Jess Preparing Her Nest

ARR’s Jess was due yesterday, August 15th.  She starting snatching up hay in the afternoon to prepare her nest for the babies to come.  She was so funny.  I’d give her a handful of hay and she would immediately start stuffing it into her mouth to put into her nestbox.  I would go back later and all the hay would be off the cage wire and in the box.  So, I’d give her another handful of hay.  She would hop right up and start gathering it all.  I did that three times.  Busy mama!

When I checked on her last night, about 10:30, she had delivered SEVEN kits.  One was DOA.  And there were several peanuts.  More pictures to come.

Kits and Kids

Kits

All 5 does that were due to have babies yesterday, have had their babies.  Jonica had three and Magic had four when I went out and checked again at 8:00 am this morning.  All warm.  All alive.  Whew.

Jonica is a true Lynx (A_bbC_ddE_).  I bred her to GBF’s Indigo (aaB_C_D_Ee) to create some lilac carriers.  They are all probably Chestnuts, unless Indigo is carrying something I don’t know about.

Magic is Black (aaB_C_DdEe).  I bred her to ARR’s CVSoul, a Chocolate Agouti (AabbC_DdEe) to create some more chocolate carriers for my Chocolate project.  Two kits appear to be black.  One of the broken kits looks like a broken black, and the other broken looks to be Agouti – again, probably a Chestnut, but suppose it could be an Opal.

My nest boxes are filling up quickly.  I’m going to have to get Stan busy building me some more (he’ll LOVE that!).  Each time I tell him I have more babies, he’s like, “You’re STILL breeding?!”  Well, of course!

Kids

Last Saturday was ‘pick out the market goats’ day for us at Crazy Chad’s Goat Farm.  It’s always so hard.  Here are a few pix I snapped before we got totally engrossed in trying to pick the best ones in the barn!

Narrowed it down to these 3 in the one barn.

Abby with her favorite.

Haley working on setting hers up. They are wild at this point because they've not been handled much at all.

Abby looking like a true farmer - orange hat, carhartt coat and winter barn boots.

Warmer Weather!

It was SO nice not to have to put 50# of clothes on to do chores last night.  AND the water wasn’t frozen.  Oh, the simple pleasures in life!!  This time of year, my Carhart coat and bib overalls are my best friends.  And my big clunky Sorel boots.    It’s been kind of a depressing two weeks for kindling though.

It started off well enough.  GBF’s Topeka (x GBF’s Pistol Pete) came through on New Years Eve with 4 beautiful kits.  Their eyes are open now, and one ventured out of the nestbox yesterday morning.  He must have been on the hunt for mom for some breakfast.   It is so sweet to hold them up to your face and feel them nuzzle you all over, looking for a teat for milk.  They have the softest little noses and gentlest little nibbles.

But then, Broo’s Deception (x Holland Haven’s Bruiser) missed on Jan 2nd, and Dowling’s Calla (x ARR’s Angry Squirrel) missed on Jan 4th.  Neither of these were big surprises though, as Bruiser only bred Deception once, and Calla had “the coon” incident shortly after she was bred.  I prefer misses to “popsicles” though.

It perked up a bit on the 8th,  Karrot Kreek’s Quay (x ARR’s Angry Squirrel) came through with one live kit.  She was two days over with this little fatty. I would like to have kept the baby with her, but ended up fostering it to Petals, as she had a singleton (x Pistol Pete) also the following day.

Holland Haven’s Lila  and White River’s Kenya were due on the 9th.  Lila missed.   Poor Kenya had one giant kit that I had to help pull.    Then L&R Donna had 4 “popsicles” – man I HATE that.  And GBF’s Annabelle missed.    Then GBF’s Bridgette had 2 “popsicles”, even after I trudged out to the barn at 3:00 am to check.  ARR’s Shimadzu had 2 cold on wire and Emi followed with a miss (first timer).  Ahhhhh.

But on the 12th, L&R Sedalia (x Broo’s Chase) came through with a nice litter of 4.   One little guy’s tail was injured in labor or shortly after, so I’m almost certain he will be without a tail when he grows up.   GBF’s Simone had 2 warm kits waiting for me this morning when I checked on her.  This was her very first breeding, so I’m very happy about these two babes.  One appears to be a tort and the other…. could it possibly be a REW or shaded?

So, out of 14 does bred and due between Dec 31st and today, I have 12 live kits to show for it.  Pretty lousy percentages.  Oh, well.  It’s winter.  It happens.  So many people think it’s SO easy to breed rabbits.  Not always.

Our friend Brian came over today and helped me vaccinate and worm all the goats.  So we are ready for kidding!