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The subject of intentional breeding or meat rabbits is prohibited. The answers provided on this board are for general guideline purposes only. The information is not intended to diagnose or treat your pet. It is your responsibility to assess the information being given and seek professional advice/second opinion from your veterinarian and/or qualified behaviorist.
› Forum › THE LOUNGE › Any of your bunnies change color?
She’s a little more than a year old at this point, still growing (which is scary because she’s HUGE), and changing color!!!! When I got her she was white as snow! Then slowly her nose, booty, and ears started going silver. Now the tip of most of her fur is silver!! I’ll try to grab a picture, she’s getting crazy with the color! Has that ever happened to anyone else?
Now that I look, the way she’s changing, it looks like a snowshoe hare. Weird.
It sounds like she’s a Californian – they’re born white and the black “points” come out with age (though I thought they came out in a few months, so it’s pretty cool that she’s still changing). Do you have pics of her now that she’s grown up?
I had a couple gerbils in the same color (called silver nutmeg) – they started out white and got brownish ticking in their fur as they aged along with darker noses and feet, then got whiter again as they got old. Very cool!
My Tammo used to be a much lighter brown color when he was a baby…he didn’t change color entirely but he darkened a lot as he got older.
On a somewhat unrelated note, my sister got two fish one year (a silver and a gold); the gold one died soon afterwards and the silver one turned gold and lived for the next 7 years
Smudge sometimes turns green… but thats about it. And that only happens after dinner
Stormy (my Harlequin) has lightened with age. He used to be dark grey and beige and now his grey in some spots is almost white and the beige has lightened quite a bit. Olivia has 2 tone fur, sometimes she’s totally steel grey and sometimes, when shedding, has a lot of beige showing too.
One of my rabbits is an agouti, so she’s always changing. Her coat seems to gradually be getting darker and darker, and her belly doesn’t have as much tan fur as it used to.
I was thinking that your bunny might be a Californian rabbit, but they don’t usually get tipped fur – just their ears, nose, paws and tail are tipped. I’d like to see a recent picture of her.
I’ll be uploading tomorrow and I’ll make sure to post them to this thread! I thought it was adorable when her nose, booty, and ears started to turn. Then the rest of her fur began changing and I was like “Whaaaaaat?” Of course she’s still adorable, just darkening down I suppose! All the fur she sheds out now is primarily white. But I’ll definitely upload photos tomorrow!
You can see a bit of the shading showing in your siggy pic from when she was younger. It sounds like she might have frosted pearl colouring or frost pointed colouring .
My Cooley used to be pure white and then changed to have frosted brown tips on her fur.
The new bunny “squee” is exactly the opposite. He is black with tan on the tips of his fur
And rocket, our Dutch bunny is our only bunny who loves to lie in the sun, in a window or anywhere in a sunbeam. Because of this his black is now a deep deep red.
And by Cooley, I mean *flopsy. Damn you auto correct!
I did a double take Kafrn, thinking who the heck is Cooley? Why does the phone think “Cooley” is more of a word than “Flopsy”? Lol.
Who knows?! Steve Jobs is a strange, strange man….
She looks like a sable point (colouring) to me..
I have siamese sables and as they get older they progressivly get darker.. when i got my girl Hershey she was silver / brown with a black nse, now at 2 years old shes a deep chocolate brown and will continue to get darker with age untill she’s completely black (or passes away) whatever comes first. Same with my other siamese sable Twix.
usually it starts in patches on Hershey’s back and for Twix her butt turns dark then the colour moves up (her butt looks like its getti ng larger everyday! lol ) each bunny darkens differently – thats something you dont hear everyday!
So if your baby girls a sable she might be getting darker but since she looks like a pearl she shouldnt get too dark.
Hopefully these work!
For those who are too lazy to copy & paste, such as myself.
Haha, thanks so much! Typically when I post pictures they’re HUGE
Oh, she’s gorgeous!
Frankie’s fur lightens and darkens a bit throughout the year, but nothing major. I love the silver on your bun :]
Yeah, Felony seems to get more orange with every shed, but his skirt on his booty gets lighter with every shed.
The same kind of thing is happening to my bunny. He’s a different color though (going from orange to almost light brown). He’s 8 months so I’m not yet 100% sure if it’s a seasonal or a turning-into-an-adult thing.
Here are pics!
4 months, light orange
8 months, light brown
She’s beautiful!!
And yeah, definitely not a californian like I thought from your description. Haha. I have no idea what she is, but she’s gorgeous.
A very similar color, actually, to the silver nutmeg gerbils I had who got darker as they aged (though silver nutmeg isn’t also a bunny color). The color was genetically related to sort of a siamese sable type color though (that’s what their litter mates were).
Otti, it looks to me like Sammi is an agouti – he didn’t have the ticking on the ends of his baby coat, but as he aged they grew in.
All of these color change buns are so interesting!
Otti, your bunny’s coat color almost reminds me of a light tortoise-shell color, like this bunny: http://www.thenaturetrail.com/photo…te-200.jpg
Does he have tipped fur?
He’s not a tort because they don’t have the light coloring on the tummy and around the eyes, or the dark lacing around the ears. He definitely seems to be some sort of agouti based color.
Yeah I’m leaning towards the agouti. He has a lot of variation in his fur right now, some black specks, dark brown, orange, light yellow, and even some cream striations going on near his back legs. I think we’ll have to wait and see for the full effect LOL
What are the bands of color when you look at an individual hair? Each agouti type has a very specific banding pattern that you can use to nail down the color.
hmmm I’ll check tonight and let you guys know.
Lion has been getting darker, from white to grey too! I just posted this to Elrohwen because her Hannah looks like she did the same too.
Okay so I checked and Sammy still has some hair that looks like it’s shedding off that goes from white to orange. The darker hair that he’s developing instead is white to orange to brown to almost black right at the tip.
Do you know what kind of agouti that would make him?
I thought Sammy might be lynx palamino colouring. There is copper agouti and chocolate agouti – Maybe Sammy is one of those. Be interesting to hear if he does have the banded fur. I *think* with agouti the white belly fur will have a darker base. I don’t know if that’s true of the white belly fur on palimono colourations though.
I can’t believe the change in Lucy! In size and colour. That’s quite amazing.
I thought Sammy might be lynx palamino colouring. There is copper agouti and chocolate agouti – Maybe Sammy is one of those. Be interesting to hear if he does have the banded fur. I *think* with agouti the white belly fur will have a darker base. I don’t know if that’s true of the white belly fur on palimono colourations though.
I can’t believe the change in Lucy! In size and colour. That’s quite amazing.
I just posted but it got lost.
I thought Sammy might be lynx palomino colouring. There is copper agouti and chocolate agouti – Maybe Sammy is one of those. Be interesting to hear if he does have the banded fur. I *think* with agouti the white belly fur will have a darker base. I don’t know if that’s true of the white belly fur on palomino colourations though.
I can’t believe the change in Lucy! In size and colour. That’s quite amazing.
You posted 3 times JG
I just posted but it got lost.
I thought Sammy might be lynx palomino colouring. There is copper agouti and chocolate agouti – Maybe Sammy is one of those. Be interesting to hear if he does have the banded fur. I *think* with agouti the white belly fur will have a darker base. I don’t know if that’s true of the white belly fur on palomino colourations though.
I can’t believe the change in Lucy! In size and colour. That’s quite amazing.
I just posted but it got lost.
I thought Sammy might be lynx palomino colouring. There is copper agouti and chocolate agouti – Maybe Sammy is one of those. Be interesting to hear if he does have the banded fur. I *think* with agouti the white belly fur will have a darker base. I don’t know if that’s true of the white belly fur on palomino colourations though.
I can’t believe the change in Lucy! In size and colour. That’s quite amazing.
I just posted but it got lost.
I thought Sammy might be lynx palomino colouring. There is copper agouti and chocolate agouti – Maybe Sammy is one of those. Be interesting to hear if he does have the banded fur. I *think* with agouti the white belly fur will have a darker base. I don’t know if that’s true of the white belly fur on palomino colourations though.
I can’t believe the change in Lucy! In size and colour. That’s quite amazing.
I think Jerseys post got lost any one seen it?!?!
Er more than 3 it seems. *blush*
Every time I submited nothing came up so I kept submitting. :p Sorry FL’s.
@ Otti, from your description he may be chocolate agouti. The band colours are tan, chocolate and chestnut tip. What colour if the base of his belly fur? That latest picture of him reminds me a little of the arba.net pic for the britannia petite breed. Though he’s bigger. I wonder if he has a little of that breed in him?
Posted By Lintini on 01/18/2011 07:06 PM
Lion has been getting darker, from white to grey too! I just posted this to Elrohwen because her Hannah looks like she did the same too.
I don’t think Hannah has gotten darker the same way that Lion and Lucy have though – she didn’t start out white. She may have gotten more black ticking on the tips as she got older, but she looks pretty much the same in the pics I found (at least the ones without flash) as she does now.
Posted By Otti on 01/18/2011 07:55 PM
Okay so I checked and Sammy still has some hair that looks like it’s shedding off that goes from white to orange. The darker hair that he’s developing instead is white to orange to brown to almost black right at the tip.Do you know what kind of agouti that would make him?
I’ve been researching different agouti colors and it’s hard to tell! I can’t find a really good list with pictures of each. I also can’t find the genetics of the palomino’s standard golden color. Some palomino rabbits do come in lynx, which is an agouti color, so I would guess the standard palomino color is also agouti – probably an agouti fawn or cream or something. In these colors, one of the genes erases the black tipping so the coat doesn’t look typically agouti, but it is – you still get the white belly, eye circles, etc. But since Sammy has the ticking, I would guess he’s not an agouti cream or fawn.
Any color can be modified by the agouti gene, so it’s tough for me to figure out what he is. This list has most colors with genetics, so you can at least look at the names, then maybe do a google search for the colors. The last few rows have all of the agouti colors (anything with A- in the genetics). I would say he probably doesn’t have the seal, himalayan, or REW gene, so the other columns might give you some ideas.
http://www.thenaturetrail.com/Rabbit-Coat-Color-Chart.htm
I think the science of color is very interesting. I learned a lot about it when my friend got into researching to see what color stud she would have to breed to for her horse to have a buckskin foal.
I think it’s neat to have a baby and not know what color it will turn out. For horses, it can be quite significant. There is a breed of horses that is born completely black and lightens with age. Eventually the horse turns completely white. The horse in this pic is about 16 years old but was born completely black. He still has a bit of lightening to do (He’s one of the famous Lippizaner Stallions that tour all over the world. They stabled at my horse’s stable for a night after their show here. Winnie had a big celebrity in her stall. )
This is my most recent pic of Stormy. The second is a couple of years ago. The grey has faded quite a bit and the beige on his nose is lighter too. It’s not the greatest comparison pic so you might not be able to tell but his beige and grey have lightened, most notably on his forehead. When he sheds a lot of the fur comes off white now and it used to be dark grey.
Link was black when we got him as a baby. Now (7 months later) he’s flecked with gray all over his body, except for his head.
I love color genetics too! It’s so interesting. I have saved pictures of an Appaloosa on my other computer that started out life very chestnut and lightened every year (while getting more white spots). By 5 years old she was completely golden with a lot of white. Beautiful.
Lipizzaners are amazing horses! You’re so lucky to meet one of them up close.
All grey horses, not just Lipizzaners, are actually born black or bay, then lighten with age – typically ending up white as adults. So most horses we think of as “white” are actually grey and were born completely dark. True white horses are very rare.
Wow! Didn’t know that about horses. LPT, thanks for the pic. I can imagine you might have wanted to camp there that night!
Some palomino rabbits do come in lynx, which is an agouti color,
I did read that yesterday…lynx also known as lilac agouti? My only familiarity with the lynx term was palomino colour rabbits that have grey and orange in the coat. So I was confused
to read lilac agouti. Doesn’t take much to confuse my with colouring terminolgy though. Lol!
Elrohwen, if you ever have too much time on your hands maybe you could give a genetics and colouring Basis 101 lesson in the Lounge. I’m enrolling now if you ever do!
Or you could just point me to some sites that don’t just throw you straight into the genetics. ; )
Even when you search for images of colourations in rabbits, often it’s the angora rabbits and it can look so completely different in them due to their wool.
On agouti, I did read there should be at least 3 distinct bands of colour on the fur shaft. With chinchilla it is just two. On that, I saw this image of a Doe classed as chinchilla
colouring and thought it a bit like MissPinUps Lucy. Looks like a diluted version. Could Lucy be chinchilla or more the smoke pearl or frosted variety?
source:http://www.rebellerabbitstud.com/Does.html
Sooooo I checked again and sammy’s white fur on his stomach is 100% white so does that means he’s not agouti?
I don’t think that means he’s not agouti – their tummies don’t have ticking like the backs do, just the white color that’s on the base of the hair shaft. The white stomach is a hallmark of the agouti colors. The otters (like ChaCha) also have white tummies, but otter rabbits cannot also be agouti since the agouti gene is dominant.
Jersey, did the site say what color that bun is? It reminds me of Hannah’s color which is sable chinchilla, but I’m not sure. I’m so bad at the agouti colors.
My best guess on Lucy is that she’s a frosted point (aka ermine I think). It’s genetically similar to orange (an agouti color), but with the chinchilla gene which makes it almost all white with ticking and darker nose. When I look up frosted point buns they look like Lucy and Lion to me. Frosted point can also be modified by blue, lilac, chocolate, etc so it’s possible to get a lot of different fur tip colors (though I imagine black or brown ticking would be the most common).
And I’d love to do a color genetics 101 post! I’ve always loved genetics.
Ok, so I finally found a site with good pictures of the differnet colors, instead of just the genetics. If you look for the frosted pearl that reminds me of Lucy (this is the same color as ermine or frosted point I mentioned in my last post).
http://www.rebeccasrabbitry.com/minilopcolorguide.html
It’s genetically similar to orange (an agouti color),
I saw this on that chart! I was thinking how is orange agouti? I’m enrolled in the class but Ms El, I warn you, I won’t be a very good student.
On the other site you linked there’s an orange lop called Great Balls of Fire. Lol ! Lots of amazing colours. I liked the black gold tip steel.
Re: The pic I posted above was classed as Chinchilla. Parents; chocolate chinchilla X Castor
Great Balls of Fire?! LOL Best bunny name ever!
I forget why orange doesn’t have the tipping, but it is actually an agouti color. It’s odd! There’s some other gene interaction I think that gets rid of the ticking. I’ll have to research that one because I could be making this all up, but I think I remember reading it somewhere.
Also interesting about that rex you posted. It’s so hard for me to tell colors in rexes and angoras – they look totally different than in the “medium” furred breeds. That chin rex is such a silver color – very shimmery compared to a chin in a different breed. Very cool.
There was a siblings pic with that rex and it looked slightly darker, more of the grey thru the coat.
I noticed on the rebecca rabbitry site with chestnut agouti theres a black and chocolate version. Rumball is chestnut agouti but I wasn’t aware if could be defined further.
Judging from the pic I’d say he’s the black chestnut agouti – where does the Black in the name come from? The hair tips? Ear shading?
I would say he’s black chestnut as well – chocolate is kind of uncommon I think and black chestnut is kind of the standard agouti color like he is.
The black vs chocolate comes from the second gene – the B gene. If it’s B- it’s black, if it’s bb it’s chocolate and all rabbits must be one or the other (there aren’t any other genes at that location, just the two). Blacks can be diluted into blues and chocolates can be diluted into lilac, and they can be modified into other colors (like oranges, etc).
I think you’re right that the black gene would make his fur tips black, while the chocolate gene would make them chocolate because it basically swaps out any black in the coat for brown.
Yeah from the picture Sammy is a black chestnut agouti as well (or becoming one at least lol). Thanks for the help! This was all super interesting
Yeah, I would guess chestnut as well since I can’t think of anything better. Haha. I’m still not sure why he was so orange as a baby and has gotten darker, since you can search baby chestnut bunnies online and they’re already dark. Could just be a unique thing that only happens with some buns I guess.
Bahahahaha
heh heh!
There is a give away on this trick though. I spy a little Addie tail!
Haha! Love the magical colour changing bunny!!!
Posted By MissPinUp on 1/14/2011 12:55 PM
She’s a little more than a year old at this point, still growing (which is scary because she’s HUGE), and changing color!!!! When I got her she was white as snow! Then slowly her nose, booty, and ears started going silver. Now the tip of most of her fur is silver!! I’ll try to grab a picture, she’s getting crazy with the color! Has that ever happened to anyone else?
What age do they change colors I have one she is still all white she is 3 months old I got her when she was 5 weeks old
Posted By Jackie Snowflake on 11/22/2014 1:52 PM
Posted By MissPinUp on 1/14/2011 12:55 PM
She’s a little more than a year old at this point, still growing (which is scary because she’s HUGE), and changing color!!!! When I got her she was white as snow! Then slowly her nose, booty, and ears started going silver. Now the tip of most of her fur is silver!! I’ll try to grab a picture, she’s getting crazy with the color! Has that ever happened to anyone else?
What age do they change colors I have one she is still all white she is 3 months old I got her when she was 5 weeks old
Welcome to BB Jackie! I just wanted to point out that this thread is from 2011. We ask that you don’t drag up old threads because it’s confusing to our members. If you have a question, start a new thread. You will get an answer much more quickly that way.
I will try to answer your question. It seems most bunnies will start to change color when their adult coats start coming in. Not all bunnies change color and I would imagine that if your bunny is white then you probably won’t see a ton of change.
› Forum › THE LOUNGE › Any of your bunnies change color?