There are three big milestones in the life of a kit.
- Being born alive.
- Thriving until about ten to twelve days old when the eyes open and ears start lifting—so very cute!
- Weaning at around six to eight weeks.
Of course, the first one is very important, and all of them are wonderful, but I think I am partial to day when we can see each other eye-to-eye and they begin to look and move around more bunny-like with their quick and not so controlled hops. It is kind of like the day a baby begins to walk.
I am fairly confident in the colors I am seeing now, so here is my list of their phenotypes (how they appear so far):
BMB1 - Chinchilla Agouti
BMB2 - Chestnut Agouti
BMB3 - Black Gold-Tipped Steel
BMB4 - Solid Black
BMB5 - Solid Black with SF fur
This is the first time I have had Agoutis, so it was fun to find tiny kits with white ears and bellies, but it was not what I was hoping to see thrown from NZW-B for my program, even when we were planning on cross breeding NZWs and SFs. So, I am quite happy to be passing him along with Whoops and her coming kindle of NZW purebreds to be the first breeders of newly starting up NZW rabbitry, where NZW-B's hidden color genetics will not matter.
I will say that the Chinchilla coloring is quite lovely and I will probably have to keep reminding myself that I am planning to focus on Silver Foxes only as that one develops.
There is always at least one in every kindle that gets to me—usually more than one actually.