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a few lessons in rabbit husbandry

We now have two years of experience under our belts raising rabbits. We have learned a lot of useful information already, but we are far from experts. That's the thing with farming, with raising animals, you will never be done learning. Bring it on. As of today we have 17 rabbits in our little group, and the more animals you have the more likely you are to have problems. Here are a few of ours:

the girls





























The first problem we had is with the smallest litter we have, which we have had in a large dog crate on the grass. They are starting to get pretty big, and coming of age, they are starting to get a little frisky. This is bad news bears. I was out watching them and saw three boys ganging up on one girl, so in a hurry I fixed up a cage and moved her into it. She was visibly shaken, breathing quickly, her hair a mess with tufts pulled out (that was the first sign I saw that something was going on.) The next day I watched the other rabbits and took another female out and gave her some company. We need to dispatch some rabbits, and we need more cages.

our boy hopper


















The second problem we have is our only breeding buck, Hopper, has an ear that has crusty scabs covering the inside. After some quick internet research I am pretty sure that it is ear mites, and can be fixed up with some medication and cleaning the cage. I'm sure that it is very uncomfortable for him, the other morning it was bleeding a little bit from him scratching. We try to take the best care of our animals we can, and I'm sorry that I didn't pay closer attention and catch it before it got this bad. Always learning. We will go to Tractor Supply tomorrow after work and get some medicine for him. He came to us with a bad front foot from some unknown accident. He is such a trooper!

this one reminds me of Rorschach from the watchmen
Until next time,

Angela Kelly
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