Those Darn Modifiers

Here are two tort English Angora bunnies, both have the color genes of: aaB-C-D-ee.  Visually we can see there is a major difference: the one on the left is quite orangey while the one on the left is quite gray.

Same two tort bunnies, photo taken from the top.   The left has orangey wool while the one on the right is more gray.

There is no requirement of bands or rings in self colors and tort is aa, a self.   No one ever questions whether the left one is a proper tort or the right one is more correct.  We accept both of them as tort.

Here are two French Angora chestnut rabbits.    The one on the left is more gray and the one on the right is more orangey or golden.    Both rabbits have the same color genes: A-B-C-D-E-, at the current time, both are called chestnut.

Blowing into the one on the left we see some golden colors on the top wool, fainted orangey bands and mainly it has blue slate bands.   

The one on the right has very distinguish tan/orangey and slate bands.

If we use the current standard the one with the tan/orangey and slate bands are more correct, thus some question the one with the slate blue band being a correct chestnut.

In the ARBA SOP up to 1995, there is chestnut and then there is "wild gray", see the next photo.

The Wild Gray is described on the upper right corner on page 78.  Chestnut is on page 77, as the colors are arranged in alphabetical order.   I was a member of the NARBC standard committee and at the time we thought we were simplifying the names by combining the Wild Gray into the Chestnut as they have exactly the same genotype: A-B-C-D-E.   It is the modifier or modifiers make the wild gray look darker than the orangey chestnut.   I personally did not foresee the issue of the question of the band colors due to the modifier.   To me, it'll make sense to bring back the name of Wild Gray to accept the fact that there are modifiers that make the same color genes look different.  The SOP and showing are more phenotype than genotype, a different name for a different visual color may be a good solution to this dilemma.  

I will urge the vote for the return of "Wild Gray" into the SOP to give recognition to the effect of modifiers.