A lot has changed in the last say 10 years when it comes to acquiring stock. It used to be that if you were after quality show stock you would go to local shows, or national breed shows, meet up with breeders, and you’d put your hands on some potential new stock to purchase. Although hands on is still arguably the best (and probably safest) way to evaluate and acquire new stock, its just not always practical. We live in the age of the internet after all, and a great many sales/presales are done over the internet well in advance of shows, or shows are skipped completely and 3rd party transporters are used. This has been great and terrible at the same time!

The biggest benefit is that people have a greater access to high quality stock, that they may not have been able to otherwise, and the ability to get different lines to out cross in the same colour instead of resorting to other colour out crossing to bring in fresh blood, therefor allowing programs to stay colour true if that is their goal. The biggest draw back is you pay top dollar for a golden bunny expecting your new herd sire (i mean come on the pictures looked fantastic!) only to get it and realize it wouldn’t have made it past your first round of culling…. Or worse yet you bring something disease wise into your barn(on that note, always quarantine new acquisitions away from your main herd!)

Helpful hints on what to look for on pictures and what to watch out for.

Keep in mind that people are often posing and taking the picture themselves so they wont always be perfect. Ideally you want to see 3 views, a side profile, a rear shot and a shot from above. I have 2 pictures of a blue fawn (the same rabbit), taken from different angles. When i look for proper pose im looking at the back end first that the back toes line up with where the knee is (and for extra credit i like to see the high point line up there aswell), then i look at the front end, ideally you want those elbows on the ground and front toes even with eyes… good luck there but you want it at least ball parked. Front legs jacked up under the shoulder can compensate and hide low/weak shoulders, or hide a delayed shoulder. Back toes too close to the elbow and past the knee point are over posed and a way to make a rabbit appear deeper then it actually is. Many times it’s accidental and just a result of the rabbit fighting the pose. If you look at the picture of the black orange tri, you can see his back end is way over posed giving him a lot more height then he deserves (also makes his back end look undercut which it is not). Glaring once you look for it but sometimes cropped out or hidden by the camera angle and show table lip. Another common way faults are hidden is to hold the ears against the back/shoulders, commonly long shoulders or delays are hidden that way.

The more pictures you take of your own rabbits that you know their faults and strengths, the easier it will be to pick faults out of rabbits you see on line, and the more you will catch sly things so as not to become a victim!

Another easy pit fall to fall in is the line game. If a breeder is selling a such and such line rabbit, but is not that person, then as far as im concerned it isn’t that persons line any more. Breeding two Jax’s rabbits for example, does not mean you have a jax’s baby, unless of course it comes from me. How come you ask? Because a breeders line is built not only on their genetics, but also on their style of breeding and culling. If a breeder sells a rabbit, its typically because its good, but they have better. In all things breeding, it only takes a generation to improve or ruin a line. And to a certain extent breeding is a gamble anyways, you just stack the deck in your favour when you start off with quality stock. Sometimes the awesome show rabbit is out produced by its brood quality litter mate… you just can’t know sometimes until you breed them. As far as im concerned the only time Lines matter(when not getting them from the source) is if you have a specific line and want to stay related line breeding, i have seen first hand that sometimes different lines just don’t cross very well.

Always think critically. If someone is offering a show quality 8 week(or younger i have seen people presaleing kits, which isn’t allowed here btw) bunnies, and the whole litter is show quality, papered etc, yet nothings posed for proper evaluation, and the breeder them selves do not show, you may want to think twice about it. They might be great rabbits, but more then likely they will be average at best. In all the years i’ve bred and shown rabbits, i’ve yet to have an entire litter end up show quality… DQ free maybe, but all top show quality nope! And there IS a difference. Just like showing regions. In an area with less rex competition the quality could be lower, but the rabbits are earning legs. Another area the rabbits could be higher quality but not earning legs because the rex are super competitive and there is far more of them. Remeber, a leg can be earned by getting first in a class with atleast 5 rabbits by 3 exhibitors, or it could be earned by getting best of breed over 200 rex, or it could be earned by winning best in show out of 500+ rabbits, and that makes a big difference. That makes it hard because on paper rabbit A looks better, but often times tabled side by side rabbit B will win out. That’s why i always look at the rabbit for qualities that will benefit my herd, try not to get distracted by patterns, pedigrees, or lines, they should never trump what you see before you.

A good breeder should be able to dissect that rabbit for you and list all its weaknesses in addition to the strengths. And remember Type, fur then pattern and colour!!! its easiest to fix pattern and colour, but a heck of alot harder to correct bad type, so lock your type in then worry about colour/pattern.