Northern California Angora Guild: 1/3/21

Prizes for Winning the First Place Sweepstakes

In a previous post, I reported that I was lucky enough to have won the first place English Angora and first place French Angora sweepstakes 2019-2020:

Northern California Angora Guild: Betty's First Place Sweepstakes Standing 2019-2020

This is the prize for the English Angora first place sweepstakes. With the NARBC logo, my name, the placing and points earned. Very nice.

This is the prize for the French Angora first place sweepstakes. With the NARBC logo, my name, the placing and points earned. Very nice.

Jade Rabbit?

This is a pretty rabbit. A rabbit made of white jade? Guessed wrong. It's a desert!
It's a Japanese desert made from "Kanten", a traditional New Year's treat. Kanten is a also called Agar powder, similar to Gelain but firmer texture. For information about Kanten, go to:
https://www.justonecookbook.com/agar-agar-kanten/

This beautiful Kanten rabbit is made by Carolyn's hubby Earl. We knew all along that Carolyn is talented and artistic, Earl sure meets Carolyn's talents.

Indigo Girl is a Mom again

Indigo Girl is in the maternity ward waiting and waiting. She has pulled lots of her beautiful blue wool to get ready for her second litter.

That's a lot of wool, what's inside the wool?

There are four healthy babies. Their mom Indigo Girl is the first place French Angora Rabbit of the Year winner and dad Lipton is the third place French Angora Rabbit of the Year. Though 3rd place, Lipton is the highest ranked French Angora buck in the nation. See:
Northern California Angora Guild: Indigo Girl Wins French Angora Rabbit of the Year 2019-2020

More Persimmon Treats

Carolyn saved several persimmons for Christmas and the holidays. These are the persimmon fruits cakes that she served at the Christmas dinner.

Casey peeled persimmons to be combined with cookies and cream as a part of Christmas desert.

A Bit of History: Angora SOP 1944-1947

Normally the SOP covers five years. This particular one covers less than 5. The right side is the first part of the Angora standard from 1944 to 1947.

This is the second page of the 1944-1947 Angora SOP.

And this is the last page.

I can see some are making the comment of "this is too small, I can't read it". In the following, I cropped enlarge the right side as much as possible within the blog format:

This is the first standard that actually use the term "English Angora". Colors accepted were still the same four: white, black, blue and fawn. The weight range is similar to that of today, 5 to 7-1/2 pounds. (the current standard allows the does to go to 7-1/2 pounds but the bucks capped off at 7 pounds).

An interesting observation is about the length: in the 1934-1939 SOP, length was to be 3-1/2 to 5 inches, then in 1939-1944 SOP, length was to be over 3 inches, in this 1944-1947 SOP, the wool length regressed to 2-1/2 to 3-1/4 inches. Why? It's hard for us to imagine today.

In this 1944-1947 SOP, the name of French Angora was first used, and also accepted the same four colors as the English Angora: white, black, blue and fawn. The "elimination" stated in both English Angora and French Angora is a bit strange. Eliminate any Angora in English classes that resembles French type, and eliminate any Angora in French classes that resembles English type. It seems that the two breeds were still not as distinctive so to be able to clearly compete in the right classes.

In this standard, the description of texture showed a bit of difference in the two breeds. The word "silky" was only used in English Angora but not French Angora. Noted that French Angora is "permissible"" to have reasonable of guard hairs but coarse hairy coat was to be disqualified. The senior weight allowed is 7 and over, no upper limit.

A Bit of History: Angora SOP 1934-1939 and 1939-1944

Due to human COVID-19 and rabbit RHD viruses, there won't be shows for quite a while. There isn't much current activities to report, we'll start a series to go into the past history. Today we'll start with Angora Standard of Perfection (SOP).

This is the earliest standard on file at the ARBA office, I received it over 20 years ago from Dick Gehr who was kind enough to make copies from the ARBA Archive. During 1934 to 1939, there was only one Angora breed that was called "Angora Woolers". No photo published. Colors accepted were White, Black, Blue and Fawn.

In the 1939-1944 SOP, a photo was added. Though there was still only one Angora breed, there were sub categories of English-Type and French-Type. The above is the description of the English-Type, continued in the next page.

This is the second page of the 1929-1944 SOP that continued with the English-Type Angora Woolers then moved to French-Type. You may notice that the English-Type still accepted White, Black, Blue and Fawn but the French-Type only accepted White. Though there was a photo, it was not specified whether the rabbit was an English-Type or a French-Type wooler.

The very top of this third page in the1939-1944 SOP shows the disqualification of the French-Type Angora Woolers. In this standard, French-Type at senior age would be disqualified for no ear tufts, and the ideal wool was to be fine, silky and wavy. The main difference between the English-Type and French-Type seemed to be the body type rather than the wool texture. The interesting part is that there is no disqualification listed for English-Type.

Also noted is that the ARBA name was yet to be used during 1939-1944 SOP. At the time, the organization is referred to as "A.R.&C.B.A." I'd guess the acronym stands for American Rabbit and Cavy Breeders Association.

Disregard the rest of lower part of the page unless you are also interested in Champagne de Argents.