I don't keep or breed angoras myself, but I have received a lot of email
lately (several from people on the FML) concerning the origin of the
angoras.  This is what I've also posted to the angora mailing list.
 
The following text can be found at www.ferret-universe.com/angora.html:
 
>The angora began as a result of a mutation in breeding on a fur farm
>back in Sweden. The breeder sold this >entire stock of ferrets to Soren
>Thingaard who has continued to breed them for several generations to
>improve >their temperament (as the original breeder bred his ferrets to
>hunt rabbits).
 
This is not entirely true.  The last two days I ve been doing some research
on angoras here in Sweden, and this is what I ve come up with (no absolute
truths, only what I ve heard from other people):
 
There was a breeder in Scotland who had ferrets with longer hairs on their
hind legs and rear part of the body.  Some of these ferrets were sold to a
large scale breeder in Norway (maybe fur farm, don t know), who after some
breeding managed to produce angora ferrets.  It is likely to believe that
this breeder practiced repeated inbreeding to manifest the angora fur
attribute.  It is also likely to assume that this is were some of the bad
traits (at least the breeding problems) were acquired, because ferrets that
came from this breeder apparently had breeding difficulties, both males and
females.  There was a high rate of jills not nursing their young and hobs
unable to perform.
 
Two breeders in Sweden (maybe more) imported these Norwegian angoras.  One,
as far as I know, failed breeding the angoras.  The other was a large scale
breeder (fur farm, not hunting ferrets), I will call him XXX.
 
XXX bred the angora jills to polecat hobs.  The kits produced was given to
surrogate, polecat jills.  These kits showed a higher breeding ability than
that of their angora birth mothers.  Ferrets from XXX apparently have nose
hair.  At one point, XXX sold his entire stock to Soren in Denmark.  (XXX
might continued angora breeding even after this however, I m not sure.  I
know for certain he continued breeding ferrets large scale after some
time.) XXX also exported ferrets to YYY, who then were small scale breeders
in the US.  YYY later moved to Sweden where they currently live.  In Sweden
they continued some angora breeding with the XXX-line of angoras) and may
have exported to the US.
 
Soren continued breeding the XXX-angoras.  From what I hear, he likes to
market himself as the only breeder of true angoras.  He is allegeably in
favour of nose hair, claming it to be a trait of TRUE angoras.  However,
the ferrets that Soren breeds is merely one line of probably several lines
of angoras (of which most originate from XXX and the Norwegians), and
obviously, his angoras are not in any sense truer than any other angoras.
He seems to be the only large scale breeder at the moment though.  Most
breeders here in Sweden who bought and bred angoras have had unsatisfactory
results (to say the least, in some cases).  For that reason there are few
people breeding angoras in Sweden now.  The majority seems to believe
angoras should be banned at this point.  It may actually come to this.  I
have just heard that the Swedish Board of Agriculture, www.sjv.se, is about
to launch an investigation concerning the possible ban of breeding angora
ferrets in Sweden.  If a ban is approved, I can only say I think this is an
unfortunate course of action.  Like I have stated before, I do believe the
bad traits of angoras can be out bred, if given the chance.  I m NOT in
favour of creating different breeds in ferrets though (longer fur is not a
different breed of course).  An important thing to remember when breeding
animals is that breeding to create new and drastically different
characteristics (such as colour and fur type) will inevitably create SOME
problems.  To manifest a certain attribute you will usually have to inbreed
more or less, and naturally occuring mutations can also carry unwanted
qualities.
 
A note on angora vs. polecat regarding size etc (in Sweden):
The Norwegian angoras have a body similar to that of the polecat.  Angoras
from XXX are more robust, and has a shorter body.  Many angoras (but
certainly not all) have narrow faces, both jills and hobs.  Angoras are NOT
larger compared to Swedish polecats, but apparently US polecats are smaller
from what I ve been told.  Compared to Swedish polecats, angoras are not in
any way more intelligent, rather the opposite it seems in some lines, and
they are not more active either.  Please remember that there are individual
differences of course.  I m sure there are angoras in Sweden that are more
intelligent and active.
 
I hope you will find some of the information useful, and I m sorry if this
was a lengthy post.
 
Marie
[Posted in FML issue 3353]