The Great Bunny Migration

After a full week of furiously building, buying, adjusting, building...the bunnies are in their new digs. Nothing is quite square. The wood is a bit warped.  The lid is a joke.

And after having completed pretty much all the cutting, screwing, hammering, and almost all the wire cutting I remained uninjured. Down to my last few inches of cutting the poultry netting I managed to cut off the tip of a finger! HOLY FREAKIN' BLOODY MESS!! Leave it to me to exsanguinate by sewing shears! Seriously, when the bleeding wasn't stopped after 15 minutes I tried using flour as a styptic. HOLY CRAPS THAT HURT!!!!!!! Another 5 minutes of bleeding and I reached for the styptic powder. I mean, how much worse could it be than the flour agony. THIS FUCKING MUCH WORSE, THAT'S HOW MUCH!!!!!! AAAAAAAIIIIIIGGGGGGGGGHHHHHHH!!!!!!! That shriek heard coast-to-coast last Thursday afternoon was me when I stuck my poor fingertip in the powder.

The good news is it worked and the bleeding stopped. The better news is my finger didn't drop off and is healing nicely. The bonus is I've been flipping everybody the bird since Thursday. Yes, it was that finger.

With the garage door open, it's cooler than the barn. Tomorrow I'll start the cleanup and look for screens to fit in the garage windows. I'd just open them, but a couple little birds keep trying to come in. I don't want them to get trapped in there if I can prevent it!

First I carried Oreo up from the barn. Then came Snickers. And then, 2 buckets full of babies!

Sunday...

9 minutes of squee!

And 3 gratuitous bonus minutes!

Eyes wide open!

All eyes open and for the 2nd morning in a row

I found the babies in a heap outside the nest. Yesterday, pandemonium as I scooped them up and returned them to the nest, only for them to crawl right back out again. After the 3rd or 4th go-round, their energy flagged and they crashed into deep sleep.

They're starting to look more like bunnies now...

Cookie Monster is no longer the biggest! Eyes are starting to open

I skipped the weigh-in yesterday, satisfied both morning and evening that everybody was fed.

Today, Cookie Monster weighed in at 5.75, while the 2nd biggest suddenly surpassed him at 6 ounces! Both of them are starting to open their eyes. Here is Monster:

I nearly lost him in the 2nd pic. He is quick but has no control or idea where he's going, so just flops around. Happily, when I started stroking his head he suddenly just laid himself down on his side and fell fast asleep!

The next biggest agouti weighed in at 4.5 and little Keebler at almost 3.5 ounces. Nilla is now a respectable 5.25, while the blacks are 5.25, 5 and 4 ounces.

Keebler pix

People have asked to see Keebler pix, so I got a couple cuties today.

I skipped yesterday's weigh-in, instead checking for round bellies morning and evening. As of today, Keebler has regained his lost weight, and a bit extra, but is still well behind having lost a full 2 days of growth. Whereas he had been growing considerably faster than Cookie Monster, they are today both at double their birth size. Official weigh-in results are:

Cookie Monster 5 ounces
Nilla 4.75
Next agouti 4.75
Next agouti 4.25
Keebler nearly 3
Big black boy 4.25
next black girl 3.75
small black girl 3.75

Cookie Monster is trying to open his eyes, but just gets little slits. Soon....once they start opening their eyes, I will replace the hay in their nest with fresh hay and also add a flat dish of pellets and water, so they can start exploring real food.

I've read that domesticated rabbits nurse their babies a few weeks longer than in the wild. Once the largest babies are on safely on solid food, I may move them into the new hutch and leave the 3 smallest with Snickers for an extra week so they can get some catch up time with extra milk.

Keebler bounces back

Most likely explanation for his sudden decline was a missed meal. Happily when I checked on them last evening, all had had been fed and had full, round bellies. Same thing when I checked this morning; in fact Keebler's looked fuller this morning than last night. Again this evening, full bellies. I think Snickers is feeding them twice/day. That is how I guided her; she may have picked it up!

Snoozing this evening:

Day 7: Keebler has had a big setback

His weight 2 days ago was 2.5 ounces. Yesterday he was very bouncy and weighed somewhere between 2.5 and 2.75 ounces. But today, he's very quiet and back to 2.5 ounces.  Worse, on exam, he was very thin, wrinkly and possibly a little dehydrated. I decided the best bet was to give him supplemental feedings.

Research showed Kitten Milk Replacer as the best option for rabbits. Recommended amounts varied; I tried to stick with the bottom of the range for 1-2 week old kits, since on the one hand he's just barely a week old and on the other hand angoras are a larger breed. Recommendations on how to feed were skimpy, with not much beyond "don't let them aspirate formula, so here's what I would add based on our first attempted feeding.

1. KMR comes in 8 ounce cans. A kit will only need a small fraction of this per feeding and once the can is open, it's only good for 72 hours. So don't skimp on pouring it into a container for heating. I used a small glass desert bowl, which I soaked in 1:10 bleach solution and then rinsed until there was no bleach smell.

2. Set up an area (and a chair for you) on a counter near a microwave to heat and re-heat both formula and hand towels.

3. Have at hand: 2 small towels to keep the bunny always wrapped in a warm towel;  tissues to quickly wick up any milk that travels up the cleft and into the nostrils; several cotton balls to wipe dribbles and drips off chins; feeding utensil (eye dropper, syringe, or tiny bottle).

3.  I selected a 3ml syringe which would allow for 2 syringe-fulls per feeding, and did the bleach soak and rinse with that as well.

Prepare for it to take some time. I'm not sure how much I got into Keebler versus how much I got on him. I didn't think to warm the towels at first; I suddenly realized his feet and formula had both gotten cold. Warmed towels first, then formula.

As far as our first attempted supplemental feeding went, I don't know that I got enough into him to make much difference. His belly was still thin and wrinkly, but he may have been rehydrated at least.

Although bunnies nurse on their backs, and one site recommended feeding them on their backs, I found that didn't work at all. Instead, I held him vertical and initially put drops of milk onto the side of his mouth. Once some seeped in, his little tongue started coming out to lick it off and then I was able to put milk directly onto his tongue. I also found angling the syringe nearly vertically up let me keep a drop of milk pushed out at the top ready to put onto his tongue. At any other angle, the milk poured down. When I had tried with him on his back, that was the *worst* of all worlds.

Once I woke up and realized he needed to be warmed, he got very lethargic. I wasn't sure if I'd killed him or if the bit of  food and toasty towel made him sleepy. Once he seemed more interested in sleeping than formula, I gave up (somewhat in despair given that his tummy was not rounded out).

Only one place recommended wiping his belly and nethers with a damp cotton ball until he'd peed and defecated. I've seen Snickers groom them after feeding, and I've seen her skip grooming. I tried wiping him, but got nothing. Actually worse, he now was damp on his belly. So I gave up and dried him off. Reheated his towel and took him back down. He did wake up on the trip down and was happy to crawl back in with his litter mates.

Best case is I got something into him to help him. Worst case scenario is I got milk or bacteria in the wrong place, or failed to get digestion and elimination going with belly stimulation. Only time will tell if he turns around or goes into terminal decline.

Day 6 and Keebler the elf turned brown overnight!

The browns look very agouti today, with sun and overhead light.  Since Keebler's the furthest "behind" on development, I'm expecting the 3 blacks will not turn. So it looks like I have 2 black girls, 1 black boy, 3 agouti boys, 1 agouti girl, and Nilla.

I was thinking last evening and again this morning that other than the 1st day when I got peed on my finger, I haven't seen any pee at all. Nilla answered my concern, letting me know while I was weighing her, that her peepee is just fine, tyvm. She went so far as to ensure that I inadvertently caught it for  posterity!

The blacks versus browns show up loud and clear when juxtoposed:

 I've been having a good time determining the color genes that Oreo and Snickers have, based on their phenotypes and now their babies. There are 5 basic color genes:

A is agouti, which is actually a very common, wild pattern that modifies the base color so that when blown open, the fur looks like it was tie-died. A is dominent; a bunny that lacks agouti is genetically "aa" and is called a "self" color.  Snickers is A?;   Oreo is a self-black, ie he lacks agouti so is aa.

There are 2 base coat colors; black and chocolate. B is black and is dominant.  Bunnies that lack B are "bb" and appear chocolate. Oreo is B? .  Chestnut agouti is based on black, so Snickers is also B?. Their 2nd base color gene is unknown since B dominates the color phenotype.

C stands for color; "cc" bunnies lack color and are albinos, called REW in the rabbit world for red-eyed white. Since neither is REW, both Oreo and Snickers are C?

D stands for not dilute and is dominant; D bunnies are full saturation. Dilute babies are "dd." Since both are full color, Oreo and Snickers are both D?

E stands for Extension and refers to how much color extends up the hair shaft. E is dominant and shows full extension; ee modifies the color to either red or fawn when combined with A, or to tortoise with aa.

So far, based on parent phenotype alone, that leaves us with:

Oreo:      aa  B_ C_ D_ E_
Snickers: A_ B_ C_ D_ E_

However, Nilla was the first bunny to fill in a blank. As a fawn, she has agouti present with ee. That means both Oreo and Snickers have "e" as their 2nd E gene.

The bunnies that have remained solid black have filled in a second blank, as they lack the A gene. Therefore, Snicker's second A gene has to be "a."

Since no REWs or Dilutes turned up, it seems likely that one or both is CC and/or DD, but that could only be confirmed with DNA testing.

The first 3 bunnies that turned brown look agouti, but it's still possible for Keebler to end up tortoise. It's just a little too early to tell. In the meantime:

Oreo: aa B_ C_ D_ Ee
Snick: Aa B_ C_ D_ Ee

Day 5: 3 babies started turning brown overnight!

Everybody is still growing, with Keebler the elf (runt) now weighing in at 2.5 ounces and still looking like a boy. Cookie Monster has reached 3.75 ounces and now looks likely to be a boy too. He's turned the lightest brown of the 3, and also now has a white spot in the middle of his head. I got a pic which, enlarged, looks like he's chestnut/agouti. All 3 of the brown bunnies are still black on their noses, so there is still room for a tortoiseshell. In the meantime, as long as the blacks stay black, that tells me more about Snickers color genetics! Here is Cookie Monster today:

Here's a picture of the agouti pattern on an adult:

Day 4: Snickers has successfully taken over her duties

without my guidance, encouragement or any intervention. She's a good mommy!

The babies have each gained 1/2 ounce since birth. I'm pretty certain the runt is not a peanut as he remains active and has achieved the highest growth rate with a 33% gain, from 1.5 ounces Thursday evening to 2 ounces today. The next up is 2.5 ounces, then 5 range from 2.75 to 3 ounces. The biggest is now a hefty 3.5 ounces and was trying to hop on the walk up to the house and while being checked out and weighed. Activity levels seem directly correlated to weight.

I've confirmed the pink baby will most likely be fawn, with red also possible although she looks too light at this point for red. I've named her?, in the cookie tradition, Nilla.

Until today, I was reluctant to name the runt, for fear he'd? turn out to be a peanut. Given his progress so far, I feel hopeful enough to dub him Keebler, after the elf.

First meals

Friday morning there was still no sign the babies had been fed. In the early afternoon I headed into the bunny stall to check on the babies. I had barely registered that Snickers was positioned on top of the nest and, before I could begin to back out, she'd jumped out. So I went ahead and spent a few minutes scritching her and vowed to leave them alone until evening.

That evening they still were unfed, so I positioned Snickers over them and distracted her with a couple pieces of lettuce. Within seconds the babies were squiggling around underneath her. They fed for at good 5 minutes, and then she groomed them quickly and left the nest. Most had full bellies, but the 2 smallest looked like they hadn't gotten enough. I weighed them in: the smallest was only 1.5 ounces. The rest ranged from 2 to 2.5 ounces

So Saturday morning, I put her on them again. Only a couple suckled for a couple minutes.

This evening I weighed them in again. My kitchen scale is not terribly precise, but the smallest weighed in at 1.75 ounces. The biggest was close to 3 ounces. Tonight they fed for less time than their first meal, but all bellies look good.

In the meantime, I saw this morning that they're now covered with peach fuzz. The grey babies have charcoal to black fuzz. The pink one is not white as I half expected, but coming in a lovely gold. I have no idea what she? will mature to...

A bowl full of bunnies

So I woke up at 2:30 this morning and couldn't fall back to sleep. After lunch, and my 3rd cup of coffee, I was supposed to take some lettuce down to the bunnies and check on Snicker. Instead, I forgot and dozed off in front of netflix.

At 4:30 I roused myself and headed down to clean the barn and care for the bunnies. I opened Snickers hutch to check her pellets and hay supply and was startled to find bright red shavings here and there. And then realized she'd had her babies a bit earlier in the day than I'd anticipated. Forget late evening; it was only 5 in the afternoon. I saw 2 little gray squirmy things out on the cage grid...craps! The babies weren't in their nest! I immediately scooped them up -- still alive, but one was cold. I put them in the nest, where I discovered 2 more babies where they belonged. Ok...not the small litter of 2 I'd hoped for, but I can deal with 4.  I ran back up to the house and came back down with the small bowl. Filled it with some fur from the edges of her nest and then dug the babies out and put them in. The cold one was still cold. Then I noticed more little gray wrigglers scattered around the hutch. Holy craps! A 5th, a 6th, a 7th, and 8th! I lost count and wasn't sure if I stopped at 8 or, gulp, 9! The bowl was too small -- I heaped them on top of each other, covered them with some wool and raced up to the house with my hand holding them in the bowl.

 I laid them out on a heated towel. From their little waists I can tell they hadn't been fed. Actually, considering that 6 were out of the nest and only one was cold, they probably were only just born.

I put them back into the bowl under the wool and took them back down to their nest. While putting them back, I realized one was still cold, so I brought him back up to the house with me. It took multiple rounds of wrapping him in a towel heated in the microwave. I had 2 towels ready to go, so heated one while he lay wrapped in the other. I slipped a thermometer in with him while waiting for the first towel to heat. It stopped short of 85 degrees! He needed to get close to 102. With the towels heated, I couldn't tell exactly where his temperature was, but once he felt warm in my hand, I figured that was good enough to return him to his nest. I wrapped him in a freshly heated towel one last time for the return trip and stuffed him down in his nest with his siblings. Mom seems unsure of what to do. Hopefully she'll figure it out sooner rather than later. Thank goodness we have a good relationship...she comes right up to me for scritches and comfort!

Final, Final Prep: Snickerdoodle 1; Granny 0

When I fed the bunnies this morning, I was shocked to find Snickers nest pulled apart and in pieces all over the hutch. I piled everything back in the box, fed her a nice pile of fresh hay, topped off her pellets, replenished her water and left her a ice bottle to cool off on a very hot day. She immediately resumed wandering around her hutch with a haystache.

When I returned some hours later, this is what I found:

Note the blue bottlecap just to the left of her nose. Yes, she incorporated the ice bottle into her nest! Other than removing the ice bottle, I left everything as is, including the now empty box on the right end of the hutch. Mommy knows best!