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- #61
SuburbanFarmChic
Overrun with beasties
Yay. Stinky McStinkerson is gone!! He's off to his new home 
SuburbanFarmChic Journal - update and rant 5/5
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elevan
Critter Addict ♥
Happy Thanksgiving SuburbanFarmChic
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- #63
SuburbanFarmChic
Overrun with beasties
It's been a busy six weeks. Figured I'd update this.
- We picked up an antique square grand piano in beautiful condition. Just had to move it and now get it tuned. Terribly excited as it has shell inlay and all the original ivory.
- Was given 4 hens and their coop and a doe rabbit and her hutch by a friend who was moving into a town house. Hope to have eggs again soon.
- Dealt with the whole Petunia thing. Oy. She's doing ok and the piglets are SO lovely. She really does make some NICE babies. Speaking of which we may have a sow from her May litter available. We were going to keep her for breeding but dad decided to keep her brother instead. Duroc/Red Wattle cross and yes, she has the wattles.
- Our spotty mini mubian is preggo and we're hoping for multiples. She just started uddering up last week and her belly us HUGE. She had trips last March. She's due some time before the end of January.
- Our orange doe has 5 kits right now and the brown/white one just had 7. We'll be rolling in the rabbits soon. Getting ready to process the Sept batch in early January.
- A friend's goats were attacked by her dogs and I ended up going over since the vet was 2hrs away. Put one down as most of her jaw muscle was gone and her back legs were perforated. The other I treated with antibiotics and banamine and she's just fine.
- Helping a friend process some turkeys this weekend.
- Still thinking about the greenhouse. Have all the parts just need to get it up.
- Debating starting a kidding thread on Spotty McFatty Fat but the last one didn't go so well and I'm a little gun shy about baby news at the moment.
Here's a picture from mid November.
- We picked up an antique square grand piano in beautiful condition. Just had to move it and now get it tuned. Terribly excited as it has shell inlay and all the original ivory.
- Was given 4 hens and their coop and a doe rabbit and her hutch by a friend who was moving into a town house. Hope to have eggs again soon.
- Dealt with the whole Petunia thing. Oy. She's doing ok and the piglets are SO lovely. She really does make some NICE babies. Speaking of which we may have a sow from her May litter available. We were going to keep her for breeding but dad decided to keep her brother instead. Duroc/Red Wattle cross and yes, she has the wattles.
- Our spotty mini mubian is preggo and we're hoping for multiples. She just started uddering up last week and her belly us HUGE. She had trips last March. She's due some time before the end of January.
- Our orange doe has 5 kits right now and the brown/white one just had 7. We'll be rolling in the rabbits soon. Getting ready to process the Sept batch in early January.
- A friend's goats were attacked by her dogs and I ended up going over since the vet was 2hrs away. Put one down as most of her jaw muscle was gone and her back legs were perforated. The other I treated with antibiotics and banamine and she's just fine.
- Helping a friend process some turkeys this weekend.
- Still thinking about the greenhouse. Have all the parts just need to get it up.
- Debating starting a kidding thread on Spotty McFatty Fat but the last one didn't go so well and I'm a little gun shy about baby news at the moment.
Here's a picture from mid November.
elevan
Critter Addict ♥
Hoping for good word on Spotty McFatty Fat 
Best of luck to you both.
Best of luck to you both.- Thread starter
- #65
SuburbanFarmChic
Overrun with beasties
I seriously need to actually name my goats. They all get dumb nick names or identifiers like Mama or Spot or Stinky. Although I guess it makes it easier if something needs to be done. And if they come with names, I can call them by that name if it isn't truly horrible. I might just have to pick a theme and go with it. I've been leaning towards Bronte characters. I'm inclined to skip Austin as there are probably WAY too many Elizabeth and Darcy combos out there. And there's always Louisa May Alcott or Laura Ingalls Wilder. You see why I never get anything named.
And lets not even talk about naming the rabbits.
We had 7 kits 2 days ago for an experimental breeding. I have one doe that has small litters but is a fantastic mother, then another that has large litters but her frantic behavior leads to some stomping losses. Good mama is a great care taker but a terrible nest builder. Bad mama is a horrible baby minder but a great nest builder. I really want to squish them into one rabbit. Anyway, good mama was only having like 3-4 kits per litter so I tried double breeding her this time and she had 7 nice healthy babies w/ no runt. Everybody looked great and 48hrs later everybody still has nice big fat bellies full of milk. I needed to know if her mothering skills extended to larger litters and apparently they do. Bad mama started out w/ 9 kits that were all born on the wire instead of either the nest box in the cage or the second nest that she made. 2 died, 2 nearly died, 1 she ate at 18hrs old and 1 disappeared at 2.5 weeks old. The baby could not have gotten out of the cage and there was no sign of it being eaten so we are clueless on that one. So from 9 we have 5. Not a great track record for her.
The next rabbitsperiment (until some of these babes are old enough to test mothering skills) will be to see if I can breed them at the same time and then foster out from bad mama to good mama. My buck is completely mello which is why I'm hoping to get some less spazzy kits from bad mama. Of the 5 there are 2 maybe 3 that are not super jumpy and 2 that freak the heck out when ever you open the box to feed. The freaky ones better taste good. Oh and the one that went poof at 2.5 weeks was the broken harlequin that I REALLY wanted to keep as a pet rabbit. grr. Oh well. At least I know the color gene is in there.
I think good mama's litter is going to be mostly black, but we'll have to see. Might be a wild rabbit looking one in there as well. I have 4 with dark skin and pink bellies, 2 splotchy ones and one pink one. Last time my pink one from her was a broken golden color.
And lets not even talk about naming the rabbits.
We had 7 kits 2 days ago for an experimental breeding. I have one doe that has small litters but is a fantastic mother, then another that has large litters but her frantic behavior leads to some stomping losses. Good mama is a great care taker but a terrible nest builder. Bad mama is a horrible baby minder but a great nest builder. I really want to squish them into one rabbit. Anyway, good mama was only having like 3-4 kits per litter so I tried double breeding her this time and she had 7 nice healthy babies w/ no runt. Everybody looked great and 48hrs later everybody still has nice big fat bellies full of milk. I needed to know if her mothering skills extended to larger litters and apparently they do. Bad mama started out w/ 9 kits that were all born on the wire instead of either the nest box in the cage or the second nest that she made. 2 died, 2 nearly died, 1 she ate at 18hrs old and 1 disappeared at 2.5 weeks old. The baby could not have gotten out of the cage and there was no sign of it being eaten so we are clueless on that one. So from 9 we have 5. Not a great track record for her.
The next rabbitsperiment (until some of these babes are old enough to test mothering skills) will be to see if I can breed them at the same time and then foster out from bad mama to good mama. My buck is completely mello which is why I'm hoping to get some less spazzy kits from bad mama. Of the 5 there are 2 maybe 3 that are not super jumpy and 2 that freak the heck out when ever you open the box to feed. The freaky ones better taste good. Oh and the one that went poof at 2.5 weeks was the broken harlequin that I REALLY wanted to keep as a pet rabbit. grr. Oh well. At least I know the color gene is in there.
I think good mama's litter is going to be mostly black, but we'll have to see. Might be a wild rabbit looking one in there as well. I have 4 with dark skin and pink bellies, 2 splotchy ones and one pink one. Last time my pink one from her was a broken golden color.
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- #66
SuburbanFarmChic
Overrun with beasties
MUAAHAHAHAHAA!!!! Watch out world!! I got a reciprocating saw as an early present last night. 
Now to go cut up some stuff to make rabbit hutches.
Now to go cut up some stuff to make rabbit hutches.Ms. Research
Herd Nerd On A Mission
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I've enjoyed reading about your "rabbitsperiment" and hope you continue to post. Wishing you success.
Congratulations on the "early" Christmas present. Have fun.
Regarding names and sticking to themes. I picked Harry Potter. Unfortunately DH kind of forgot that and we have "Willard". It just popped into his head. So my suggestion, go with whatever works. I like my animals to have names. Even if it's just temporary and will change in the future. But that's just me.
K
Congratulations on the "early" Christmas present. Have fun.
Regarding names and sticking to themes. I picked Harry Potter. Unfortunately DH kind of forgot that and we have "Willard". It just popped into his head. So my suggestion, go with whatever works. I like my animals to have names. Even if it's just temporary and will change in the future. But that's just me.
K
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- #68
SuburbanFarmChic
Overrun with beasties
Have been working on building rabbit hutches. The rain today has not been helping. At least it's not snow though. Found out we're getting another do so I need to make another outdoor hutch and a grow out pen. My "plan" is to have a living/nursery pen for each doe and a grow out pen for each doe for her litter. I need to do some maths on how many litter we'll be having a year etc. Hoping to have it set up where we have 5 or so does that rotate out to have a litter every other month or so. Then w/ the grow out pens and such we can keep them until they are big enough to butcher. I have friends that want rabbit meat but I need to get a steady supply up and going.
So far since the project started I am in it about $150.00. I need that to change and to have some litters that are old enough to sell. We're getting there though. After we take this other doe from a friend I'm not getting any more until what I have is running smoothly and is paying for itself or more.
So far since the project started I am in it about $150.00. I need that to change and to have some litters that are old enough to sell. We're getting there though. After we take this other doe from a friend I'm not getting any more until what I have is running smoothly and is paying for itself or more.
elevan
Critter Addict ♥
Haha! I love power tools myself. So much fun and so much easier than doing things the good old fashioned way.SuburbanFarmChic said:MUAAHAHAHAHAA!!!! Watch out world!! I got a reciprocating saw as an early present last night.
Don't forget to take some pics of your project and enter it into the Livestock Housing Contest . You could win a GHM!
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- #70
SuburbanFarmChic
Overrun with beasties
Uh, yeah, that would have required having a plan instead of randomly slapping pieces of wood out of the lumber stack together and hoping it resembles something a rabbit would want to inhabit when I'm done.
Hoping to pick up a Nigerian buck tomorrow morning. Then we'll get some of these girlies bred and I'll see who is worth keeping and who gets the boot. Gotta breed soon if I'm going to sell babies this summer at the chicken swap thingie.
Still mulling over future animal plans. Want to stick w/ goats and rabbits for a while. We have the 4 chickens I took for a friend and we'll probably hold tight there for now. I dislike chicken smell and butchering chickens and such. Eggs are nice and if these girls can kick it into gear I'll be happy. If not they are getting stew potted and I'm returning to a chicken free lifestyle until Spring/Summer.
Hoping to pick up a Nigerian buck tomorrow morning. Then we'll get some of these girlies bred and I'll see who is worth keeping and who gets the boot. Gotta breed soon if I'm going to sell babies this summer at the chicken swap thingie.
Still mulling over future animal plans. Want to stick w/ goats and rabbits for a while. We have the 4 chickens I took for a friend and we'll probably hold tight there for now. I dislike chicken smell and butchering chickens and such. Eggs are nice and if these girls can kick it into gear I'll be happy. If not they are getting stew potted and I'm returning to a chicken free lifestyle until Spring/Summer.
