Pictures . . . Hay & Babies

Today is a bit warmer (high around 40), so waters were able to thaw out some. We refilled all the water bottles and if the forecast is right, hopefully I won't have to fill crocks 3x a day over the weekend. We'll see.

The barn needs a desperate cleaning. I did a little bit today - dumped 4 trays. The trays haven't been dumped for like 2 weeks and the big tray hasn't been rinsed off for about a week. It's gonna be so fun rinsing that off whenever the hoses thaw out - Not! Some of the trays were SO full since the buns have been getting so much hay.

After I gave the buns hay last night, I decided to snap a few pictures:




Cameron, isn't he so cute!





Brad's head is really starting to "pop"!

And, finally Sarabeth's babies . . .



Qadoshyah

Frozen

Well, we've been frozen the past couple days. It has not gotten about freezing. I think it may have been just barely above freezing (like 33 degrees) by this afternoon, but still not enough for everything to thaw.

I had to get the crocks out for the rabbits and water them 3 times a day for the past day. It's almost time to do that again too - fun :/!

Today felt a little warmer only because there was no wind chill factor. So, I opened up the sunny side of the barn in hopes that the sun would warm things up in the barn a little.

Sarabeth did kindle to 6 babies on Sunday. 2 brokens and 4 "pinks." I think she may have a bk sable & a bk smoke pearl, but I'm not 100% sure on that yet. Because it was down in the teens last night, I decided to bring her babies inside just to be safe. Don't want any frozen babies!

Well, not much else to report. The sun is setting quickly and I better get back out to the barn before the temp drops too much more!

Qadoshyah

Pictures

My mom got a new camera (a Nikon D40), so I used it for a little while today. It's a fun camera and takes such cool pictures. Nice lighting, neat focus & blurring. Here's a few pictures of the buns & cats taken this afternoon ~

Kadence:
Truffle, the old girl :)
Brandy
Daisy

Grass hay ~ My cousin just picked this stuff up for me last week. It's so nice, fresh & GREEN! The rabbits like it a lot. It's so soft too. I haven't fed grass hay for a couple months and it's so nice to have grass hay back in the barn

One of the kittys
Mud (left) & Kyle
The beautiful Kyle . . . isn't his color just amazing. I will have to get some pictures of him out of his cage soon.
And the other kitty doing her "prancing" maneuver, LOL!
Qadoshyah

Huge Herd Reduction!

Alright, well I finally got the herd reduction up on the website. You can see it at www.hoppinherdofhares.com/forsale.html.

17 bunnies up on the sale page. Hopefully I can move them out soon. It'll be nice to only have about 20 bunnies in the barn again!

Some of the bunny bottles were frozen in the barn this morning. First morning that it's frozen in the barn this "winter." It's gonna be a long winter, since winter hasn't even technically hit and it's already freezing. Last year it was freezing until March at least . . . so fun. Not.

Since I had to take a few pictures of some bunnies for someone, I finally got a few new pics of the babies. My little keeper, who still has no name is turning out so nice. It's fun to have a broken self chocolate, since I haven't had a keeper like that for awhile!




Qadoshyah

A lot . . .

It's been awhile since I updated. Life has been crazy. Between working on building a search database that has half a million entries in it for a County Assessor's website, Thanksgiving, my 21st birthday party, getting new counter-tops and so much more, life's been non-stop-on-the-go :).

Daisy's & Kristen's babies are all doing good & getting big! Very cute. They're 9 weeks old already!

Sarabeth is due this Saturday and she is FULL of babies! I plan to breed Jana, Champagne, Kadence and maybe one or two more in the next few days. Jana to Brad, Champagne to Cameron & Kadence to Nick. Some new bucks finally and young does, should make some pretty babies.

I am planning on doing a huge herd reduction soon. I'm still thinking it through, but there will probably be 10-12 seniors/almost seniors for sale. I haven't decided 100% who they will all be. But, I need to do a herd reduction. It's time to refocus and reduce the numbers in the barn. With only 2 empty cages in the barn, that means there's too many bunnies! The tentative list of who I will probably be moving on out are:

Kristen
Daisy
Brandy
Lauren
Tatianna
Blush (pending)
Brantini
Mud
Josh (pending)
Crystal
Jr. pointed white buck (pending)
Clara
Nick

After the herd reduction is done, I hope to bring in a trio of another breed or a pair or trio of another color. We will see whichever one works out and seems the best idea.

My brother just ordered supplies so we can build new shutters for the barn. So we can get rid of the nasty tarps and I won't ever have to deal with tarps again, Lord willing! It should turn out nice and be much more airtight and insulated :).

I think that's about it for now . . .

Qadoshyah

Wow . . .

Where has the last week & a half gone?!! It's certainly flown by FAST! We just had flooring put in our downstairs, so the house was a disaster for about a week. It's just about all put back together now. It's so nice to have a smooth, easy to clean surface compared to bare wood :)!

The bunnies are all doing great. The weather has been pretty cold lately, but it warmed up today. It was beautiful today! So, we did the MUCH needed chore of dumping the trays and spraying off the big tray. Also, did some random brushing bunnies & playing with them.

Cameron & Jana have settled in REALLY well!

Jana is doing great. She's eating all her food and acting completely fine. She's a hilarious doe. Michael told me she was a bit shy when she was at his place . . . but she ain't a shy doe anymore. She's always pacing her cage when I step into the barn and at the door of her cage when I get close to her. She's so fun & so cute!

Cameron is also doing great. He's much less animated than Jana and would rather be starring at the doe in the cage behind him than pay attention to me being in the barn. But, lately he has been at the front of his cage when feeding time comes :).

I hope to get some new pictures of some bunnies (ones that I need to sell) soon, so we'll see. Hopefully that can happen in the next few days.

Qadoshyah

New Additions

On Friday night I picked up two new additions to the rabbitry. The hope was to pick them up early Friday morning, but the transporters didn't get out of convention as early as they were hoping. One is a chinchilla mini lop buck and the other is a chestnut agouti mini lop doe. They are both young seniors - the buck just turned 6 months old (like a few days ago) and the doe is almost 9 months old.

Buck: Posey's Cameron! I've wanted to get a buck from Kim & Cristina for awhile and it finally worked out a few months ago. This year I realized it was about time for me to bring in a new herd buck, since almost all my babies this year are out of one buck. I kept my eye on the Posey's sale page and asked about several bunnies, but then this little guy stuck out to me. I think he will be a great addition to the herd and looks like exactly what the herd needs. He's not from unfamiliar lines either, which is a benefit. Thanks again guys :). So, here is Cameron:




This is not the best picture of him at all, since he is a lot nicer than this. I'll try to get a new picture of him soon!

Doe: Silent Spring's Jana! I had tossed around the idea of bringing in a doe from the Posey's but that wasn't going to work out very well because of all the transport costs. So, I gave up on bringing in another doe, until I saw a post Michael put up doing a big herd reduction. Michael has gorgeous stock and I know he'll be selling out shortly for college, so I figured I'd get another rabbit from him while I had a chance with a transport. Jana is from completely new lines, but I know these lines mesh well with my current lines. Jana is out of pure Kitsemble lines :)! I have one doe from Sara Kitsemble, but she is in my pointed white project, so it's nice to have a doe for my chocolate/lilac project out of Kitsemble lines. Jana is one beautiful doe who I think will add A LOT to the barn :). Jana placed 8th of 39 in Youth ML's at the ARBA Convention in San Diego this past week!! She's having a bit of a rougher time adjusting to everything out here, but she's already starting to not be so stressed out.






Qadoshyah

Annoying Server

Since I finally had a chance today to upload some pictures to the website, I opened up the FTP program and can't login to our server. Oh well, praise the Lord anyway! Our server has supposedly been doing updates for like a week or more. It was supposed to be up in 24-48 hours like 72 hours ago. So, I will post a few pictures of the baby pictures that I took last week here . . . it's not all of them though . . .











I got pictures of the new additions, but those will have to wait for the time being. I'm exhausted, my brain's fried from working on MySQL/PHP stuff for a website and I've gotta get off the computer for a few ;).

Qadoshyah

Update time . . .

A couple days ago I gave a few does ACV in their water. It worked again. Jake successfully bred Sarabeth yesterday. I'm hoping Tatianna will be ready to breed in the next day or so too.

I was able to get new pictures of the babies on Wednesday, but haven't had a chance to upload them yet. Our web server is in the process of upgrading, so we can't do anything with the sites for a couple more days anyway. I'm going to keep the bk chocolate doe out of Daisy's litter. She is beautiful. Very short & deep. Not that I *need* to keep another baby, but she will be very beneficial to the herd, I think. Plus, this is the last chance I have to keep anything out of Deckles :(. I'm not keeping anything from Kristen.

My two new rabbits are ALMOST here!! They should be somewhere in Texas or the first part of Oklahoma now and I should be picking them up within the next couple hours :). Yay! Will give more info & pictures once they arrive!

Jaimie emailed me a picture of Thad with his BIS bunny & all the stuff he won with it. Congrats again Thad :)! I'm so happy the buns have done so well. And this doe of his is a broken chocolate too!!


Qadoshyah

Fall Cleaning

Thankfully this week has been SUNNY & much warmer. It's been a nice change from the cold, rainy, cloudy past couple months we've had.

I went ahead and took the opportunity to clean the barn today. I only got half the barn cleaned and re-organized, but the other half is *easy* to finished. The other half to clean is just the big cage unit and all that involves is taking the bunnies out of it and spraying it off.

I finally had the chance to get all the carrier cages cleaned out and put away under a tarp too. Some of them had shavings in them from random trips and stuff. I hadn't been able to get them all organized and put away right since my foot was broken and then it has been cold & rainy the past few weeks since I've been off crutches.

I hope to get some pictures of the babies tomorrow, Lord willing. We'll see though.

A couple days ago I received an exciting update from Jaimie in Louisiana. As I mentioned a couple posts ago, I sold several mini lops to her nephew a couple months back.

My nephew just won BIS at our state fair with the broken doe! He won his first belt buckle, a plaque, and a banner. Just wanted to let you know. He is so excited.

That was some great news to receive! Thanks for keeping me updated Jaimie and congrats again to Thad :)!

Qadoshyah