Remember When: Pointed White English Angora, So Cute So Troubled

In 1984, a new sub-variety of English Angora was accepted by the ARBA. At that time, it was called "Himi". The marking is the same as a Californian or a Himalayan; dark points and white body. Himi was accepted for showing in 1985, it was classified in the colored variety when showing in the regular classes but classified as white variety when showing in wool. Confusing? You bet. The show catalogs had to give special instructions about how to enter himi. In 1986, when the new ARBA Standard of Perfection was published, himi was renamed "Pointed White". For showing, it is in the white variety and remains the same since.

Betty says,

"I got a himi buck from Gini, a result of a trade. Gini wanted a fawn buck from Bubbling Champagne, so I received Jonathan as a trade.

Jonathan was a sweetie, pretty nice in both wool and type. He received five legs in the colored variety and became a grand champion. I used him for breeding and learned a very interesting lesson.

The gene that is responsible for the point marking is the himi gene c(ch). It is temperature sensitive. The himi English Angora usually have nice dark points when they are young and if the temperature is cool. When their wool grow out and if the temperature becomes hot, the points fade.

The top picture shows Higgins at a younger age in March 1988, with dark points. In August 1988 he was full grown and it was hot. His points were almost invisible.

The third picture is Delia and the last picture Jonathan. Jonathan was as dark as Delia in the winter but a half of his nose point was white during the summer; the worse was that the nose point color did not turn back to the dark color when it's cooler. I did not take any picture of Jonathan with dark points when he was young because he was the first himi and I had no knowledge of the fading points.

The same rabbit could be winning shows in the winter but could get disqualified during the summer. I was very frustrated.

In addition, the toenails of himi/pointed white are required to be dark in the Standard. Realistically, it was very hard to get the right toenails. I was more frustrated.

It was hard to improve the points because the c(ch) gene is recessive to the color gene C; breeding himi to colored only get colored rabbits if the colored rabbit does not carry either the himi gene or the albino gene. The himi gene c(ch) is dominant of the albino gene c; breeding himi to white will get himi rabbits but the points are even more faded. It needs two copies of the himi gene c(ch) gene to make the points more intense. Still, any hot temperature could fade the points and it's hard to get back the dark points even if the weather gets cool.

I finally made the decision in 1989 that I would spend my effort in improving wool and type instead of playing with color or markings. I dispensed all rabbits that were related to Jonathan and stopped my association with himi/pointed white.

I have not seen any pointed white English Angora on the show table for a long time. On a national level, the last time I saw a himi/pointed white English Angora being shown in an ARBA convention was 1993 in WA. I am speculating that others had similar experience as I did. "