Since we were getting back into breeding the rabbits this season, I began thinking what I wanted if we were going to continue to crossbreed and it did not include brokens so I planned to test breed the three NZW bucks to see if they carried brokens with my GT Black Steel, Golden Girl, and my Blue Silver Fox, Misty Blue. However, in my heart, I wanted to work with the Silver Fox lines only and we still needed a SF buck.
4K was one of the breeders I first contacted as she had been raising rabbits for several years. The rabbitry was not far away. However, she told me that while they are still homesteading, they cut back on the number and type of animals they were keeping, so she no longer had Silver Foxs. 4K also told me that WF, from whom we had gotten our first Silver Foxes, had moved and were no longer carrying them. She gave me the name of another breeder, JRRF, which was not that far away from 4K but when I contacted her, she only had does available at that time. It was just before the breeding season, so it is understandable that rabbits were hard to find but I still tried.
I finally found a post about an 8-week old Black Silver Fox buck. She was as close as about any Silver Fox breeder right now. His pedigree showed all 4K lines. She was obviously one of the people who got the last of 4K's rabbits .
She had two brothers and we picked one with hopes to stay in touch. Rabbit breeders often need to have connections with other breeders to freshen their lines or in case of tragedy and they need rabbits to get back into it. My husband handed him the most and picked the name Comet on the drive back home. He loves rabbit husbandry, he just is not home enough to do it as he would like and he was happy that I was taking it over.
Until recently we just had a folder for the two rabbits we had with pedigrees and just the simplest records on breeding breeding and birthing dates. However, we were going to do this quite differently from this time on and we would absolutely need hutch cards to keep track of who is who, because it was not going to be just two NZWs and two SF and one GT Black Steel, all easily identifiable. At this time we had three NZW junior bucks and they all were quite similar. We would need to refloor two cages that were set aside with the stronger galvanized-after-the-weld cage wire and get them ready for rabbits and I really want another brood cage but space is an issue. I still think it is possible but I have to wait for my miracle working man to figure it out.
I also had been working on organizing a binder to place our pedigrees, breeding plans and records, kindle records, and such. I ordered a good scale to keep track of growth rates of the kits and get senior weights for all my rabbits and new clippers for their nails. I created charts and tried out breeding software, online and not. I finally picked one I like the most called Kintracks for a PC. It was not as pricey as others and it has several pedigree templates that can be customized. I wanted to be sure I could place genotypes and weights on my pedigrees as well as names, ear numbers, and dates of birth. I have looked into tattooing the ear but for now I will be using xylene-free markers on the kits.
The plan was that we were going to weigh kits every week and handle them more in hopes that we learn what what good breeders should know about their rabbits and improving their lines. My does would be on a tight breeding schedule as to rotation because of cage space and I would be juggling the breedings to produce both purebreds and crosses.
That was the initial plan....
That was the initial plan....