Keeping all the babies happy.

We got all the bunnies home safe and sound and took a few days to get to know our new friends.  As first time rabbit owners, we learned a couple of things really quickly.  1. Rabbits eat like little piggies!  I think they may even eat more than pigs.  Particularly the baby bunnies.  Thank goodness we had all that fodder.   2. Baby bunnies grow like crazy from all that eating!  It became apparent really quickly that the Momma rabbit – Dixie – had had enough of her lovely babies.  It was well past time for them to be on their own and she was looking a little harassed with all these bunnies in her cage.  So we set about building some new cages to help spread them out a bit.  Using the hutches we got with the rabbits as a template, Chuck got to work building a couple more.  Some 2×4’s here and some wire there and pretty soon we have something that looks like the other hutches……. only bigger…. and grander!  Yes, Chuck has made some of the nicest rabbit hutches you have ever seen.  They come complete with 2 stories of luxury living including porcelain tile upper floors (left over from our house reno – farmers are thrifty!) and large wired windows to gaze out at their friends.  These rabbits have died and gone to “Chuck is looking after us” heaven.  The fresh fodder every day was only the beginning. Darren helped with the doors and the roof  and I did my part by going to the farmer supply store ( My city friends, farm stuff is purchased from a special store for farmers! Who knew?) and buying the bottom rabbit cage wire.  Yes!  There is special wire that has to be used for the bottom of the rabbit hutches, the holes have to be big enough for the poops to fall thru the bottom and strong enough to not erode away from their urine….. again who knew!??  In no time we have 2 new hutches.

So, to give Momma Dixie some peace, we decided to take the babies out of her hutch and separate them – by sex – we are city people but not crazy.  When we picked up the bunnies they showed us how to check them out and determine the girls from the boys.  You could be forgiven for thinking this is not a big deal – should be fairly obvious for a rational adult to figure out.  But you would be wrong.  When they showed us, these little darlings were a couple of weeks younger.  They picked them up, flipped them on their backs and shoved their heads under their armpits (covering their faces calms them down).  However, don’t forget that these are Giant Flemish rabbits.  These little buggers are getting huge and more than a wee bit harder to handle.  But we forge ahead.  So we grab one of the babies and attempt the flip them on their back and do the whole, under the armpit thing.  It looked so easy when they did it.  But they squirm and they scratch – their legs are pretty powerful – getting them anywhere near your armpit seemed a little dangerous to be truthful here.  It took 2 of us to get this accomplished – one hanging onto the rabbit for dear life, and the other having a peak and the nether regions for innies or outies!  We had to get a good look because, if we get this wrong – we could need a ton more cages!! Finally we have determined that we have 4 girls and 2 boys and we get them into their new homes.  Momma Dixie looks like she has died and gone to heaven – not that I blame her!  Over the next couple of weeks we manage to sell all of the babies and have set about cooking up another batch – this time with Sweetie Pie!

Speaking of growing like bad weeds, the chicks Fallon hatched a while ago are getting big too!  They are still housed in their brooder box down in her basement.  They are a couple weeks away from being big enough to be introduced to the rest of the chickens in the coop.  We need to get these two out there with the others because we have 30 more laying hens and 10 turkeys coming in April.  These will all be chicks and will have to stay indoors for about 8 weeks….. we still have to figure out how we are going to accomplish that.  But have faith!  It all has to be under control for the end of May when out meat chickens will arrive… yes, as chicks that will have to stay indoors for 8 weeks.   We are a teensy bit worried that we may have been overly ambitious and that the circus is about to begin.  But we lived through a Kootenay winter and are hardened homesteaders now….  we can do it!   Stay tuned!