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It’s been a bad couple of months for the Twisted Wabbitry.

The 2 month heat wave finally took it’s toll in July – we lost Abby (Ruby-Eyed White Doe – Pedigree) to the heat.  On the same day we discovered that Little Joe (Fawn Buck – Pedigree) – had developed Fly Bite. The infestation had not gotten into his skin – just in his fur – but the stress of us trying to clean him up and heat was apparently too much and we lost him overnight.

The heat wave broke two days later.

Nathen rebuilt the Rabbitry over the next two months for me making everyone much more accessible which had been great, however, on Monday this week, Yoder (Black Buck – Amish) managed to work his cage off the rack and escape – we haven’t seen hide nor hair of him since.

The icing on the cake came this morning when I let our dogs out into their yard for walkies… only to find two huge stray dogs in the rabbit yard. I chased them off but Bucky (Broken Black Buck – Pedigree) was nowhere to be found. His wood hutch – separate from the others – was toppled over and pulled apart.

BIL is doing sweeps of the yard today keeping an eye out for Bucky and for the dogs – I hate calling Animal Control, but I did it and I hope they find those animals. We’ve never had an issue with any of the neigborhood dogs before – but I’ve never seen these two before and they are absolutely huge.

The only silver lining is that I didn’t find a carcass – hopefully Bucky (and Yoder for that matter) will turn up.

Bucky

Yoder - Black Buck - No Pedigree

Little Joe - Fawn Buck

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Well Husband has stated that there is room for improvement on the Rabbit Hutch design – which we knew going in, but hey.  The sewage system was indeed hit rather hard by the straw from the bedding boxes but that burden has lessened a bit now that it’s all packed down but cleaning out that system wasn’t fun… or at least I figure it wasn’t from the expression on Hubby’s face – he is so awesome that he did it for me! I wuvs my Hubby.

Anyway – he put together a 10′ pole (no jokes) with a wooden disk on the end to snake out the catch pipes – it’s oookie since some of the mess invariably comes out the end your working on, but it does work.  Now I get to shovel up all that ‘compost’ and spread it on the garden… fun, fun.

As for the escapee…

Yoder and Wonka are 30″ cages instead of 36″ cages currently – were upgrading as budget allows and these are the only two still waiting. We’ll apparently the got rowdy enough that they shoved the cages off their support beams.  Yoder’s cage slipped down enough that the hole in the wire cage to access his wooden bedding box slipped below the box and he was able to wiggle out into the free world… the unfenced free world full of roaming neighborhood cats and dogs. (Rabbit Photos are Here).

I’m not sure how long he was out yesterday – in the pouring rain – before our awesome neighbors spotted him and came to let us know (did I mention they are the most awesome neighbors?!), but Hubby said he walked out there and Yoder was just hanging out by the Hutch. He was able to right the cage and then just pick the little guy up and put back in his home – no problem!

Yay Neighbors! Yay Hubby! and Yay Yoder for not being a skittish turd!

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I joined the ARBA – The American Rabbit Breeders Association! I also registered a Rabbitry name – The Twisted Wabbitry (Thank you Maria for the inspiration!).

By joining the ARBA I get to attend their shows where I can have my rabbits compared to the breed standard by qualified judges – they also have judges that only look at the quality of the fiber but you have to show in the breed category too from what I understand.

I also registered my rabbitry – The Twisted Wabbitry.  That means when I fill out my pedigrees on my eventually baby Buns (if/when I sell) they’ll show as Twisted’s Domino or Twisted’s Wonka, etc, on the paperwork. This allows people to always be able to identify where my rabbit came from and contact me directly if they have an issue or question. Of course this means I’ve got to get a tattoo setup so I can tag my guys. Pedigreed rabbits have a number/letter combination tattooed in their left ear; that number also goes on their pedigree forms.  I’ll have to decide also what I want that mark to be – it’s usually 5 digits I believe.

I think I need to transfer my registered rabbits into my name but I’m still looking into that one.

I’m also going to joining the National Angora Rabbit Breeders Club which is a specialty club under the ARBA dealing only with Angoras.

The Twisted Wabbitry is going to specialize in naturally colored French Angora Rabbits and fiber since the majority of my buns are non-white.

I’ve decided on my next breeding combinations – I had wanted to try to breed this month but it’s been absolutely frigid here and alot of sites I’ve read this week have said the Does aren’t as receptive this time of year and if they do manage to kindle then they may reabsorb the babies during gestation so I think I’m going to wait, but here’s what I want to do:

Abby is a registered Ruby-eyed White but her undercoat tends to felt right on her so I’m planning to breed her with Bucky who’s a Broken Black, meaning he’s white with black spots. I’m hoping this will improve the coats on the babies and we can get some nice brown-eyed white rabbits out of it. Bucky’s two surviving kits (Domino and Wonka) have absolutely beautiful coats that are soft, fluffy, and does not mat very badly at all even with very little grooming – just like their father.

I also want to breed Sundown and Little Joe. According to their pedigrees Joe is a Fawn color and Sundown is a lynx, I don’t know what the definition of those colors are but just looking at them I’d say Sundown is a fawn and Little Joe is the lynx but whatever.  By crossing them I’m hoping to get an improvement on Sundown’s coat which I feel is very hair-like and limp while Little Joe’s is fluffy and soft. Color-wise I hope to get a full spread from orange to a wild rabbit brown.

Then we’ll try our last attempt with Gertie to Yoder. Both are blackish-gray, non-pedigree, from the Amish small-animal auction. I’m hoping that the issue we had with Gertie with her first litter was due to age – I’m thinking she may have been right on the cusp of breeding age when she had them and maybe that contributed to the issue? Physically she’s changed a lot since then so we’ll cross our fingers on this one.  Again I’m hoping for a coat improvement.  Yoder’s is very soft and fluffy but for some reason the ends of his fur want to felt together which causes that hank of fur to slowly twist and felt up until he gets these u-shaped mats which pinch him. He gotten the most grooming this year out of everyone but still has the worst matting. If Gertie abandons this litter then we’re going to retire her to a fiber only bun.

You can see pictures of everybody here.

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My wonderful-awesome-super-fantabulous husband spent his entire Thanksgiving holiday and all day this past Saturday building me a new hutch for our Angora Bunnies, complete with nest boxes both for Kindling (babies!) and to get them out of the cold! (It was 17 degrees the night we finished construction).

The cages themselves are store bought units from Rural King (I don’t remember the brand) – they are 36″x30″x18″ – $33 a piece. The plywood nest boxes are 11 1/2″ x 30″ (roughly) and are integral to the wood structure. Right now the end pieces are nailed in but before the spring that will be changed and they’ll be hinged for access and cleaning – we lost the light and it was COLD so they got nailed on.

That rabbits seem to like them – although now they are covered in straw and need to be groomed horribly.  Also the straw is going to be a trial on the PVC sewage system we put in. There’s a cat litter syle container that goes beneath the downspout to transfer waste to the compost bin (the tray has holes for drainage).

But I’m happy with it - and more importantly, so are the Buns!

Hubby workin’ HARD!

The Hutch 95% done!

Moto enjoying the new digs.

This is baby Domino (one of the Survivors!) all grown up and using her box!

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I learned an important lesson this week about grooming my Angora’s; a revelation that has caused me quite a bit of distress.

The first two months their coat is growing does not require much maintenance, just dealing with the occasional small mat… Well apparently I got lazy after those first months of them not needing me and I stopped checking their coats. 

Until last week. 

When I realized that it was pretty much time to sheer.

And I realized that a bored Moto had chewed the fur down the sides of his body… he’s pretty much got a faux-hawk now.

Abby’s coat is hard to describe… Cottony(?) I guess.  She doesn’t feel like she has mats but when you get into the fur, the fibers are nearly inseparable.

But Yoder is the one who’s got me upset.  The fur matted so badly on his sides (where it’s not visible because of the long fur from his back), that he’s got some scabbing where the fur ripped out as he moved around and the mats pulled. I was horrified when I found it – now it’s not bad, there are only a few bald spots, no bigger than a dime and only one of those had some freckle sized scabs but still – I didn’t realize that could happen!

All the rabbits were horribly matted when I brought them home from their former owners but I’d never seen the mats pull out like that – I’m guessing it was because those mats formed when the hair was so much shorter and these newest ones formed with the longer hair.

I had to cut everything from the front shoulder blades forward on poor Yoder – plus a bit from his hind legs and middle sides.  I’ve lost maybe a quarter of the harvest from my beautiful boy besides the shame of being a bad bunny mom.

My wonderful husband has built me a grooming cart for the Buns (so I don’t do it on his woodworking bench anymore) and this week I’ve put it to good use trying to repair the damage my ignorance has caused. I use a dog slicker brush and mat busting comb – with the occasional snip with the scissors.

It’s time to shear everyone – but it’s turned off cold and rainy and I’m worried about them getting cold since they are housed outside under a lean-to.  I’m going to have hubby build some nest box type things out of untreated pine boards this weekend (budget permitting).  Once they have those I’ll be able to harvest. Of course nest boxes full of straw means more grooming to get the straw out of their coats… sigh. A bunny barn is starting to look more and more appealing…

I wonder if I could take the knotted fur and felt up some bunny blankets… wonder if they’d try to eat them…

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Hillybilly.drp over at the Self Sufficient homestead asked me about a cost analysis on raising Angora Rabbits and what started out as a quick reply turned into an epic post! Hope Johnny Max and Queen didn’t mind! 

I decided to go ahead and post my reply here as well since I was planning on posting this information sooner or later anyway so, here we go!

You can find the forum here:

We haven’t done a full cost analysis of the venture yet – there just wasn’t enough information on the web that I could find. We may be losing our shirts on this deal but if the worst happens, at least we’ll be warm.

36” Cage for a Doe runs about $30.

30” Cage for a Buck runs about $26.  (Rural King)

My husband built a rack for the cages out of 2×4’s with a sheet of plywood and leftover shingles for the roof (actually one of them has a roof made out of slats from an old pallet covered in shingles).

I love my handy hubby.

During the Summer a 40 lb/ $7 bag of Rabbit Pellets lasts 4 weeks with 7 adult rabbits – that’s roughly ¾ a cup a day (some days they’ll eat more, some day’s they’ll eat less). With the addition of 2 juvenile rabbits I’ve seen that figure drop to 3 weeks and with cooler weather moving in it’s pulled back further to 2-2 ½ weeks.  Hopefully it will go back to at least 3 weeks once they’re done putting on their winter weight. This is with no Hay as a supplement.

Hay helps extend your pellets a lot.  I’ve seen some websites that are totally anti-hay because it gets in the fur and decreases the value of your harvest.  I haven’t seen that with my rabbits.  I only give them a handful at a time so it’s not like they’re rolling around it (which they will if they get bored enough!) And as long as you have a decent size cage they’re not going to wind up laying in it for lack of space.  Also brushing regularly (which is a must anyway) keeps this from being a problem also.

I am fully pro-hay.  The biggest health issue with Angora rabbits is Wool block – and the easiest way to prevent that is by feeding Hay.  Wool block is when the fur the rabbit ingests while grooming itself gets trapped in the stomach – this makes the rabbit think it’s not hungry and it slowly starves to death.  I read somewhere that the animal’s stomach can actually rot out with severe wool block.  Rabbits cannot regurgitate like dogs or cats.  Some sites recommend papaya tablets or pineapple juice in their water but I’ve read just as much stuff against those methods as for them – so I’ll stick to hay, it keeps everything ‘movin’ on through’ if you know what I mean.

I use ceramic crocks for water. I read about one lady who said water bottles were too much work for an animal that size when you take into consideration how much they have to drink while carrying that hot, heavy coat.  I liked what she had to say and it seems to work very well for my guys. Also the bowls keep them amused when they get bored – they push them around the cages with their heads.

I also use the crocks for feeders – you have to use the big 3” deep crocks otherwise they’ll tip them when their annoyed or bored.  The high sides also seem to cut down on them urinating in their bowls – something they’ll do when bored or annoyed – which equals wasted food and you have to wash them.

Washing the crocks is so much easier than a water bottle as well – a bucket of hot bleach water and a rag and you’re set!

The crocks were $1 a piece from the Dollar Tree (gotta love the Dollar Tree!).

Salt/Mineral blocks are $0.30 each (Rural King – $1.00 each at Petsmart!).

I have a slicker brush and a mat comb (for dogs – roughly $8 a piece).

I shear instead of pluck – plucking takes forever and the rabbits start giving me the evil eye after awhile; for that I use Fiskars Children’s safety scissors (with the rounded tips) – they only cost $1-$2 a piece. I may have to replace them after a full harvest but we’ll see.

I also bought plastic storage boxes to keep the fur in – and Ziploc freezer bags to put the stuff unsuitable for spinning in (keep it for felting!).  The boxes were $3.50 each (next size up from a shoebox).

As for the animals themselves- I’ve seen prices on line all over the place, from $35 to $200.  I bought my pedigreed animals for $25 each.  The Amish auction bunnies sold for $7.50 each – a white animal at the same auction went for almost $60; although the auction route is iffier.  You can’t tell the health of the animal (you couldn’t get your hands into the cages to check their build under all the fur) – you have no idea of the age of the animal or why the owner got rid of it (behavioral/genetic flaw/etc.). You can read about my trials with my Doe Gertie on my blog.

Market wise – you’re aiming mostly at Hand-Knitters and Fiber Artists in general. You probably will never be able to compete commercially with the Asian Market. (Of course there is always the Eco/American Made market…).  Angora is 8x’s warmer than wool and is often utilized in the sports industry for hunting clothes and arctic wear.  Cabela’s (sp?) sells 3 or 4 yard pieces of yarn for fly tying.  Hubby wants some Angora knee warmers for hunting season.

For undyed/unspun fiber, prices seem to range between $4 & $8 per oz – although I’ve heard of prices up to $16 an oz. I don’t have numbers yet for the average weight of fur per rabbit yet – hopefully after our harvest in October I’ll be able to provide those numbers.

Handspun yarn seems to go between $16 and $30 a skein (I’ve not done any comparisons between dyed/undyed, yardage or gauge yet). I know a commercial spun 30 yard dyed skein (which is nothing – you could knit a single baby bootie out it maybe) was $16 – on clearance for $10 I think.

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Our Angora Rabbits got mentioned on the Self-Sufficient Homestead Podcast! Squuueeeee!!!!

You can listen to it here. 

The forum post they’re reading is here.

Plus, you know, you should listen to it anyway – ’cause I recommended it! They are all about improving your self-sufficiency – living off the land you have no matter how little that is!

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I met a local Raveler this past Monday (the 13th) – Mariaknittedit, and had an impromptu spinning lesson.  Ms. Maria is in the process of setting up a private fiber studio called Black Dog Studio. I went to her to critique the fiber I collected off 2 of my buns (most of it is woefully too short but when the mercury hits 100 – them’s the breaks) but in the process I was sent to the wheel myself!

Here’s the fiber we worked with from Moto, a lovely rain cloud gray:

And this is what Mariaknittedit spun out:

Then we carded some together with some white Merino wool and I spun this:

As you can see there are lots of little spirals in it where I totally overspun it (big feet move faster than my hands apparently) but still! If we had to have yarn I could make it! It would be ugly and weird – but we’d be warm! (at least till it all came apart because, you know, not a skill I’ve got down yet…)

And Ms. Maria is fabulous – hopefully I didn’t scar her too badly between my awful spinning and just plain weirdness.