Tuesday, June 26, 2018

Replacing rabbit doe

The doe I'd brought home a couple weeks ago was quite determined to escape her pen. She found a weak point in the old cat pen and made it into a neighboring pen. I caught her, fixed up the hole, and put her back in. She found another spot she could break out of. Once again I happened upon her while she was still nearby, but this time she escaped from my net and ran out into the orchard. That's that, I thought. Five days later, she came back! But she had a bad respiratory infection and passed within 24 hours. At which point, I could handle her without unnecessary stress, and realized that she'd been a buck all along. The person who had sold the pair to me had made a mistake, and I hadn't thought to check when I picked them up, because sexing a grown rabbit is pretty easy.

On the bright side, when I posted to the local homesteading list that I was looking for a doe, someone offered me a two year old female who had already had healthy litters. She's a California/New Zealand cross (very common hybrid for meat rabbits).

Crossing my fingers that there are no more shenanigans!

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