My Half Acre Homestead: Our First Littler Of Rabbit Kittens Have Arrived!

Mistakes of Newbies!

Back In the Spring..We Bought some rabbits and cages off a guy at my husbands work..We were ECSTATIC! He told us which was the male and which were the females and we sorted them accordingly!

Built them a hutch in the barn with nesting boxes..Oiled their ears for mites..made them cookies ( no kidding) and when we thought they were settled enough..we set about methodically trying to breed them.. Occasionally we got a glimpse of "Thumper" valiantly wooing the "girls and doing what we thought was his job. But no babies came..a couple of the girls built nests..but had no babies..we consulted the internet..talked to friends..were told it could be the heat..and many other reasons..We were Baffled!! If someone did not soon Produce..we would have to dispatch them to the freezer..and buy new ones and try again. In the beginning of August..the gentleman who sold us the rabbits and cages.. brought us his last two rabbits..and then we really DID have a problem..as we had to double some up in cages..the new brown one went into the split cage next to Thumper...and the black and white went into the cage with the other black and white...Immediately..the brown rabbit started to whine and try and get through the divider to Thumper...

So Howie lifted the divider..and much to our shock..The BROWN Rabbit Immediately Jumped onto the back of "Thumper" and..well began to thump!

Then my friend Nancy told me HOW to sex the rabbits...and sure enough..with the exception of the brown one..they were ALL females!!!

We had been trying to breed females ALL SUMMER LONG!

SO!! We decided which rabbits to keep..and kept three of the grey Does..and of course our lone male..whose name is now Charlie Brown..Thumper is now called MOMMA..and sometime in the last 48 hours..she delivered her first litter!

So take it from me folks...don't always take someone's WORD for the sex of a rabbit..learn to sex them yourself..it is quite simple..Have someone hold them on their back..with thumb and forefinger gently squeeze together the sides of the genital opening..if a little Penis pops out..it is a BOY..is nothing pops out..It is a GIRL!!

Our Buck Charlie Brown!