# Bunny drama



## Miss mouse (Mar 18, 2020)

Hey all! So we had our planned tan Flemish giant litter of four last week. Then the next day our 4 month old black female unexpectedly gave us 7 more! She must of gotten pregnant right before we broke up the litter at 3 months! And the litter’s next door neighbour was my California females. We bred her this weekend but she’s already bunching hay.

 So do we think she had an oops litter through the cage due any second from the neighbours or do we think she’s just getting her nesting on a month early?
Attaching pics for cuteness!


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## promiseacres (Mar 19, 2020)

Hard to say.... could be she's already bred through the cage...have heard it's not impossible. Or she's just getting ready extra early. Or a false pregnancy... 
That's crazy for a 4 month old flemish to have a litter! & hopefully it doesn't stunt her growth. 
 I would provide a nest box for the California  and be prepared for a long wait and see.


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## Miss mouse (Mar 19, 2020)

promiseacres said:


> Hard to say.... could be she's already bred through the cage...have heard it's not impossible. Or she's just getting ready extra early. Or a false pregnancy...
> That's crazy for a 4 month old flemish to have a litter! & hopefully it doesn't stunt her growth.
> I would provide a nest box for the California  and be prepared for a long wait and see.


Thanks so much. We’ve given her a nesting box which she seems to like. 

The lady I bought the black litter from knew both parents to be predominantly Flemish giant mixes as she had had the paternal grande parents. The mom had been sold to her as a Flemish mix. 
But the father displays a dwarf trait so clearly they’re just a big mix of who knows what. 
Since we breed for meat I hadn’t decided if I’d be breeding them yet since I wanted to see how big they’d get and was hoping to introduce the black colouring to our herd as I’m trying to make use of our pelts.
 I , like you, had not thought a predominantly Flemish giant litter would be mature at 3 months when we broke them up so this was a big surprise. The momma is also getting pretty skinny taking care of these babies. Any suggestions how to help her keep her weight on?


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## promiseacres (Mar 19, 2020)

Full feed and I will give calf manna for a supplement, manna pro makes it. For nursing does I give a couple tablespoons a day.  I have a mini rex with 2 kits...only gave her a little bit the first couple of days then quit as they all are quite plump.


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## Bunnylady (Mar 19, 2020)

Miss mouse said:


> But the father displays a dwarf trait



I'm confused - how does a Flemish Giant mix display a Dwarf trait? How can you tell?

But this is why I tell people to separate by gender no later than 10 weeks - rabbits can become fertile at 12 weeks, and can surprise you with "whoops!" litters. Looks like your teen mom is doing a good job, though.         

As to your Californian doe - without a track record for her, it's hard to know what she's up to. It could be a sign that she's pregnant and getting ready early, it could be a sign that she's ending a false pregnancy almost as it began, it could also be a sign that she isn't pregnant and is only now hitting her fertile peak. Time will tell (I will say, though, that I have never seen a doe that was "haystaching" that didn't at least think she was pregnant).


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## Duckfarmerpa1 (Mar 19, 2020)

If you look back through the rabbit threads, you might not want to, but I had a ‘slip up bunnies’ happen.  Same thing.  Bonded bunnies I thought were too young to be breed ...luckily not related.  But...the really crazy thing....about five weeks after the first kits came along...she kindled again!!   She was not exposed to a buck again.  Apparently this can happen, but rare.  I got great advice on here, to split up the kits.  Weaned the older ones.  Unfortunately, the second set didn’t make it, for whatever reason?  When this was happening, I was given advice to feed my kits and the mom, who needed extra nutrients rolled oats.  I also give some bunnies BOSS every once in awhile..some like it, some don’t.  but the6 love the oats!!


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## Miss mouse (Mar 19, 2020)

Bunnylady said:


> confused - how does a Flemish Giant mix display a Dwarf trait? How can you tell?


So she advertised them as Flemish giants. When I went to pick them up (2 hours each way) I met both parents. The mom looked mostly Flemish and the babies were just 1 month old so hard to tell. Then she showed me the dad who she had bred from 2 “Flemish giants” but he looked like he was less than 10lbs and he was fully mature. 
So I figured at the price I was getting them I’d just take them home and see how big they actually get before I decide if they would be part of my breeding stock or not. I really like the black colour though so I kept the 2 with the best personalities. For rabbits that aren’t kept in the house as pets our black female is a sweetie she even licks my hands.


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## Miss mouse (Mar 19, 2020)

This is one happy potential momma, she just loves her nesting box


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## Miss mouse (Mar 19, 2020)

And this is our “teen mom” if anyone wants to guess her breed mix for me


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## Bunnylady (Mar 19, 2020)

Miss mouse said:


> he looked like he was less than 10lbs and he was fully mature.



While it is true that, for show purposes, Flemish are supposed to weigh at least 13 lbs, they can come smaller than that. There are lots of commercial-type breeds that mature at 10 lbs or considerably less; if the buck's parents had some of those in their background, he may simply be taking after them (though I am wondering, if she's breeding Flemish, why she would keep something so undersized as a breeding animal). Netherland Dwarfs average around 2 lbs; other dwarf breeds may run up in the  4 lb range, but that's a far cry from that buck's 10 lbs!


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## Miss mouse (Mar 19, 2020)

Bunnylady said:


> While it is true that, for show purposes, Flemish are supposed to weigh at least 13 lbs, they can come smaller than that. There are lots of commercial-type breeds that mature at 10 lbs or considerably less; if the buck's parents had some of those in their background, he may simply be taking after them (though I am wondering, if she's breeding Flemish, why she would keep something so undersized as a breeding animal). Netherland Dwarfs average around 2 lbs; other dwarf breeds may run up in the  4 lb range, but that's a far cry from that buck's 10 lbs!


Okay that makes way more sense. Dwarf was her guess for his size. She just breeds to create pets for her grandchildren so she didn’t seem to mind. They kept the two tan rabbits for her grandkids from the litter and I got the other 6.


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## Bunnylady (Mar 19, 2020)

Miss mouse said:


> Okay that makes way more sense. *Dwarf was her guess for his size.* She just breeds to create pets for her grandchildren so she didn’t seem to mind. They kept the two tan rabbits for her grandkids from the litter and I got the other 6.



I think I would take anything she said with a horse-sized block of salt, because she clearly knows little about what she's doing and apparently doesn't care.

Your black doe's body profile could be "semi-arch" (she's not posed, so that may not actually be the case) and she does have good large ears, but that picture doesn't shout "Flemish Giant" at me - her head, especially, just doesn't get me there. She probably has a healthy dollop of Flemish in her, but I think "Flemish mix" is about as far as one can truthfully go, and that's a guess (that baby with the white on it is hers, sired by her brother, correct? That's Dutch marking, which shouldn't ever be seen in purebred Flemish).


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## Miss mouse (Mar 19, 2020)

Bunnylady said:


> I think I would take anything she said with a horse-sized block of salt, because she clearly knows little about what she's doing and apparently doesn't care.
> 
> Your black doe's body profile could be "semi-arch" (she's not posed, so that may not actually be the case) and she does have good large ears, but that picture doesn't shout "Flemish Giant" at me - her head, especially, just doesn't get me there. She probably has a healthy dollop of Flemish in her, but I think "Flemish mix" is about as far as one can truthfully go, and that's a guess (that baby with the white on it is hers, sired by her brother, correct? That's Dutch marking, which shouldn't ever be seen in purebred Flemish).


Oh my gosh! I hadn’t even raised the Dutch markings😂. One of her bothers had it too but I should’ve recognized it because my friends when I was growing up had one who was obviously named Oreo. So I’m sure she’s a little bit of everything. Up where we live most rabbits are sold as “meat”, California (if they have the colouring), or Flemish giant but I honestly doubt a single member of my herd is pure anything 🙄


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## Miss mouse (Mar 20, 2020)

@Bunnylady  we got some new drama. My black babies are starting to weigh in much further apart and I need to monitor them but 5/7 are completely black. How do I mark them to keep track of who is who?


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## Bunnylady (Mar 20, 2020)

Can you use different colored permanent markers to color the insides of their ears?


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## Miss mouse (Mar 20, 2020)

Bunnylady said:


> Can you use different colored permanent markers to color the insides of their ears?


They aren’t big enough ears yet but two of them have 20%lower weights than the average of the litter. So even if there’sa way to just mark those two that would be awesome


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## Bunnylady (Mar 20, 2020)

My daughter managed to do it with some Netherland Dwarfs that I'm sure had smaller ears than your babies (same reason, tracking growth on some newborns) - just take a Sharpie and color the part that doesn't have much hair on it. You'll probably have to touch them up every day or so, but if you pick colors that are different enough (red and blue, as opposed to blue and green, for example), you should be able to see enough color to know who's who.


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## Miss mouse (Mar 20, 2020)

Okay I’ll give it a go in the morning and post my results


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## Miss mouse (Mar 21, 2020)

Bunnylady said:


> My daughter managed to do it with some Netherland Dwarfs that I'm sure had smaller ears than your babies (same reason, tracking growth on some newborns) - just take a Sharpie and color the part that doesn't have much hair on it. You'll probably have to touch them up every day or so, but if you pick colors that are different enough (red and blue, as opposed to blue and green, for example), you should be able to see enough color to know who's who.


Okay here we go. They both got fed last night but are still smaller than their siblings. Those colours are supposed to be blue and orange but we’ll see how they look tonight.


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## Miss mouse (Mar 21, 2020)

this is my tracking and analysis so far. The highlighted ones are the ones I can’t be totally sure that they matched to their first day weights as they are all black with no natural identifiers. But they now have identifiers!


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## Miss mouse (Mar 21, 2020)

promiseacres said:


> Full feed and I will give calf manna for a supplement, manna pro makes it. For nursing does I give a couple tablespoons a day.  I have a mini rex with 2 kits...only gave her a little bit the first couple of days then quit as they all are quite plump.


Okay so I asked my boyfriend to get some and he even put me on with the sales lady to make sure we got calf manna. All seemed to go well I walked her through the rabbit situation and she knew what I was talking about. I told him to buy what she gives him. He came home with a 50lb bag 😂 so I didn’t think to tell the lady smaller size because I assumed talking rabbits she would know we only need a little bit. So I now have an endless supply 😂😂😂


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## Miss mouse (Mar 22, 2020)

baby update: tan babies are 10 days old and black are 9 days old. All the tans have their eyes open and one black has opened its eyes a tiny bit. In the picture above you see our biggest tan kit who weighed in at 302 grams and our smallest black that weighed in at 113 grams today.


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## Miss mouse (Mar 26, 2020)

Californian update
She must've had a false pregnancy because no kits arrived and when we tested her out with one of our males a week later she was awfully willing.
He fell off 3 times so now i think we're in business. Will update when they hopefully arrive in 2.5 weeks.


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