The Tan Miniature Lop project started a few years back now when I visited a friend in Holland to acquire some Sallander Miniature Lops and ended up leaving with a lop rabbit in the colour Haaskleur. Haaskleur means Hare Coloured and the rabbit I brought back was certainly that! A very high rufus animal with a red belly. This got me to thinking that she could be utilized and possibly help in creating another colour - The Tan. I had assumed that it would be fairly easy to do this new 'project' and set about lining up the first mating
I was certainly not aware that my idea was going to be a lot harder than I first imagined. I had planned, which I executed, to use a Chocolate Otter buck of my own in the program. Super typed animal with good colour (for an otter) and also a good coat. The import doe had a fantastic coat, so this should have been followed on with, which it was. The resulting litter was a mixed bag. Some high rufus agouti's (red agouti) and one which had a lot of colouring on the belly, bordering on Haaskluer, but not quite, and then others in the litter which for all intense and purpose were just regular agouti mini lops. Disaster struck when I lost 4 of the 7 youngsters to bloat, which was the first time i had had it in my rabbits in about 3 years. All the babies I lost were the bucks and all those remaining were does. Just my luck, as I wanted to retain a buck to put back to its mother to capitalise on the rufus in her. Never mind though, I had another idea.
<< Red Agouti Doe
Very Red Agouti Doe >>
Comanchero >> The Choc Otter buck I used in the first matings.
Then came in the Tan! I was lucky enough to get hold of a tan doe from Holland on one of my next trips. This doe was not excessively high in rufus but did have a coloured belly rather than creamy white. On the big side too, but showing good body type and making me think it was something i could work with.
My next step was to mate this tan doe to the same Otter buck I used for the first matings with the Haaskleur doe. The resulting litter gave me 2 chocolate otters (high rufus) and 1 black fox and 1 choc fox. This was a setback. Having the dark chinchillation gene in the tan project was not good, but it could be worked around easily enough. I retained only the high rufus buck from this pairing; hoping I would be able to use him later on one of the does from the Haaskleurs first litter.
When the time finally came, I mated the young high rufus chocolate otter back to his mother (the black tan) and I also mated him to his half sister (the red agouti). From the Black Tan doe I got another surprise. I knew she carried the self gene, which she inturn had obviously passed on to her son, as in the litter were three blacks, one high rufus black otter and one very high rufus chocolate otter. NONE of the litter had coloured bellies. Now this was a surprise! I thought I had put enough rufus back into the breeding to produce more of it out, and in doing so, covering the belly. WRONG!
From the other mating to the high rufus choc otter boy to his half sister, again, we got a mixed bunch. Two self chocolates, two high rufus black otters one red agouti and a high rufus LILAC otter. This was very interesting as it meant that the line carries the dilution gene, which was a bonus, for my end hope was to be able to produce all four colours of tan. Although the litter was disappointing in the fact there was none of them expressing red bellies, I had at least found out I wasn't going to have to work in the dilution gene further down the line.
So it was back to my think tank to see where I wanted to go now. Back into the rabbits which weren't producing the right amount of rufus, or look towards having to add more in from a different source!
I had already started to create a 'side' line of rufus rabbits by using one of my exceptional tyepd sooty fawn males to the original Haaskleur doe. I knew I was adding into the line something that might cause problems later on (the non extension gene) but the type injection was needed and so was the extra added bonus which came with this buck who seemed to be a wideband carrier.
My next step was to speak with Donna Woodhouse - Hampton Rabbits who, along with her daughter, Lexi are also working on Tan Mini Lops. Donna is working hers down from the actual Tan rabbit and had an F3 visual wideband/high rufus Black Tan Buck that she could let me have. Ugly bugger with ears still bolt upright and really just looking like a 'fat tan' as Donna called him. But HOW useful would this buck be? He duly arrived and sat for a month or so until I decided on how I wanted to use him.
I had already done another mating with the Haaskleur doe to a Chocolate Tort buck, and the resulting litter was enormous. 11 babies in all, of which 8 survived. 6 with the mother and 2 fostered out to another doe. In this litter were another 3 red/orange's and 2 red agouti's. Both of which are bucks and are staying here to put back into the program at a later date. The best red/orange male is going to live in Holland with Edwin Langejans which is where my original Haaskleur came from and who is working on 'oranje' (the Dutch name for our Red)
From a different mating of a Red Agouti doe to a high rufus Choc Otter buck, there is a Red Agouti buck leaving here to go and live with Donna to help her further her breeding program.
I eventually decided that I needed to capitalise on the high amount of rufus in Donna's F3 tan buck and also his expression of wideband, so I mated him to my original Black Tan doe with the orange belly. 6 babies have been born. 4 Blacks and 2 Chocolates. Up to about 7 days they were showing very good rich tanning but nothing on the belly - and then day 8 came and I started to see them colouring up. And colouring up nicely too. They are now three weeks old and bellies are a very good colour. Not 100% correct, but a very good percentage of the way there, AND they are lopping.
There is a good mixture of bucks and does, so from here we can go back into the previous 'type' line and put a bit more colour back in, and hopefully, this time, get it back out....... LOL
^^ F3 Tan Buck from Donna Woodhouse
<< Belly of a 2 week old baby tan from above buck and the original lopped tan doe
Ian Gerrard from Scotland is now on board with the Tan project and we are looking forward to taking this breeding program another step further. Ian has been involved with rabbits for well over 30 years and breeds Dalmatian Rex, among other things and was looking for another challenge. And there could be nothing better than Tan Mini Lops. Ian will be taking the breeding stock from here and following our program and between us, hoepfully, we will be getting Tan Mini Lops on a show table VERY soon.
^^ Latest Black Tan Mini Lop 3 week old baby
and here it is below at 12 weeks old
and here it is below at 12 weeks old
N
E
X
T
G
E
N
E
R
A
T
I
O
N
D
O
W
N
E
X
T
G
E
N
E
R
A
T
I
O
N
D
O
W
N
4 month old buck