# Line breeding



## bunnylover (Nov 1, 2007)

How closely can you line breed rabbits? I have a trio of Californians, and I want to expand by another buck and 2 or 3 more does at least. The 2 does are mother and daughter, and the buck is unrelated to either of them. If I kept a buck from one doe's litter, would it be safe to breed him to the does of the other doe's litter? Or could I breed them back to the sire? I hope that makes sense...


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## MaggieJ (Feb 6, 2006)

Unless there are "bad genes" in there, you can linebreed rabbits for generations without encountering any decline. Linebreeding enhances characteristics both desirable and undesirable, so if there is an inherited weakness then yes, it can become worse. If there is a strength the offspring will improve. That's an oversimplification, but it gives you the basic idea.

I'm sorry, I can't recall if you are raising for meat or for other reasons. If for meat you have no worries at all. You will be eating most of the rabbits and will only save the very, very best. 

I've been inbreeding my mutts for the past three years. My senior doe, Patches, is the mother of my buck (Tao) and my two other does. Tao and Tuppence were sired by the same (unrelated) buck and are full siblings. The youngest doe, Polly, who has not yet been bred, is Patches' by Tao... and I have no qualms about breeding Polly to Tao this spring. So far, the rabbits are just getting better and better... but I cull very, very hard. If a rabbit that looks promising at 12 weeks doesn't look equally promising at 4 -5 months, it goes straight to freezer camp. And if this stops working for me, I will know it is time to bring in new blood.


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## jil101ca (Jul 2, 2007)

I line breed as well. I often breed father to daughter, mother to son. ect. The only rule is you can not breed a full brother and sister. I'm not sure why, I was told not to so I don't. I don't to chance 3 eared rabbits.


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## KSALguy (Feb 14, 2006)

brother to sister isnt bad at all, as you can see by Maggie's example, you can breed any rabbit to any rabbit regardless of genetic relationship and be fine, you just cant keep anything but the best as replacements or you will get into trouble just cause you didnt cull properly, 

if you breed closely related animals and the whole litter is bad you probably shouldnt breed ANY of them includeing the parrents ever again due to the fact that even if you used a differint unrelated partner in the next breeding your still passing on the bad traits. so cull responcibly and your fine,


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## General Brown (Jan 10, 2008)

jil101ca said:


> I I don't to chance 3 eared rabbits.



Now, just what would be wrong with a meat rabbit having 5 legs?


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## jil101ca (Jul 2, 2007)

5 legs would be ok, better yet would be thighs .:goodjob:


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## Honorine (Feb 27, 2006)

I've got rabbits that are their own granpa, I linebreed by choice. I want to fix traits and make the litters as uniform as possible, and for the most part they are. I was pretty weirded out the first time I bred my Cremes, because they weren't really linebred and the litter of 10 was all over the map in charateristics. Although its common to discourage full sibling breedings in most species its not as big of a no no in rabbits. There was a study done where rabbits were full sibling crossed for 18 generations before problems surfaced. Rabbits can handle quite a bit of inbreeding.


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## SquashNut (Sep 25, 2005)

I think we have decided not to line breed. Unless we have no other choice.
There is in-breeding and line breeding. In-breeding is brother to sister and mother to son and father to daughter.
Line breeding is uncles , aunts, cousins, and grand parents.
you can run into alot of problems with either system of breeding. Including fertility and growth rate problems, not just deformanties.
There are charts on the web showing how to line breed.


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## Beaners (Feb 23, 2005)

I just want to repeat what was said about inbreeding and linebreeding only bringing out traits that are already there. I like linebreeding in lots of different animals because it really shows you what traits are "hidden" in the lines. Brother/sister breedings are fine, especially if it is a terminal cross. Cull like crazy (which is a good habit regardless) and you will get good results.

You are far more likely to get deformities and crappy growth from breeding unrelated animals that have terrible genes than you are by breeding closely related animals with good genes.

Kayleigh


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## SquashNut (Sep 25, 2005)

I understnd what you are saying about bringing out the hidden traits by in-breeding, but when some one asks about line breeding, I usually asume they want to know as it applys to saving stock.
Producing culls for meat use can be accomplished with out much thought to a breeding program.
But producing litters with at least a few breeding prospects is a whole different concept.


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## Beaniemom (May 25, 2007)

Well, we line bred. Now, it happened by accident, mind you! I hadn't looked closely at a replacement does pedegree, yep, turns out my herd buck is her brother. Same litter. I thought, oh crap. Turns out I got two BOB bunnies out of that cross, so it turned out well. So well, I'm actually going to repeat the breeding on purpose! I actually bred her to my Bucks son (out of a dif doe) so we'll see how those turn out (that was of course the litter that I cooked, so only 2 left to see how they turned out!)

I hadn't planned on breeding that close, I thought I may do it where you cross the grandsire back in. I know I saw all these great charts online that explained it, even how to end up with all these different lines from like 3 rabbits!

I think in the future I'm going to pay less attention to who is related to whom, and more who will balance out what I need. At least we can eat the mistakes!


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## Somerhill (Dec 13, 2005)

Beaniemom said:


> I think in the future I'm going to pay less attention to who is related to whom, and more who will balance out what I need. At least we can eat the mistakes!



Excellent! My Satin Angoras are heavily linebred. I've tried to introduce new blood from time to time, and am never satisfied with the results. Like you say - pay attention to quality, and don't use anything but the best for breeding. Each generation gets better and better. I started out with litters that were all over the place in size and type. I just kept chosing the biggest, most robust rabbit with good body type and very dense wool. Now my litters are getting much more consistant in quality.

Lisa
www.somerhillfarm.com


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## steve-in-kville (Nov 12, 2005)

jil101ca said:


> The only rule is you can not breed a full brother and sister. I'm not sure why, I was told not to so I don't. I don't to chance 3 eared rabbits.



I never heard this before. I was left with the impression that litter mates were open game. Thanks for the insight, though.


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## Beaniemom (May 25, 2007)

I'm hoping that eventually all the silvering on my SF will be consitant! Its hard to pick something based on type when you dpn't know how the silver will turn out! Plus It seems like I got every kind of silver under the sun from the one breeding. At least the brother/sister cross all look the same!


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## MaggieJ (Feb 6, 2006)

Steve, most rabbit books will tell you not to breed siblings together. There is a lot of "accepted wisdom" out there that, with experience and with a plan in mind, can be sometimes disregarded. *Indiscriminate* inbreeding can cause problems. You have to be willing to choose only the very best in every way and to cull all the others. This is not a problem if you are raising rabbits for meat, of course, and quite gratifying improvements in body type, temperament, mothering skills and so forth can be seen over a few generations. But you must cull hard. The cream comes to the top... you can't make butter with the skim milk.


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## Honorine (Feb 27, 2006)

SquashNut said:


> I understnd what you are saying about bringing out the hidden traits by in-breeding, but when some one asks about line breeding, I usually asume they want to know as it applys to saving stock.
> Producing culls for meat use can be accomplished with out much thought to a breeding program.
> But producing litters with at least a few breeding prospects is a whole different concept.



Respectfully its kind of the opposite, what I try to produce in a breeding animal is that they are prepotent for the charateristics that I'm trying to fix, meaning that they will consistantly throw what I want, and I can't get that with a non-linebred animal. For instance, my best mini-rex doe Callie who throws the best typed cookie cutter babies is a half sibling cross. Her mother Cissi didn't consistantly throw as nice of kits as Callie does, and they were all over the board in size, head shape, ear length. Cissie would occasionally throw a kit as good as Callie, but Callie consistantly in every litter throws excellant very similiar babies. Doesn't matter what you breed her to, she stamps her look on them. Skipping species, my stud dog is tightly linebred and he does the same, always improves and stamps his look on his puppies. This is important even in meat rabbits, as meat pens are judged on both the quality, size, condition and consistency/similarities. Linebreeding does two things, brings out the best, and the worst. If you cull the bad and keep the best your much further ahead in the game than breeding unrelated rabbits. If all I wanted was rabbits for meat then yes, I'd breed unrelated rabbits, and it wouldn't matter if they were all different from each other in size, flesh and shape. But since I'm breeding for show and to improve my lines I have to linebreed, and I will only keep the best linebred rabbits, and even when I look for new stock I look for linebred rabbits.


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## SquashNut (Sep 25, 2005)

In this area you cann't find a pedigreed rabbit that isn't related in some way.
My senior buck and doe have been bred several times and they do have kits of several sizes and shapes in the same litter.
So what your saying is I can possibly fix this by breeding the largest son back to his mother.
I think the problem is there are so many thoughts on this. I have a pedigree program that shows in breeding percentages and indicates that breeding too close as being a bad thing. Any thing over 25 percent is not acceptable. In order to breed correctly by this concept you would need to out cross occasionally or at least breed farther apart.


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## Beaniemom (May 25, 2007)

I'd go ahead and do that cross Squashnut, what is the worst that could happen, you have to eat the results? 

I'm trying to think ahead in my breeding plan, planing on linebreeding with some outcrosses as needed. What I am thinking is I should probably decide whose lines to buy those outcrosses from and just stick to them instead of looking at every rabbit line under the sun! 

The nice thing about showing rabbits is you get to know people (good and bad) so I have a mental list of those I would buy from and those I would never ever buy from!


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## jil101ca (Jul 2, 2007)

Most of my stock I bred myself. I breed daughters back to Dad and sons to moms. I am consistantly seeing what I am after in my stock which is big rabbits with fine/small bones.Each generation is better and closeer to the body type I am after. I recently bought a nice big buck from Bernadette for some new blood and am breeding him to some "homegrown" does with fine bone features. Hopefully I will get some fine bone big rabbits with unique colouring


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