Website Is Finished!

I finally finished moving my website over to my new domain today! I still need to figure out how to make a guestbook and still add all my links to my links page. Check it out!

www.silentspringsrabbitry.com

Nothing going on today. . . . I am going to clean cages tonight and print out some pedigrees for babies! I also need to order some new business cards, I might do that tomorrow.

- Michael

Mini Lops Available

I'm still in the process of reducing my herd for the summer and while most of them have been sold, I still have several nice bucks for sale. Here they are.

SSR's Sundance Kid (RGC, 5 Legs) - Opal Sr Buck
(Velotta's Raymond (RGC, 6 Legs) x Hoppin's Cookiesn'Cream (2 Legs))
Sundance is a gorgeous buck that throws gorgeous babies. I have granded three of his offspring myself and one has gone on to win a BIS! Past his show prime now, he'd be best used as a herd sire.

Silent Spring's MF2 - Broken Smoke Pearl Chin Jr Buck
(DeSurra's Morgan (GC, 7 Legs) x Silent Spring's Faith (RGC, 6 Legs))
Promising buck in a gorgeous color! I love his head! Just starting his to go into his ganglies, but I'm expecting him to turn out nicely.
Hold for Heather?

Silent Spring's GH3 - Black Steel Jr Buck
(Kitsemble's Gus (Reg, 1 Leg) x Silent Spring's Hope (Reg))
Very sweet buck with amazing fur! Gus has really thrown this fantastic, plush fur to most of his offspring! Very full, would like to see a bit more depth to balance out the width.

.....I am also contemplating selling Casey, my BEW Jersey Wooly senior buck. Contact me if you'd like more information on him.
email -
ssrrabbits@sbcglobal.net

I'm working on getting pictures up right now!

- Michael

Blue Eyed White Genetics

Since I just had a litter of BEW Woolies, I thought I'd blog about the genetics of the BEW, or Vienna, gene. First, let's start with the basics.

VV - Non-vienna carrier, or in other words an ordinary rabbit. Will not be able to throw Blue Eyed White babies.

Vv - A vienna carrier, also known as a 'VC' or a vienna marked, 'VM'. VC's show no signs of carrying the vienna gene and can still be shown. VM's sport tell-tale signs of carrying the gene, wether that be blue eyes on a normal colored rabbit, or white splashes on a normal colored coat. They are sometimes referred to as 'sports'. Both of these will throw BEW when bred to another 'Vv' or a 'vv'.

vv - A Blue Eyed White Rabbit.

Here are the different kinds of combos you can do with those three different versions of the gene.

VV x VV = 100% VV
VV x Vv = 50% VV, 50% Vv
VV x vv = 100% Vv
Vv x Vv = 25% VV, 50% Vv, 25% vv
Vv x vv = 50% Vv, 50% vv
vv x vv = 100% vv

When I first started my BEW breeding project, I got a BEW buck (vv) and a Blue Doe (VV). The resulting litter consisted of 4 Black Otters, all of them Vienna Carriers (Vv).

I then retained a Black Otter doe (Silent Spring's Jinger) and upon reaching breeding age she was bred back to her BEW sire. That would be a Vv x vv breeding. The expected outcome would have been 50% BEW and 50% VC/VM offspring. The actual litter was three BEWs and one Black VC. Luck was on my side that time! But each one is the luck of the dice, I could repeat the breeding and end up with an all BEW litter, or a litter of just VC/VM's.

The next step in my breeding program would be to keep a BEW baby and repeat the whole process over again. I know, it's a very slow process! That's why someone who breeds BEWs needs to know what they're doing or if they're planning on breeding them on a larger scale, be prepared to have lots of extra holes for unshowable Vv offspring.

- Michael

Unbearable Temperatures

So far this week every single day has been triple digit heat! I like summer because I don't have school, but I hate having to take care of the rabbits! Thank goodness they only get sunlight in the morning hours, and not during the hottest part of the day. The misters have been doing a great job, much better than at my old house. I've also been going out there several times a day wetting their ears. Since rabbits don't sweat, they have to rely on other means to cool off. If you wet their ears or rub ice on them, it will cool the blood in the veins and be transported to the rest of the body. The effect will be a cooler bunny.

Today was pretty uneventful, I went to the Votaw's home and went through their extremely adorable Mini Lop babies! The litter was very consistant and nice! I picked one out for Jennifer that is super cute, I've nicknamed her 'Gizzard'. I also registered a few of their bunnies for them and then headed home.

Nothing much happening for the rest of the week, except for the Fourth of July! Jennifer is coming up on Friday to pick up Jim Bob, Michelle, Joy-Anna, Hope, and 'Gizzard'. I've also got to drop off Cody to Kara to go up to Emily in Sacramento. It's going to be a relief not to have to deal with some many bunnies anymore with this heat.

Jinger's litter is my last litter until I resume breeding in the fall. Hopefully by then I'll have a nice new buck to breed my does to. :) More on that later though.

- Michael

New Litters!

Today we had our first Jersey Wooly litter of the year (our last litter was the very end of last year) so I am extremely excited! Jinger had four, three blue eyed whites and one black VC! She is doing a great job for a first timer, she pulled plenty of fur and had them all in the box. I've often thought that mothering abilities run in the line....Pudge, Jinger's dam, was also an extremely successful mother. We can't wait to watch these babies grow! Our first BEW's!

In Mini Lop news, I am having a major herd reduction. Most are already spoken for, but I have a few nice bucks available. Sidney's litter is maturing nicely, there are four does and two bucks. I'm keeping my eyes on the chestnuts and the broken chinchilla. The broken chestnut was the runt and is probably just going to be a pet, which should suit him well. He's extremely sociable!

I am also slowly moving to a new domain name, due to geocities closing. My new address on the website is

http://www.silentspringsrabbitry.com/

Please update your bookmarks! It's a mess right now, but give me a few weeks and it'll look much better! :)

- Michael

Newest news...haha.

The Bakersfield Show on 4/18 was very fun. I got BOB in both shows with Sidney and BOSB in one of the shows with Jim Bob. That was Sidney's 7th and 8th legs and Bob's 4th leg! (: Very proud of them. The show was well run and I look forward to attending again next year. My very first show was a Bakersfield Show....but I'll save that for another blog. It was a good day, one that sparked the rabbit bug in me.
I've also had a few litters these past few weeks. Hope has a litter of 3 - 2 steels, 1 chestnut. All bucks. The father is Gus. I really like one of the steels, it may replace the sire and dam in my breeding program. Time will tell.
Faith also had a litter 2 1/2 weeks ago, another litter of three. She has one broken smoke pearl, one broken blue, and one smoke pearl. The sire is a white buck, DeSurra's Morgan, that our friend Kate and Heidi of MGM let us borrow. The babies are adorable, my favorite is the smoke pearl, which is probably a buck. Bucks are good though, I need some new ones!
I currently have just one Convention breeding. I bred Sidney to Sundance. Hopefully the results will be nice. She is due later this month. She palpates positive, so I'm crossing fingers! Sundance normally meshes well with any doe he is bred with.
I will be updated my website soon - I have several animals I must post for sale since I will be reducing my herd for the summer more than usual.....

Michael

SLO Show

San Luis Obispo was really fun! I was the registrar, so that was fun. I brought 4 juniors to sell and sold 3 of them! Now I only have a few left for sale.

Show A was judged by Doug King. Kaitlyn Dueck won BOB with a SJB and a BSD won BOSB, but I don't know the owner. I won the SSB class with Ryan, even with his sunburnt coat lol.

Armando Cabrera judged Show B. I won BOB with a Sidney, a BSD, and BOSB with Jim BOB, a SJB. I also won BOSV with Faith, a SSD. :) She was two weeks pregnant to top it off! They gave out really pretty rosettes for BOSB and medallions for BOB!

Hope is due any day know and she looks fit to burst! She is bred to Gus. :)

I also updated my website today - check it out!

Michael