I know your hand is up).
But compared to the other rabbit genes, the color genes are quite simple. There are just a few basic genes. Yes, it gets more complicated when you start talking modifiers. But you can see the results and figure out where the components came from if you have access to the appropriate records.
The other genes are much more complex. How many genes does it take to make a huge head with good teeth, a bold eye, and proper ear carriage? How many different genes reside in the same location? That is, we know there are five different c-series genes for color. How many ear placement genes are there? And in which order are they dominant?
It's no wonder we get surprises in our litters. I'm sure that many of the really great rabbits in any given breed were surprises. The real trick is to try to line those good genes up and produce those good rabbits on a regular basis.
But if you can't really figure out for sure where the pair of dilute genes came from in a line, how in the world can we figure out all of the other parts of the rabbit?
Our best tools, in my opinion, are working with a small gene pool and breeding large enough numbers from the same gene pool to start seeing patterns. To me, becoming very familiar with a small gene pool is better than having all of the very best rabbit genes in the country represented in my barn. That would be like having a grand library full of books written in languages I don't understand.
Sure, even working with a smaller gene pool we will have lots of surprises. But instead of breeding with the hope of lucking up on a really great surprise, we will be working with our herd to the point that we don't have to count on a lucky surprise for good results. In fact, it would be nice to get to the point that we are surprised if there is no nice show rabbit in each litter!
Laurie Stroupe
The Nature Trail Rabbitry
Holland Lops Of Distinction
Precious Pet Rabbits
Pet Rabbit Care Information, Quality Pet Rabbit Breeders, and Rabbit Fun ¶ 9:02 AM
A friend wrote about a rabbit I used to own. He's a blue tort. Every rabbit in his pedigree is tort. That dilute gene was hidden for generations - at least the line that led to this boy. It's really a surprise; you can't see where it came from.
And I've produced some rabbits myself that show dilute or the sable gene when it was a total surprise. Sometimes I can ferret out where it came from and other times, I have no clue.
May recently threw a sable point, which was a surprise. Her parents, grandparents and great grandparents are all either tort or black. I'm guessing that she inherited the REW gene from her father. I learned about that genetic surprise on a previous litter.
I suppose a line breeding might prove out the theory, if I'm lucky. If May bred to Merlin produced a REW, it would be certain. But they could have a nice-sized litter of torts and it would prove nothing. She was bred to Anthony who is out of GC LL Brendan. I know for certain that Brendan carries dilute and I the sable gene. So I learned something about Anthony with this breeding, too.
Although I have an almost all-tort barn, my rabbits still do hold a few color surprises.
I think I wrote to someone once that chestnut was a very dominant color. I meant that, a homogenous chestnut will throw chestnuts with anything except a steel or BEW (it throws a sport with a BEW).
Then I got a note one day saying that a certain gene was "very dominant." I really couldn't complain because I had used that concept myself. But in reality, genes are subject to the laws of probability. They aren't more stubborn or flimsy or even more dominant than dominant (though some are incompletely dominant). And when you have very large samples, they behave in a very predictable way. But in small samples, we can be very easily surprised.
Color genetics are very simple.
Raise your hand if you disagree with that statement. I'm sure there are a lot of hands up (even though there is no one there to see you, I know your hand is up).
But compared to the other rabbit genes, the color genes are quite simple. There are just a few basic genes. Yes, it gets more complicated when you start talking modifiers. But you can see the results and figure out where the components came from if you have access to the appropriate records.
The other genes are much more complex. How many genes does it take to make a huge head with good teeth, a bold eye, and proper ear carriage? How many different genes reside in the same location? That is, we know there are five different c-series genes for color. How many ear placement genes are there? And in which order are they dominant?
It's no wonder we get surprises in our litters. I'm sure that many of the really great rabbits in any given breed were surprises. The real trick is to try to line those good genes up and produce those good rabbits on a regular basis.
But if you can't really figure out for sure where the pair of dilute genes came from in a line, how in the world can we figure out all of the other parts of the rabbit?
Our best tools, in my opinion, are working with a small gene pool and breeding large enough numbers from the same gene pool to start seeing patterns. To me, becoming very familiar with a small gene pool is better than having all of the very best rabbit genes in the country represented in my barn. That would be like having a grand library full of books written in languages I don't understand.
Sure, even working with a smaller gene pool we will have lots of surprises. But instead of breeding with the hope of lucking up on a really great surprise, we will be working with our herd to the point that we don't have to count on a lucky surprise for good results. In fact, it would be nice to get to the point that we are surprised if there is no nice show rabbit in each litter!
Laurie Stroupe
The Nature Trail Rabbitry
Holland Lops Of Distinction
Precious Pet Rabbits
Pet Rabbit Care Information, Quality Pet Rabbit Breeders, and Rabbit Fun ¶ 9:02 AM
