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…