Color Coat

Question
I bought a baby rabbit from a pet store, sex, definite age, breed unknown. I fell in love with it because it looks so much like an eastern cottontail. I've raised several and released them. It has very fuzzy soft short fur, almost downey feeling. Brownish coat with slight back tips, not as defined as a wild one, with a grayish cast to his coat. Black rimming its ears, and the white/creamish underbelly. Even has the white cottontail with the black on top. I might have been fooled myself if it didnt have domestic rabbit features such as the rounder face, soft doe like eyes, shorter plumper body, and short wide feet. It even seems to have some wild rabbit personality that I have not seen in my other domestic rabbits, altho it is a sweet cuddly little thing. I would like to know what breed of rabbit has the color coating of a cottontail like this? In all my web surfing I have not seen this color, only on an adoption site did I see a pic of a rabbit described as looking like a wild rabbit. Just wondering what he could be mixed with and what breeds look like cottontails please? Thank you so much!!!

Answer
Amy, I believe what you have described for me is a breed known as Minirex, and a color called eithre Castor (agouti) or Tortoise..meaning it is a "Shaded' variety.  Look at the two links below. On the first page, look especially at the American Sable, and the Cinnamon breeds for color similarities. On the second URL, look at the fur type.. (The tortoise color on the minirex page is bad color and not clear, as it should look more like the Cinnamon. The castor s rather representative).
http://www.arba.net/photo.htm
http://www.nmrrc.com/varieties.htm
Also, I would suggest that releasing the rabbit into the wild may not be advisable. First, they don't have survival instincts since they weren't reared in thr wild, and didn't have good "Role models" mothers. Also, since they are not related to the cottontail, they cannot crossbreed with them (sort of like a horse [Equuus caballus] and donkey [Equus asinus] can have a mule that is infertile- but they are the same genus-Equus)but.... Well, there are NO crosses between Cottontail [Sylvilagus floridanus] and the omestic rabbit[Oryctolagus cunicularus] as they aren't even the same genus. You may be aware that all domestic rabbits are descended from european rabbits. Any way, foloow the links and you'll see a rabbit of similar color and coat, I would guess.   The 'wild color' domestic rabbit, (by the way) is genetically A-B-C-D-E- , a very common genetic color code, and as you can see is dominant to most other colors. Without  selective breeding, all domestic rabbits would eventually regress to the wild looking color. There are NO breeds that actually look like a cottontail (body shape AND color), but Chestnut Netherland Dwarfs(http://www.andrc.com/spotlight.html), Sandy agouti Flemish Giants (http://www.nffgrb.com/Flemish%20Giant%20Rabbit%20Photos/SD-Sweden.jpg), and Copper Satins( are as close as we have in the rabbit breeding hobby. Hope this is useful to you.  Steve