French Angora & Californian- Jack Frost

[Hens and Roos]

thanks for the tips, FA are new to us- this is our 1st pair- 1st time breeding them. No kits, so we will probably be re-breeding in the next day or so.

Our doe is a bit on the snotty side so handling her can be a challenge.

Kind of like chicken math

 

[RedBrush Farm]

If it were not for chicken math, I couldn't justify my chicken obsession)

 

[Hens and Roos]

I think chickens are just the start and it's a losing battle from there

my DS(8)decided he'd rather have another FA rabbit instead of chicks.....yep my kids are hooked too!

 

[RedBrush Farm]

Well, with us it started with chickens (rare breeds) expanded to peafowl added turkey's and then bought a flock of sheep after which I decided I just MUST have the French Angora...... Chicken math goes well beyond chickens. I tell everyone that if your going to have a farm what could be more fun than filling it up??

 

[Hens and Roos]

We have peafowl, and kids raise meat turkeys for fair...just haven't gotten into the other animals yet...DD is asking for Alpacas- we are learning to spin fiber

btw- like your avatar

 

[RedBrush Farm]

Thanks, this is one of a set of twins born Christmas morning. I would love to learn to spin the fiber from my Rabbits. I just sell it now. Don't know exactally when I could fit in another thing to learn. We looked into alpaca and even committed to a pair, but after much research on care we backed out. The biggest factor for us is they must be treated ASAP if a problem arises and none of our local vets was willing to treat them. The gentleman who had them had a vet coming from 60 miles away and told us up front was very costly. We were looking at the Suri and they were beautiful..... Maybe someday

 

[Hens and Roos]

We picked up an reasonably priced drop spindle and are slowly learning to spin with it. My DD(14 years), DS(8 years) and myself are learning- we are actually looking at getting a spinning wheel. We have a fiber shop close by that the gal has been very helpful in showing/explaining to us the steps. I also checked out a book from the library called "Teach Yourself Visually Handspinning" by Judith Mackenzie McCuin

Right now we only have the 2 FA so we haven't tried to sell the fiber. We have been learning to mix the FA fiber with Merino fiber.

 

[Hens and Roos]

So we are at day15 for our FA Cashew- we tested her with the buck and she wanted nothing to do with him so hopefully we will have a litter around March 19th or so

 

[Hens and Roos]

thought I would add a picture of our newest addition , picked him up the other night, he is a half-sib to our buck-Jack Frost. So far the kids are calling him "Jack Black" and my DS(12) is laying claim to him.....I had kind of picked him out for myself so we'll see how this works. We are hoping that he carries the blue gene but won't know that until he is older.

So last week Thursday wasn't a good day in our house.....our newest buck- Jack Black got spooked and ended up breaking a hind leg and we had to put him down...very sad all around.

 

[Hens and Roos]

So we have been waiting to see if our doe Cashew was actually pregnant this time around as indicated by testing her at day 14. This morning at chore time her nest box was loaded with fur and if you watched long enough you could see it wiggle! At this point we have not checked and will give her a few days before doing so.