blue eyed rabbits

[momma_to_seven_chi]

Anyone familiar with blue eyed rabbits? *I bought one at a livestock auction in August. *She is a small pretty white NZ(looking) cross with blue eyes. *It must be a dominant trait because now I have a bunch of orange *and white *bunnies with blue eyes. They are beautiful. *My bucks are both just NZ whites. I had never seen a rabbit with blue eyes before, so I bought her just because she was pretty. *She's very small at about 4lbs. *Some of my giants are 15lbs, so she is tiny. I'm guessing her bunnies will be medium sized.

[harvester]

I believe the Beveren rabbit normally has blue eyes in its white coated variety.
However there are many rabbit breeders that are trying to develop the BEW (blue eyed white) gene in other breeds.

[fancyfowl]

You got colored kits from a white to white mating?
White masks color, some whites can be red, black or whatever and test mating can determine which they are.
The red eye whites are albino and the blue eyed are viennas. they need to be homozygous for vienna(vv) to be white w. blue eyes.
Red eye wghites we use in breeding any color variety but not so with the bew because they can make the wrong eye color in the offspring.

The Mini Rex breed recognises both REW and BEW.

[momma_to_seven_chi]

I have some orange bunnies from the white/blue eyed doe. *My rabbits are a colony, and the two full-grown bucks are nz whites. *It may be possible that she actually mated with another (young) buck that is in there because it is a colony. I am going to cull out a lot of them to sell when it gets closer to Resurrection Day. I really haven't sexed the young ones since they are so small. So I "think" she mated with the bucks, but anything is possible in a colony. *I really haven't sorted rabbits since late last year. The only ones I have been sorting out of the colony recently have been the lops. *I'm not overly fond of them.
I really don't know a lot about rabbit breeds, I just keep them to give the area kids 4h bunnies and fill the freezer. *The blue-eyed babies are pretty though, especially the orangish yellow ones.

[harvester]

More than likely the orange bunnies are comming from your nz bucks. They are probably descendants of new zealand reds, they are orangish.
The blue in your doe isnt an indication of breed. only an indication that she has the ability to throw color as she is not albino.

[fancyfowl]

white is recessive, white to white would be 2 recessive genes and this mating can only make white. To express a color 1 or the other must be a colored animal which allows the dominant gene for whichever color to be expressed.

It would be possible to produce a weak colored red from a white to red mating deopending on the quality of the red parent.

Some people think you can breed a broken by crossing a solid and a white but that is not possible unless 1 parent carries the broken pattern gene. I breed whites and blacks and only get good whites and blacks, knowing my white is a genetic black.

[harvester]

yes but when you have the blue eyes you no longer have a tru white gene. blue eyes indicate that the white is not true white and carries color.