Inbreeding - what can be the consiquences please?

Hi....

Anyone know what can happen if a bun is inbred.... short term and long term?

What affects would it have on their health etc?

Also, can you answer this question for babies born to a brother/sister mating and a mum/son mating.

Obviously I am not intending on breeding, mine are neutered, but I know of a bun for sale that has been inbred and I want to know what warnings they should come with.

Thank you ever so much. Any experiences or comments welcome

My 2 newest fosters are the results of a brother sister mating and they have terrible teeth and eye problems and are only 10 months old, Dex actually had to have his front teeth out already.

Spike was one of the Oxford rescue buns who all had horrendous problems due to inbreeding. Spikes teeth were awful and he had the front ones removed and the back ones were misaligned as well.

I've just been googling looking for information on the subject and came across this - http://answers.yahoo.com/question/index?qid=20090505120548AATSPXF - :shock: No wonder people think it's ok to inbreed with some of the answers given on there! :evil:

I've actually found dozens of sites saying it's acceptable. There are obviously a right bunch of idiots in this world. :shock:

Anyhoo, I suspect my Daphne is inbred - she came from a pet shop (which I will NEVER be using again) that breeds their own stock. I went there a while a go and they had a family of gorgeous blue bunnies - brothers and sisters - and the next time I went, one of the does had been put in a different cage (still on the shop floor and low enough for the managers jack russell to growl and bark at them all day :evil and she had seven babies. All blue again. The buck was still there, obviously had developed some kind of teeth problem so I suspect that he was inbred himself and then bred to his sister. I got some of the babies out for cuddles and a lot of them had bald patches and were in poor fur condition with frazzled looking whiskers - I'm not sure if this was due to inbreeding or because of the conditions they were being forced to exist in.

Daphne has had teeth problems all her life and has completely bunged up tear ducts. Her eyes have been flushed 6 times, which has been utterly unsuccessful. She's had her molars burred more times than I can count and recently had her incisors out completely as they were completely mis-alligned. She is also incredibly scatty and terrified of people. I've tried handling her gently and giving her treats etc. She's now four and still will not come near me. I've literally tried everything I can think of to tame her but I now wonder if she has some kind of brain problem too as she doesn't seem quite 'all there'. She runs into walls and all sorts. :?

Teeth problems are the most obvious result of inbreeding (although they can occur in well bred bunnies too!) and a lowered immune system is common.

I believe they can also suffer bone deformities/weaknesses along with sight trouble, hearing trouble etc.

Inbreeding isn't good!

ETA - Just remembered I have a picture of one of the babies. This is one of the healthier looking ones - somebody would have seen these babies and bought them only to discover they have issues. I just hope they found good homes with people willing to pay the vet bills.

Look how small the hutches are!

I think it depends on the level of inbreeding and the exact line (there was a post the other day saying brother to sister is worst), but I would imagine it also has a major cumulative effect, eg. generations of inbreeding would exaggerate and worsen any genetic defects.

From a Breeder's Website :

''Inbreeding is breeding brother to sister. Inbreeding is a great way to "set" the characteristics of the sire and dam. When you inbreed, you have a greater chance of genes "lining up," both good and bad. When you inbreed, cull heavily, only keeping what you are really pleased with. Because the poor characteristics are just as "set" as the good ones''

cant be 100% sure but Pearl being a rare breed AND developing a heart problem i believe shes inbred and thats why her heart is iffy. all i know about her is she was part of an unwanted litter

Yes inbreeding sets in certain traits. It can be a good or bad thing. If you breed two healthy rabbits with no genetic problems, you'll get healthy rabbits, but if you keep inbreeding/line breeding with unhealthy buns thats when you'll get a problem. I personally thing line breeding with healthy rabbits is a lot better than outcrossing to rabbits that have also been outcrossed themselves, as they could carry anything.

It can also be a way to test for genetic problems, and if a rabbit is found to have a problem, the breeder may choose to remove the rabbit from his/her breeding program.

breeders with a good strong line can breed mum to son dad to daughter but their babies have to be bred out or the genetics will close up and thats when deformities start etc. but obviously theres still risks in mum son dad daughter breeding so would never advise it. my mum got a healthy champion cat from an accidental mum to son breeding but to be honest their still silly unnessary risks.

i still get a nigling feeling that Crystal was in some way related to her babies dad they came from teh same garden centre at teh same time, one of the babies had very bad teeth need incissors cut at only 5/6 weeks old becaus ethey were growing up his lip towards his nose and grew back again withina week and a half!, and another had constant eye problems and took fits he died only a year old poor flopsy.

georgie_f said:

I've just been googling looking for information on the subject and came across this - http://answers.yahoo.com/question/index?qid=20090505120548AATSPXF - :shock: No wonder people think it's ok to inbreed with some of the answers given on there! :evil:

I've actually found dozens of sites saying it's acceptable. There are obviously a right bunch of idiots in this world. :shock:

Anyhoo, I suspect my Daphne is inbred - she came from a pet shop (which I will NEVER be using again) that breeds their own stock. I went there a while a go and they had a family of gorgeous blue bunnies - brothers and sisters - and the next time I went, one of the does had been put in a different cage (still on the shop floor and low enough for the managers jack russell to growl and bark at them all day :evil and she had seven babies. All blue again. The buck was still there, obviously had developed some kind of teeth problem so I suspect that he was inbred himself and then bred to his sister. I got some of the babies out for cuddles and a lot of them had bald patches and were in poor fur condition with frazzled looking whiskers - I'm not sure if this was due to inbreeding or because of the conditions they were being forced to exist in.

Daphne has had teeth problems all her life and has completely bunged up tear ducts. Her eyes have been flushed 6 times, which has been utterly unsuccessful. She's had her molars burred more times than I can count and recently had her incisors out completely as they were completely mis-alligned. She is also incredibly scatty and terrified of people. I've tried handling her gently and giving her treats etc. She's now four and still will not come near me. I've literally tried everything I can think of to tame her but I now wonder if she has some kind of brain problem too as she doesn't seem quite 'all there'. She runs into walls and all sorts. :?

Teeth problems are the most obvious result of inbreeding (although they can occur in well bred bunnies too!) and a lowered immune system is common.

I believe they can also suffer bone deformities/weaknesses along with sight trouble, hearing trouble etc.

Inbreeding isn't good!

ETA - Just remembered I have a picture of one of the babies. This is one of the healthier looking ones - somebody would have seen these babies and bought them only to discover they have issues. I just hope they found good homes with people willing to pay the vet bills.

Look how small the hutches are!

Click to expand...

And if you make any sensible comment on there then you get flamed by morons, one of the reasons that I stopped going on there is because I git very annoyed about the whole community of ingnorant and plainly just stupid people on there; one person even claimed that vaccines would kill a rabbit. Sorry for the rant

It causes utter heart ache ....... and loss I don't care what anyone say's I've had to live through 2 years of the effects of interbreeding and I'd give anything to have my Ivy back - He never lived a normal Life, I had to watch everything he ate, He spent most of his life living on Fibreplex, and we were at the vets probably once a month with something or other.

It's just wrong and ANYONE who might even think it could be okay in my opinion is completely bonkers, and needs their head looking at - would you tell a father to have a baby with his daughter?? I may be biased, and I don't care I've seen it too many times to believe anything else

Chipmunk_K said:

It causes utter heart ache ....... and loss I don't care what anyone say's I've had to live through 2 years of the effects of interbreeding and I'd give anything to have my Ivy back - He never lived a normal Life, I had to watch everything he ate, He spent most of his life living on Fibreplex, and we were at the vets probably once a month with something or other.

It's just wrong and ANYONE who might even think it could be okay in my opinion is completely bonkers, and needs their head looking at - would you tell a father to have a baby with his daughter?? I may be biased, and I don't care I've seen it too many times to believe anything else

Click to expand...

Agreed! :wave: Related rabbits (and humans, monkeys, dogs, whales... anything) should not be bred together. The only reason I have found to inbreed is to improve the look of a rabbit. IMO, if people are breeding purely to make a nicer looking rabbit, they are selfish, probably doing it for money, have no regard for the welfare of any babies that may be born with problems and shouldn't have rabbits in the first place. Just the risk that a baby *might* have problems would be enough for me to never ever do it.