I was cleaning cages when I noticed that nice pose Truffles was in. I thought to myself that he is looking kind of cute. So I decided to take some pictures of him and that lead me to judge him based on my understanding of the SOP. I am sure you'll agree with me how cute this little fellow is.
- Putting On The Cute Look
- One of my favorites
- Close up on the head
While I was being so engrossed in looking through the lenses, out of a sudden, I saw a pair of chopsticks! It was Beth! She thought Truffles' eye looked delicious and wanted to try practice her motor skills picking out the eye using the chopsticks. I stopped her while laughing hard rolling on the floor! ROFL!!!!
- Yummy Truffles?
I normally do not bother my ugly juniors that much although they get their usual run time, I do not judge them. Being a "show" breeder, I have learned to be extremely fussy with how my rabbits look. There are definitely exterior traits that I look out for in each and everyone of my rabbits. I must say that most breeders expect much more from their rabbits compared to a real judge. I believe it is inevitable. To stay competitive, the breeder much ensure their rabbits are up to the competition come what may. You will not be surprise that breeders judge their rabbits the hardest.
As for me, I do have my own preferences eventhough we are yet to have any ARBA sanctioned rabbit shows here. I simply get the thrills from comparing my rabbits to those from top breeders in the US. Although I am not a judge, the photos below would be points that I will look out for if I am one.
Please note that this is my own personal opinion based on my own preferences and what I share here does not reflect in anyway the opinions of a professional ARBA judge. Feel free to comment.
Let's do a point to point comparison. Truffles is almost 4 months old. I hope he'll improve through time. It may be unfair for him that I used a GC as a point of reference but I just wanted to share what I look out for personally.
Let's walk through the crown. It is very obvious Clark has got a very prominent crown. It is one of the things I like about him.
I strongly believe that in certain cases, the crown is so badly slipped behind, it pushes the ears down making them look extremely long. This is one of the strong point to prove the Summer ears theory wrong as genetics is still the prime determinant of ear length.
A HL's head should be 50% to approximately 67% in length compared to its body length. That should give you a ratio between 1:1.5 and 1:2.
You may have heard breeders mentioning the "DEPTH OF CHEST". The depth of chest is how the head rest on the rabbit's shoulder. In the HL, it is highly desirable that the rabbit seemed to NOT have a neck. The chest is exactly where the chin should be resting.
A lot of emphasis is placed on the HL's head alone. We always strive to have the massive look and most of it comes from the head. The head should be wide and to judge that, the width between the eyes must be as wide as possible.
The width of the shoulders also determines the massive look. Truffles do have quite narrow shoulders for now. I hope he grows up with thicker bones although not likely. LOL!
The front legs should look like a stump, short and thick!
Please correct me if I have used the wrong terms. If not, basically these are the things I look out for in a Holland Lop.
Hope you enjoyed my sharing. Holland Lop rules!
