Things have been going better in the rabbitry. Chevelle's litter is 2 sable pts and a siamese sable. Cool! Their eyes are just starting to open. Hope there's something I can work with.
Got almost all the does bred. Finally! How frustrating it's been. I resorted to shuffling the does around, putting them between 2 bucks. Had empty holes between bucks and if the does wouldn't lift that day, I switched them back and forth in the empties which finally worked. I'm calling this method "buck overload". Flood the does' senses with buckness.
The one broken doe that would not breed, turns out she was pregnant! Ohhh...ok. She dumped a dead kit on the wire after the latest attempt with the buck. Just the one and I'm sure it would have been DOA in any case. Just goes to show you, it can happen when you think it didn't. I was sure she never lifted for him. Since I'm not sure when she was bred, I can't say if it was born on time or if she was retaining it and the buck jiggled it out of her. I tried rebreeding her a couple days later, and she was VERY eager. They had much fun together that day! Now if she'd just have a live litter. She's one of my nicest broken does.
The only does still open are the new himi I talked about last time and Chevette. Her 4 himis are almost 6 wks, and normally I would have waited until this week to wean them out. When I pulled her out to breed, I realized how skinny she is. It's awful, poor darling. Someone was digging out feed so I wasn't topping off the J-feeder like I normally would. Chevette had never been a digger so it had to be the kits. As a result, she wasn't getting enough to eat. I pulled the litter out last week, and she's on hiatus until she regains weight. Now that she's alone, she's eating GOOD!
Oh and the black Smith's buck who was such a wimp finally got his groove back on. He's happily and aggressively breeding anything I toss at him. About time! I wonder what his deal was all year.
I have a very promising broken black buck from that Smith's sire. Out of Baroquen. There were only 2 brokens in that litter, just barely 10% (IMO). I kept the doe, but the buck had bad teeth and I dumped him outside in the Summer House with some other weanlings until I decided what to do about him. The teeth looked like they were going full-on malocclusion and I figured I'd be dealing with him terminally. Darned if they didn't correct on their own, and he's looking really good at almost 4 mos. Glad I didn't throw him away just yet. I moved him back into the shed so I can work with him. Since I figured he was history, I hadn't been handling him much, and he's a wild man! He's starting to calm down and behave on the table.
Here's hoping for a better new year in the barn.
tnt
