When it comes to purchasing rabbits, look for a reputable breeder that breeds healthy animals and strives to breed to better the breed. A lot of people don't realize that there is a difference between a reputable breeder and a backyard pet breeder. Some people don't really care about this information as they just want a cheap, cute bunny so will buy the cheapest one available instead of paying a little more for a rabbit deemed as a pet from a responsible breeder whose animals will be healthier than the ones you tend to purchase from a backyard breeder. However, a person looking for show or brood stock to start a breeding program for showing, will find this information valuable.
What is the difference between a Reputable Breeder and a Backyard Pet Breeder? Reputable breeders, aka as “hobby breeders”, do not breed for a profit; they simply do it for the betterment of the breed, for the love of the hobby and well... because it's fun! You will notice that Responsible Breeders tend to charge more than Pet Breeders who often price their rabbits low to sell rather quickly or they charge high prices for “cute” animals that are of poor quality. How To Identify A Pet Breeder Pet Breeders often have subpar animals that do not represent the S.O.P. and would not be successful in a show breeders program. A Pet Breeder will often be breeding several different colored animals instead of focusing on one color project until it can be competitive on the tables. One of the biggest things people will notice with a Pet Breeder is that they are messing with color rules to just produce “cute” animals such as a Chocolate VM which is not useful in any breeding program. Some Pet Breeders often try accepting deposits on newborn kits or very young animals. I recently came across several people who were taking deposits on kits the day they were born. Some of the common terms used by Pet Breeders include but are not limited to ”cute, micro, dwarf lop, pocket bunny, incorrect color terms", etc. Their pictures are often taken to make the rabbits look cute and not posed. They often get defensive about discussing flaws in their animals as well. By asking them a lot of questions, you tend to be able to easily figure them out as well. Also, ask them if they attend ARBA Sanctioned shows, placings, etc. Finding A Great Breeder Finding a great breeder isnt too hard but it is always great to do your own research as much as you can before committing to purchasing a rabbit from one. Usually if you ask someone in the breeding community, they can or will always have breeders they recommend or don't recommend. Just note, just because someone has placed in the Top Lop in Hollands for example doesn't mean they are the best person to be purchasing from. Make sure to ask a lot of questions and see what the breeders responses are. Don't be afraid to look for a mentor either or someone who is willing to take time out to give you their opinions on matters. Some breeders may be too busy to respond right away which is fine but beware of those who get aggressive in their responses. If a breeder sees that you are taking the initiative to learn, they will often be willing to help when they can.
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I have a lot of people who ask, “how can you tell a doe is pregnant?” We do this by palpating. Palpating a doe may take you awhile to catch on to or even learn how to successfully palpate an animal correctly. Palpating is extremely hard to do on rabbits who have a lot of fat. 11-14 days gestation is ideal of when to palpate a doe but you can palpate an animal a week before they are due to tell rather or not they need to go back into breeding again. Palpating at a later stage is obviously a lot more easier to do as the babies are of size by then. At 11-14 days, the eggs will feel like tiny marbles or peas. I place the doe in front of me, facing me and using both hands, feel her abdomen. You want to find your own fingers first through the doe's body then you will feel a small lump pass between your fingers, that's when you located a kit. If you do not feel any small lumps, it's safe to say your doe probably didn't take at which case, you can go ahead and rebreed your doe. Do not be afraid to squeeze a little as it is very hard to hurt the eggs at this stage.
Breeding Rabbits: Table Breeding vs Cage Breeding.
When breeding rabbits, there is two techniques that can be used: Table Breeding and Cage Breeding. Both have their own benefits when trying to mate two rabbits together. I personally prefer cage breeding that way I can breed multiple animals together without having to monitor rabbits on a table setting however, sometimes table breeding is required when breeding certain animals. When should you utilize table breeding? I will table breed when my does are more aggressive towards the buck than I prefer meaning that the doe is attacking the buck. In order to avoid injury, I will assist in a breeding by putting both rabbits on a table and closely monitoring the animals. Usually I have to also assist in holding the doe in place to make sure she does not strike out towards the buck or causes injury. With some breeds, you will notice more breeders use this method with the high energy animals or aggressive breeders. Cage Breeding Always, and I mean absolutely always place the doe in the bucks cage. If you notice that after 30 minutes or so that your doe is not being receptive to the buck, simply remove her and try again an hour later. If the doe is still not receptive, I will try her again the next day. Be sure to write the days down for all matings you do rather or not you witness a fall off. There is a lot of misconceptions that line breeding is the same as inbreeding and that is incorrect. When breeding rabbits, you need to do a lot of line breeding in order to set the desired traits you want in your herd.
What is line breeding? Line breeding is the carefully selected process of breeding closely related animals in order to improve individual traits in your rabbits. All great lines start with only a few rabbits. A breeder will then breed the rabbits together and keep the best offspring; that offspring then gets bred back to the parents or grandparents and so on, always selecting the best matches and only keeping the best animals out of the crossing. Eventually rabbits become distantly related as the original animals are no longer viewed on the pedigree. Once a breeder selects a nice buck from their lines and rebreeds that buck to all their does, the line breeding then begins again. Line breeding is an excellent tool to use in breeding programs because it is all about consistency. If you wanting a breeding program that will have long-term success, line breeding is the way to go. Rabbits do carry recessive traits such as color, fur, type and condition, with these traits, they can carry both good and bad. Eventually you will have the good and bad traits surface in which case, you will cull the rabbits with the bad traits from your program, only keeping the rabbits with the ideal traits. Ideally, you will be able to produce consistent animals without any surprises in your litters. You will also learn how to correctly judge your animals at an early stage to decide which are keepers and which are not. When line breeding, be sure to keep going forward in your program and not backwards. Do not sacrifice one trait to get another as this will back fire. What I mean by this is if you already have an animal with a solid hindquarter but thin ears, don't keep an animal back that has a terrible hindquarter but decent ears, don't become barn blind. If you have another friend that is a breeder, it would be a good idea to ask them for their thoughts on animals as well. When to utilize an outcross. Outcrossing can be beneficial to help bring in a certain trait you are lacking in that your current program is failing to fix. When selecting an outcross, be sure to select an animal that has generations of the correct trait that you wish to correct on your own animals. When you first outcross, it is okay to be disappointed as their traits may clash with yours. I suggest taking the best F1 rabbit and breeding back to your line, you should be able to then see results in the F2 kits. What is inbreeding? Inbreeding is when you breed brother to sister. This also has it's benefits for locking in the desired traits that you want however you will need to cull heavily as this can also lock in the bad traits as well. If I do this sort of breeding myself, I will not breed the kits to another closely related animal as you do not want too much inbreeding going on in your program. I have had the most success with half brothers and half sisters pairing however again, you must realize that I would only ever mate two rabbits that are the best matches and crosses faults. For my first actual blog post, I want to touch base on breeding programs in general, this is for all breeding programs regardless of breed. Each program has an ideal perspective of what animal most resembles the Standard of Perfection based on what is written. Due to comprehensions being up to the reader, this can lead to different thoughts but at the end of the day, there will always be a similar animal sitting in front of the breeder that they think best resembles the SOP. A breeder also has an ideal picture in their head of an animal that they really like, for me personally, I like bulldog type Holland Lops and Netherland Dwarfs where as some breeders do like the more slender or smaller animals. Whatever the case may be, a breeder should always be striving towards producing the best animals that correctly fits the SOP and bettering the breed overall; you want to be producing quality, not quantity.
Breeding programs should be kept on a strict schedule in order to obtain their goals, producing better animals. Often people will hear breeders say, “Breed hard, Cull harder” and this is absolutely true. Don't keep every animal unless you know for a fact they are going to better your program, you simply want to keep the best and move on the rest. I am not saying that the animals that you cull from your own program won't be helpful to another breeder, unless that animal is absolutely pet quality. A lot of breeders, myself included, will purchase multiple “parts animals” to help correct the issues we may have in our own breeding program and that's okay. Remember, there is no such thing as a perfect animal, every animal has a flaw, we just want to reduce the number of flaws to bare minimum but always try to strive to produce perfection. In each breeding program, you will see that the breeder has both show animals and brood animals. There is a numerous amount of reasons for this which from my experience, includes that you often get your best animals from your brood animals. Some people, like myself, are very tough on their brood animals and although we don't consider them being show quality, they can also hold their own on the show tables, they may just not win the class. Again, you want to keep animals back that has only a few flaws to help your program. For brood animals, I will disregard size (weight) as larger does often produce more kits per litter. You want to look at their overall type and make sure they balance. Now let's discuss compatible bloodlines and consistency. Throughout your breeding program, you will find that some bloodlines just do not cross well together and that's okay, it happens. Before most breeders will cull a certain bloodline, we will try taking the 2nd generation and breeding it back to the 1st generation to see if it will produce a nice animal. There is also some bloodlines that should be culled from your breeding program immediately for example, BEWs in a chocolate or shaded program, constantly producing white spots, bad teeth and other genetic disqualifications. If you cull these animals out hard, you will find that you are saving yourself from headaches and heartaches in your program later. With any program, consistency is key. If your animals are constantly producing inconstant animals, I would personally remove those animals from my breeding program. What is consistency? In my opinion, consistency is when you can breed two animals together expecting a certain result and achieving that result, time after time, your animals will continuously get better. Inconsistency is when you breed two animals multiple times and the results are all over the spectrum. With any great breeding program, you will find that breeders continuously try to better their lines and build a solid foundation. When starting out, we often hear, "build your barn before you paint it", now that doesn't mean to disregard color all together. With some breeds, like Netherland Dwarfs, there is certain "dos" and "do nots" that must be followed when breeding them or you risk destroying your program with a bunch of unshowable colors. Most breeders will only bring in new bloodlines into their programs after their foundation is already set, this is key. You want to target a breeder who's line is consistent and a genetic powerhouse and not to mention, animals that are going to help correct the flaws. Often I will take an entire year to focus on correcting two flaws. If I manage to correct those flaws rather quickly, I will start working on my next project. For example, this year the goal was to correct ear position and fur. In order to accomplish this goal, I brought in 5 Netherland Dwarfs from an outside breeder who is well known for both of these being amazing on his dwarfs. With my Holland Lop breeding program, I focused on breeding my animals and will continue to do so until I need to bring in a new line. The whole idea to fix in the HL Program was bone and shortness of limb; the next flaw for me to fix is crown. One thing you never want to do with your breeding program is go backwards. If your current litters are not achieving the goal you had in mind, sometimes it is best to sit back and rethink the situation as something is not working. This may include culling animals from your program and don't be afraid to cull entire litters if they are not better than their sire/dams. Breeding rabbits is all about the journey and sometimes that includes learning things the hard way and trial and errors. Always remember, even the best breeders out there started somewhere too. I want to wish all my fellow breeders and rabbit addicts good luck with their breeding programs! Remember, never give up! Everyone hits a bump in the road every once in awhile. Welcome to our new BUNNY BLOG! I am so excited to start this blog for all our fellow rabbit addicts to follow what's going on in our breeding and show programs! I will be sure to touch up on several subjects in this blog, hopefully add some videos and answer questions based off of my experiences. I want to remind everyone now though that the blog is based off of my opinion and therefore others may agree or disagree. At some point, I may even just move this completely over to a YouTube channel and do video blogs, that's in the future though, not anytime soon. For now, everyone will have to deal with the written blogs. The blogs are going to touch base strictly on rabbit or cavy related subjects. Stay tuned to see our next blog post!
Be sure to leave your comments below including any questions you may have that I can touch base with on the next blog! |
AuthorBrittany is an Open A.R.B.A. exhibitor that raises and shows Pedigreed Holland Lops and Netherland Dwarfs. She started breeding rabbits in 2002 and American Cavies in 2005. Archives
June 2022
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