Hey kids! Do you want a bunny?

YEAH!
Well, we're going to eat her babies.
Um.... WHAT?!?!

So my two step-daughters Chey (11) and Maddie (8) have pet rabbits at their mom's house.  I stress PET.  So a few months ago my husband and I told them that we were planning on getting one or two rabbits this spring (aka: now!).

They were SO excited... until I started laying out the ground rules.

1) They will live outside
2) We will choose the breeds
3) We will get a male and a female
4) I will let you keep ONE female from the first litter
5) We are going to eat all of the other babies

WHOAH! #5 was a shocker.  Luckily the girls are pretty open minded and have grown up in an area where there are a lot of farms.  We've agreed that we will "make the meat" on a weekend when the girls aren't here and in return they have agreed to try it (Although Maddie said that she is "going to cry the whole time she's eating dinner".

We'll see Maddie!  You're very brave to try and I know that you're going to be so proud that we made this meat ourselves. I'm envisioning a dinner with veggies from the garden and a nice rabbit stew as the centerpiece.

Thanks for agreeing to try. Hopefully this sticks after you've seen the babies.

We bought a chest freezer last month. We will hopefully be buying a hutch (or two) within the next month and a young rabbit (or two) soon after. We'll see how it goes!  I'm excited to potentially be getting back into the game and to be teaching kids at the same time!

Renegade Rabbit

We have an escapee!! One of the three males from Cher's litter flew the coop day before yesterday and has made himself quite at home in the pine trees behind the hutches. He's having a blast and seems to find it very funny that, try as I might, I can't get my hands on him!

He's figured out that the poop piles under the hutch are nice and warm!

We've decided (well, he has actually, since I can't catch him!) that we're going to let him roam the yard and "see what happens". He's already made friends with our cat Molly, they've been playing tag all morning - he does as much of the chasing as she does! Since he's made himself stand out from the crowd he's earned a name... Rennie (AKA Renegade Rabbit).

See him laughing at me??

Here is a shot of the new hutch. It is a MESS because it's been snowing non-stop for over a week and neatening up is not a priority right now. There are three sections on the top (with trays under them to catch the droppings) and eventually it will have 2 grow-out pens on the bottom for future litters. The striped awning flips down to give them some protection from the wind. This is in a temporary location. I'm planning on building a shed near the wood pile this spring for all of the hutches to go into. You can see the other two boys in the last cage... they didn't get out... Rennie's a sneaky one!

Quick Update!

Yesterday we got 6 eggs! Neat huh? They were all brown and I am pretty sure that they are all from our Black Sex Link hens... which is weird because they are from the second batch of chicks! This morning I did pick up one white egg which is either from the Brown Leghorns or one of the Silkies... Whoever it was it surprised them because it was on the floor :) One of the Sex Links is a double yolker! We've already gotten 3 HUGE eggs from her (not to mention the normal sized eggs she's produced)! Not bad for such a young girl!

Today I'm starting on my new rabbit hutch. Since we are keeping two girls from this litter and plan on buying a Californian buck we need more space. I lucked out though and saw some free doors on the side of the road. They are those great old solid oak doors and will make EXCELLENT walls! I'm going to try to make this hutch a "double decker" with "poop slides" under the upper floor. The bottom floor will probably be 2 large cages that we can use to raise the babies until they reach 10 weeks. I am big into recycling materials, so a lot of this hutch is going to be made out of "found" items. It's more fun building this way! It makes you think! :)

Sadness :(

Last time I posted I mentioned that one of the baby bunnies had died. Well three days ago I found another one, not dead, but partially paralyzed!! I had noticed that they were jumping up onto the door that separated the two sections to sit with their mother. I think they both fell off! I found the first dead baby right under the door, but at that time I didn't know they could get up there!

So the other day I removed the door, and today I wired the hole up, so now Cher and her remaining 4 babies are locked into the larger side of the cage. Today I also ended the little paralyzed ones suffering. I was hoping that the paralysis was caused by inflammation and would go away, but it didn't, and I couldn't bear to see him suffer.

So, we're down to four out of six. Sigh... all I can say is live and learn. Hopefully someone will read this before building a cage and not try to get fancy like I did.

Don't Do This!!

Rehabbed Rabbit Hutch

My neighbors next door neighbors (who are very nice people!) just lost their last rabbit. He was very old and had to be put down. He lived in a HUGE rabbit hutch that used to have 3 rabbits in it - but they too were very old and passed away. They decided that they didn't want to have rabbits again and offered me the hutch! I said YES! (of course!)

When I brought it home it was SERIOUSLY unimpressive and my MIL wanted to burn it. I don't blame her - it was a mess...




But I was inspired and KNEW I could make something really nice out of it! So I got to work. I SCRUBBED IT OUT, removed the rotten wood and the too-small gauge mesh on the front and the rotten mesh on the floor...


Once it was all clean and dry I started with my "master plan". This is going to be used to raise meat rabbits. One boy, one girl and a section to raise the babies to the right size.

The door in the back was used only as an access panel and was left closed all the time. I decided that I would use it as cross ventilation so I put a hinge in the LARGE door so it could fold up against the back of the hutch in the summer and be closed in the winter.


Here it is! All done! Looks pretty nice I think... nothing like the shack it was when it got here! It makes Chubs hutch look TINY! This new one is REALLY big. I actually sat in it to put up the inside walls...
I decided to put this door between the moms section and the center section. While she's pregnant and is nursing I can leave the door open to give her more room - once the babies are weaned I can shut the door and they can grow up in the familiar center section.

So anyway! That's my latest project... Now I just have to find my new bunnies! We're going to a local fair this week, so I might find them there.

Who knows what I'll be building next - the neighbors (same ones!) just did some construction on their house and gave me a big pile of leftover lumber... MUAHAHA!!!

Silkie Baby Pictures

I took some pictures yesterday afternoon of the new babies... Enjoy!

Splash Silkie (2 days old)

Splash Silkie (2 days old)

Black Silkie (2 days old)

Cochin (1 week old?)

I also finished putting up the chicken wire around the base of the fence and started putting the netting up over the top of the run to keep the hawks out!

I thought this would be funny too... haha!

This is the only picture I have of what Chubs home-made hutch used to look like. He came into my life unexpectedly and all I had was some old pallets, wire and a chainsaw... So his hutch was kinda ugly...


I ripped it apart the other day, replaced a lot of the boards, built a hinged roof (with roofing instead of plastic!) and repainted it to match the coop... It looks a LOT better now!!

That's all for now! I'm sure I'll post more soon!