The fun thing when you're a bunny breeder is that you get first choice when it comes time for picking baby bunnies. There's loads of fuzzy bunnies, but which ones stay and which ones go to new homes? There's a whole bunch of things to consider.
Unless another big hutch; well, or any more hutches, are built there's only room for about two dozen bunnies. That's the first limitation on how many can stay.
Boy bunnies need their own space since otherwise they will get into fights. Julius bit his brother Caesar when they were only about four and half months old. Usually, they don't get grumpy at sharing quarters with another buck until they're five or six months old, but Julius was precocious, I guess. Julius has gone to live with up in Ahualoa, so now he won't bite Caesar's nose anymore. Caesar still has a gray spot on his nose from where he got bit. I think it's going to always be there, but we can wait for him to molt and see if it changes.
So, other than building new hutches, the herd will be organized to fit the hutches we have. To inventory the available space, there's the first of the big hutches. It's been divided into six spaces and it's now pretty much 'The Buck Hutch'. Since Julius moved away, there's five adult bucks left so we have room for one more buck. At this moment, two girls, Speck and Spot are hanging out there. Spot will go to a new home, Speck may stay here even though she's a hybrid. I harvested her wool yesterday and she has some lovely very crimpy wool. She probably won't be bred, but she can stay here as a 'wooler' instead of a breeder.
These are the current bucks here at Hillside. We are doing much better with the number of bucks, several years ago we had only two, which isn't enough for a solid and healthy herd. I'll list them in order of age, with the oldest ones first.
Now if anyone's been keeping track, they will have noticed that I mentioned the Buck hutch has room for six bucks, bucks don't cohabitate well and then there is a list of seven bucks. So, there's a spare buck there and one of them will have to go to a new home. More than likely, Caesar will go find a new home since his son, Daffydill, is an exceptionally nice and extra fuzzy baby buck. However, Daffy and Aster are only 9 and 6 weeks old so there's several months before they will need their own spaces. Caesar will probably have another litter before he finds a new home.
This is the new baby tortoiseshell buck, Hillside DaffyDill.
Hillside DaffyDill is eight weeks old at the moment. He's always been extra fluffy, so we've got high hopes for him as a herd buck. His sire is Caesar, which is surprising since Caesar doesn't have the same amount of ear furnishings this little guy sports. His dam is Christine's Olivia, a chocolate doe so DaffyDill will be able to sire chocolate offspring. As well as extra fluffy ones, we hope.
The other new buck is Hillside Aster, he's a Ruby Eyed White and he's only six weeks old at the moment. I don't have a current picture of him yet. His sire is Hillside Phineus Phogge, a lilac buck so Aster will be able to sire chocolates, albinos and blues. If he's bred to some type of agouti colored doe, then he'd be able to sire chocolate agouti and lynx, providing, of course that the doe has matching recessives for chocolates and blues.
I should get pictures of all the bucks and show them here, although there's also pictures of the whole herd on another page of this website, now that the herd is getting organized, that page will need to be updated and organized as well.
We are also keeping a few new girls, too.
We're doing Flower Names this year, in case you haven't noticed. This is DaffyDill's sister, Buttercup. She's also 8 weeks old and she's a tortoiseshell bunny, just like Daffy. However, she's nowhere near as fuzzy as he is. Which is good, that he's the more fuzzy one since a buck has more impact on the quality of the herd than a doe. A doe will have maybe four or five litters in her lifetime, at least around here since we don't breed as frequently as folks who are raising rabbits for other purposes than fiber. A buck, however, can meet up with that many girls within a week or two. So he will have a lot more offspring than a doe. Anyway, this is Buttercup and she's a sweetie even if she isn't as fuzzy as her brother.
Hillside Daisy is litter mate to DaffyDill and Buttercup. Their black brother, Hillside Sire Alexander, went off to Kauai last thursday. Daisy will meet up with Hillside Aster when they are both old enough and a litter between Daisy and Aster will be 100% Ruby Eyed Whites. That should solve the problem we've been having of lack of white bunnies.
The bunnies here provide fiber for Hula Bunny yarn. Hula Bunny yarn comes in three colors - providing we have the right color of bunnies providing fiber for the yarn. The yarn isn't dyed, it relys on the color of the bunny fluff so we need one third of the herd providing fluff for Moonlit Dance color of yarn. That's a silvery gray and made with fluff from the black, blue, lilac and some agouti colors of fiber. We need another third of the bunnies providing fiber for the Beach Bunny color of Hula Bunny yarn. That's a light sandy tan color and is made with the fiber from tortoiseshells, chocolates and some colors of agouti. The last color of Hula Bunny yarn is Coconut Dream and it's white. We need Ruby Eyed White bunnies for the Coconut Dream color and we've not been able to make any of that color for several years now.
This is fourteen week old Speck. She has a few white hairs on her nose, which is where she got the name 'Speck'. I'd not planned on keeping her, but she does have some really nice really crimpy fiber, so she will stay here for awhile. She's only 14 weeks old, but I already got one harvest from her coat. It was a small harvest, probably just an ounce or two. Guess I should weigh it.
There is also another young white doe who will be staying here at Hillside Farm, I should go get some pictures of her. She is Hillside Petunia. She is 14 weeks old at the moment and is a sister and littermate to Speck.
This is Hillside Sire Alexander considering some future occupations, I guess. Does he want to be a financial advisor or is he considering a life of a desperado bank bandit? On his way to Kauai, he dropped in at the local bank to visit while his people were doing boring bank things. Maybe he's not going to be a financial advisor after all. He'd probably recommend everyone to stock their portfolios with valuable carrots instead of carets. He did enjoy the air conditioning and visiting with the clerks. He then continued his day of being a cosmopolitan bunny by flying off to Kauai.
Alex is also an 'extra-fuzzy' bunny like his brother DaffyDill. He will hopefully provide a lot of luscious fiber for his new people.
Not sure how it's going in your part of the world, but here it's beginning to feel like summer time. The temperatures have been reaching over eighty degrees Fahrenheit. That would be about 27 degrees Celsius for folks who prefer C to F. Since it's starting to get quite warm, it's time to shear all the bunnies.
More salad, less soup, time to replant lettuces, too, the usual summer time things. Switch over to the Romaines and red lettuces for summertime since they do better in heat. Hmm, maybe after bunny haircuts it will be time for some gardening. Maybe some watermelons? Haven't grown those for a few years. Well, bunny hair cuts first.
Ziggy will be glad when the haircut is over. She's been running around with a pretty thick coat.
Usually, I start their haircuts at the top of the back and work down from there. When their new coat is just beginning to come in, then they can be sheared down to almost nothing. If their next coat is halfway in, then they get plucked or combed to get the older coat off since it's no good for yarn to have short fibers mixed in with the long ones. The short fibers can cause what's called 'neps' or little bumps in the finished yarn.
We've been using hair cutting scissors for bunny hair cuts these days. The embroidery snips do well since they take small snips and it's easier to not get the bunny along with the coat, but the barber scissors go much faster. Unless you know the shape of bunny bodies, though, it may be best to use the embroidery snips since any 'ooops! Sorry, bunny!'s will be smaller.
Now Ziggy is ready for summer. Give her three or four months and she will be as shaggy as ever. These buns love to get fluffy again, but they are pretty happy to be naked, too. Ziggy bounced around all over the place after her haircut. In the bunny world, it's called a 'binky' and it's when they jump up and kinda add in a happy little twist. Much easier to be a binky bunny when one isn't weighed down by a heavy coat of wool.
