November 26th, 2019

New Babee Buhnees! Woot!!

a whole pile of REW, too!

Seven new baby bunnies and their first picture is from just hours old. Daisy was actually supposed to have them yesterday, but they were there early this morning. I'd guess they are about one to four hours old in their first picture. They are pink and clean (really newborns who are mere minutes old are usually streaked with red) which would indicate at least an hour or more old. There was still some bright red waste wool outside the nest and the blood on it hadn't dried or darkened yet so not more than an hour or two old.

Their sire is Hillside Aster, our Ruby Eyed White buck and Hillside Daisy, a Ruby Eyed White doe. (usually the Ruby Eyed White is just written as "REW" and pronounced 'roo'). Since genetically, it requires a double recessive gene to get REW, both parents can only give a recessive REW gene to their babies so a litter between two REW parents will result in 100% REW offspring. Which means there are seven white baby bunnies, even though they look rather pink at the moment.

It will take several days before they start looking white, which will be when their coat starts coming in. In about ten days, they will open their eyes and we expect all their eyes to be ruby red. They are still really delicate, but by the time their eyes open, they will be more sturdy.

Half a day later, they're all still there and it looks like they've been fed. Don't they look fatter to you? There almost seems to be a glint of white on one nose in there, too. The one on the far left side almost seems to have a halo of white on it's nose already. These little ones will all be white as adults, if hopefully they all make it to adult.

This is a first litter for Daisy, it's a first litter for Aster, too, although he's not very helpful in taking care of the babies. We give the females their own nest space without the buck around. I don't know if the buck would hurt the little ones, but baby bunnies are extremely delicate so the less chance for them to incur damage, the better. Being stepped on is no fun for anyone, but when you're a really baby bunny it can be fatal.

As a first time mum, Daisy is doing well. She had her babies in the nest box instead of outside somewhere else in her hutch. That's frequently referred to as being born 'on the wire' since many angora bunnies are kept in wire bottomed hutches so their wool stays clean. Being born 'on the wire' can be really hard on baby bunnies and many, if not most, don't make it if they aren't born in the nestbox. Actually, for baby bunnies, there's a whole pile of stuff that can go wrong, which is probably what keeps the planet from being covered in bunnies.

So, for a first time mum, the first major hurdle is to build a nest. We kinda help the bunnies a bit by giving them a nestbox that is usually already stuffed with some grass. Daisy did pull a little bit of wool to add to the grass. She may pull more wool in the next several days. Other than being good insulation for the nest so the newborn hairless babies stay warm, pulling the wool allows access to her nipples so the babies can feed easier. Frequently, the mum bun will finish pulling wool after the babies are born. Not sure why, you'd think before would be better, but as long as the little ones stay warm and can reach the milk, it's all good.

The second major hurdle to be a successful mum bun is to have the babies in the nest. Which Daisy did. Yay, Daisy! All seven (at least, I've counted seven, there could be another hiding in the back) babies were born nice and warm in the nest.

The third major hurdle is to feed the babies. We've had some mum buns who didn't make milk for their babies so that can be a problem. Newborn baby bunnies can be bottle fed, although more often than not, it doesn't work well. Having mum bun feed them is the best, especially for the first few days so they get colostrum from the mum, which helps keep them healthy as adults.

They are still at the very delicate stage, a week to ten days from now, then they will be a lot less delicate and we will be a lot less likely to lose them. At this point, I don't get surprised if something should happen to them. I could make a list of all the possible mishaps, but that would be too depressing.

Hillside Phineous Phogge and Hillside Jessie were supposed to have a litter, too, but Jessie didn't seem to get the memo. She can still possibly have a litter, but she's about a day late. Daisy and Jessie met up with the bucks at the same time so they should be on the same schedule, but there could be a day or two difference. Or perhaps Jessie won't have a litter. Phin didn't have a haircut before meeting up with Jessie so it may not have worked. Guess we will find out in the next few days if it worked or not.

The refrigerator niche is finished. Yay! (Well, except for the last two asphalt shingles behind the kitchen door where you can't see it in the picture) but for all intents and purposes, the refrigerator niche is done. It was basically a two week project, although we don't always work a solid eight hour day.

It does make the kitchen feel a lot bigger with the fridge tucked away into the new niche. It's kinda interesting to walk into the kitchen now and kinda look around for the refrigerator. Usually when walking into a kitchen it's the very first thing you see, kinda like a big slap on the head (visually speaking, of course) is the refrigerator. Now, with the new niche, there's no real feel of 'refrigerator HERE', no big white appliance looming over everything. Too bad this little house will be a rental, I'd not mind cooking in this kitchen.

Oh, the picture was taken in the middle of installing the upper cabinet to the left of the window. We don't usually have crooked cabinets or cabinets sitting on benches on top of the counter. We do have another cabinet which could go on the other side of the kitchen window, but I think that would make the kitchen feel too crowded so it may not be installed there. Not sure where else it would fit, though. This is a pretty small house.

The jobsite is being run off an extension cord from the house next door so the refrigerator isn't plugged into it's proper outlet at the back of the niche. Which is why there's that odd cord on the floor. We will get the official power turned on before it gets renters.

Not sure what the next project that I'll be working on will be, although there's still one or two more days of exterior shingles left to do. Then the shingle project will be completely finished. Woot! Guess I can pick between remodeling the bath room or replacing the front lanai. At the moment, I'm thinking maybe of doing the lanai. Then we will have more time to enjoy it before we rent out the house. The front lanai isn't very large, but it's a great sit spot for a couple of folks while watching the clouds go by. As well as watching the cars coming into and going out of town on the lower road. Not that we have much traffic in our little town, but there's enough to give us something to watch.