Revisit: Those Mysterious Modifiers: Rufus (Rufous)

 

This post about Rufus was originally posted on February 23, 2019.

In this picture there are two babies that are identified as red and fawn.  What is red?  Red is not a part of the ABCDE genetics, it is a modifier that makes the fawn color turn reddish.   It is currently an identified modifier thus it is not as mysterious as Umbros.       

These are bunnies come from Casey's efforts of breeding Red English Angora.  Of the four colored ones, second and fourth from the left are expressing the effect of Rufus while the very right one shows a regular tort.   Of the three that have reddish color, only one can be called "Red".  Why? According to SOP, Red is under the "Wide Band Group" and the wild band group is agouti patterned.   The two on the left are tort and chocolate tort, so they would not be considered as red, they are just tort and chocolate that have the rufus modifier.  

Here is another group of the bunnies that come from Casey's effort of breeding red English Angora.   The second and the fourth can be called Red as they have the reddish wool and agouti patterned.   The first one is a tort with the rufus modifier but not considered as red as it is a self.   Then the middle and the very right bunnies do not seem to be affected by the rufus modifier, they look like a regular tort and a cream.   

Unlike the Umbros modifier, the Rufus modifier can affect both agouti and non-agouti coats.   Though the rufus is not as mysterious as the Umbros darkening modifier, it is still quite unpredictable as it could affect the bunnies in the same litter differently. 

By the way these photos are from many years ago.   Casey is no longer working on the red English Angora.