Back yard rabbit group anyone?

[herbandteas]

I belong to the chin rabbit group, meat rabbit group, northwest reporter, nw rare and heritage rabbit breeder group. There are a couple more I belong to but they are not real busy sites.

 

[mamato3]

happy new year everyone
i belong to the meat rabbit fourm on yahoo and homesteading today which has a section on rabbits

 

[herbandteas]

Quote:
Hi on the meat rabbit group I am beadnfibers ak Helaine

Good to see you here too. I have chickens that are suppose to be easter eggers but my 1st eggs came when we had the frozen snow and it was a brown egg now I am getting brown and green eggs LOL

 

[Preservation Acres]

I've tossed around the idea of raising rabbits, but I'd like to do some sort of "psuedo-free ranging" where I let them run around in an enclosed run and gave them a "coop" at night.

Gosh, I really have chickens on the brain.

Can you do this with rabbits?

 

[mamato3]

Quote:
Hi on the meat rabbit group I am beadnfibers ak Helaine

Good to see you here too. I have chickens that are suppose to be easter eggers but my 1st eggs came when we had the frozen snow and it was a brown egg now I am getting brown and green eggs LOL

hello im under ricktiffe or Tiffany its a great site ive been helped out lots of time by reading or posting on it

Preservation Acres You can do its got a name for it oooo my mind is blank i think it call something like colony rasing or something like that you just build them a barn and a fence around the barn and let the live freely someone on here will now what its called lol

 

[herbandteas]

with colony raising of rabbits you will end up with more rabbits than you want to have....we did that long ago. I had to buy feed weekly for them. We had 35 at one time. then I just started selling them off. I was really sad when the original pair passed on and they are buried under the tree that they raised their brood.

 

[Preservation Acres]

Thanks,

If I were to do it, I'd want to raise critically endangered rabbits as labeled by ALBC, so lots of reproduction might not be a bad thing as long as I'd have enough buyers to pick up all my extra births.

 

[chinbunny1]

not only that you take chances of severe inbreeding, and the bucks beating each other up. Thats why most of us use cages. But thats not saying you can't give them a little yard time.

There are alot of rare breeds the albc doesn't recognize that are endangered too. like my standard chinchillas.

 

[gypsy2621]

Quote:
This is a good plan on paper, BUT
as Chinbunny1 pointed out not all rabbits that are endangered are on that list.
keep in mind when your raising a rare heritage breed you must be vigilant in culling out the undesireables, bad bone density, weak shoulders, wrong color, etc etc, just raisiing them because they are rare and endangered does NOT mean quality nor breed specifications.
read up on the Standards of Perfection as to what these breeds need to look like, what they standards call for, otherwise you are doing more damage than you are perfecting.

As ChinBunny knows full well Standard Chins can be ruined in a matter of one generation, all it takes is one rabbit of the wrong breed to mess up generation after generation of any breed.

If I am correct as to whom Chinbunny is I believe there was an issue a few years back with whites popping up iin her litters?
Generations back some one trying to improve the breed bred in likely a NewZeland rabbit, the white gene will now pop up generation after generation reducing the rabbits to meat quality only.

I breed and raise Silver Fox to the Standards set down by ARBA.
This sunday past I picked up 3 Silver fox that were pointed, meaning someone somewhere along the generations bred in a Califonian. now keep in mind Silver Fox are on the Rare Breeds list.
these 3 rabbits I bought are for meat production only and will never see anything other than the inside of a crock pot or oven.

ANY Rare or Endangered animal is only worth the time, effort, education and quality the breeder puts into them.

In breeding can help and can destroy a herd in a blink, Colony raising of a Rare breed is not generally recomeded. Careful control over breedings on the other hand is.

I dont want to sound mean here but with Rare and Endangered breeds you really have to do homework, talk with breeders who are raising them to Standards.

I would also like to add if possible go to a rabbit show, stand at a judging table for the breed you are interested in raising. So MUCH can be learned from the judges comments on what makes that animal specal, worth rasing, and how to improve on specific traits.

I guess what I am saying is :
If your going to breed a rare animal please breed responsibly.
I know a lot of us that work so hard on keeping to standards get very frustrated when a drop dead beautiful animal produces babys that are not with in breed standards.

 

[ChickieWhickie]

Count me in on the rabbit forum.

I checked out the arba website.

http://www.arba.net/Breeds.htm

I like this one too:

http://www.rabbitandcavydirectory.com/Rabbit_Cavy_Breed_Gallery_Menu.htm