So I was posing the current Mini Rex kits (Both Ciel's twins and Elmiraj's triple chubs) for some new photos on the website (phone and computer hate each other right now so it might be a while) and took some note on how they looked.
I was a little amazed in myself that I was able to note the downsides to each kit now. I've been learning a lot recently and this was the first time in a while that I posed anyone out (since late June). Doing so, I took note on what I needed in my herd. Depth, shoulders, ears. Excluding Max and even his son for now, the ears go on for miles in my herd. I've learned that it's possible they are all falser than false dwarfs and at least it's likely I won't have any peanuts. I seriously couldn't handle seeing a peanut or hippo baby I'd lose my mind. Ciel's still unnamed blue otter kit keeps wanting to pose like an E-Lop. Or maybe that's just her because she's got long shoulders. Plus I keep hearing that they're little meat bricks, yet most of my guys are as lanky in the bones as a Belgian hare, I feel like. Sometimes I swear Ciel is a Belgian hare! Yes, I understand all of this is very apparent but I'm starting to learn what it all means. And of course I knew my herd was likely pet quality from the start. No, I'm not culling my entire starter herd, either. I'm still learning about this breed and I'm not comfortable investing into a quality herd just yet.
0 Comments
August brings a few much needed updates to the site since Facebook is swiftly declining but I've been way too busy to post in any of my blogs, let alone my Breeder's Blog. So the breeder says in this edition: updates!
I’ll start this post out like this: no, I don’t really cry in the driveway. Okay, sometimes I do, but I just happen to be there. Secondly, this isn’t focused on my emotional sanity. And thirdly, we do have Viasat at our house. But it drains the bandwidth like crazy when you have a lot of website editing and photo uploading to do! As some know, the bandwidth isn’t cheap, either. So when I have a lot of work to do on any of my sites, I pack up the 8 year old laptop and trek to the point of LTE on my driveway. From there, I connect my computer to my phone’s mobile hotspot that broadcasts the LTE to my computer like an outdated McDonald’s. I still have a monthly hotspot limit, but the network is even faster than the home network. Plus the limit is larger than the internet’s is, too. I always listen to my trusty YouTube music playlist while working on the site; often EDM or some sort of thumping rock. When you have a good set of headphones and a really nice song list to listen to, you’ll find the web editing goes a lot smoother than without it. I usually take farm dog, Logan with me when I go at night (it’s easier to see the computer screen), but the last time I did, he decided to take down an opossum, so he’s been in trouble since. There was a time that I walked the 1.2 miles 5 days in a row, the latter two days I walked the trip twice. I’ll admit the actual blog posts I write on Microsoft Word at home off the hotspot so I can spend more time on the site itself when I’m up there. My computer generally gives me 1 hour 30 minutes to 2 hours of battery life, and if I go up later in the evening, I can catch my dad coming home from work and ride along with him instead of walking! Being an animal breeder is hard; we break our backs healing animals for them to die anyway, we try our best to find the best homes for them and the homes end up being less than stellar as we had hoped or the animal gets aggressive and it freaks it up for you (I.E, Chevelle I’m talking about you.); people give out false information about breeds and species and we find ourselves cleaning up their mess, ECT. If caring for your animals wasn’t enough, now FaceBook is making it next to impossible for us to find caring buyers and move on our stock. Now we practically have to babysit our own posts and groups to keep our information from being deleted by our own ex-ally. With the recent FaceBook regulations on animal sales, apparently they feel the need to manually go in and delete countless pages and groups of animal breeders because we’re all “puppy” millers and “unethical” because people declare to “adopt, don’t shop”. Adoption is the only way; breeders just enlarge the problem and sell animals when there are animals dying in shelters every day. Sure, animals are dying in shelters. Sure, some believe in only adoption. But they don’t need to run around and force their views on ethical breeders and everyone else to feel self righteous or whatever. With that being said, Facebook has adopted more than sad puppies and old cats (if they ever even had in their lives); they have recently gone overboard with some new policies. These policies include banning sales of animals, including livestock. I have even seen non-sales related post be removed, like cute memes and funny stories. When the system sees animal sales posts (or not sales posts at all) with certain phrases, it flags them—and you. Once flagged, the system patrols your pages and personal profile meticulously for any more posts remotely sales related; this is why it feels like every post you upload gets nixed. They are targeting all farms and rabbitries. Possibly thousands of pages and sales groups have been targeted and/or removed, and some users have even been banned from FaceBook. Some brave breeders have decided to stay and fight, BSAR included, but so far, our efforts seem to be futile. Sensing FaceBook may just be a lost cause to save, many are just up and moving their shops to alternative social media sites such as MeWe, Instagram, Google+, and more. Some are working sales 100% off their websites, using FaceBook as a mere attention getter and to share their sales posts directly from their sites. Many more are creating websites through Weebly and Wix to do just that. I’ve had this website for BSAR since the beginning, but anticipating the FaceBook ban-hammer to sweep our way, I have recently been very active revamping it and making it much easier to navigate, as it may eventually replace our page completely. I absolutely love my FaceBook rabbitry page; I really do! It’s so easy to figure out and it’s so easy to find buyers that way. Or at least it used to. Why they seriously believe (or maybe they’re just sick of PETA complaining and ranting and just doing this to us so they’ll finally shut the heck up) that this will stop animal sales, who knows? We can always post flyers and hand out business cards locally; I’ve ran into countless breeders who run their business off flyers alone and have never used any sort of virtual sales resources, after all. We’re in an age where sometimes, it takes a lot of intelligence to run things. We all just have to be smarter than Zuckerberg, simply enough. Here are some tips I have learned on surviving the purge from personal experience and watching others:
(Puns aside as we’re pretty cherry after seeing everyone’s oa-k)
Ah. There’s no feeling in the world quite like half a pine tree falling on your rabbitry while you’re in the middle of renovating your house. If you’re screaming the S word while another falls right in front of you and nearly hits two hutches with 3 does between them while you’re helplessly watching, I think you’re doing pretty well. Let’s just say it’s been a long and tiresome weekend. Yes, nobody was hurt, and we’re all A-OK. Californian doe Nova was wigging out and trying to climb up her hutch walls to get out, but I managed to ease her nerves with my soothing voice before the other tree fell nearby. The old potter shed was decimated and a couple cars were almost hit, and the bucks are now missing their shade, but we survived the first half of the storm. The wind is still raging, but the way the trees are, they’re blocking the hutches from further harm. Miraculously, despite a tree downing on them, the 20 year old wire hutches were unharmed other than a brisk jostling off their posts. Their inhabitants didn’t even really seem offended, either. In fact, when I went out to calm everybody down, they really looked more interested in the idea of me feeding them rather than saving them! There are five pregnant does out there; two were due on Saturday and the other 3 are due on Thursday, and the latter 3 were in the worst of the tree wrecks. The returned Nova is currently pulling fur and will probably (knowing my rabbits LOL) end up giving birth tonight despite the fact her roof has blown off 3 times and counting today. In fact, I wouldn’t be shocked if all the does coming up due go tonight. It’d be my luck! So now I’m already planning on an all-new set up with new cages and new faces, too. You can either get knocked down and lie there, or you can jump back up swinging fists and nun-chucks, I say. I’ve been working on a new hutch system and my first totally 100% homemade cage, a nice 36” wide by 30” long one. Also, it was blown around a little, but totally unharmed. Work will continue on it tomorrow alongside chainsawing the trees and setting the knocked down hutches back up. Heck, I might even spite this dumb storm and its little petty hissy fit by incorporating the downed trees into my new hutches somehow! I’ll share my expected designs tomorrow as I give them a look over. For now, stay dry and keep us in your prayers for protection! God will provide; we may lose a great set-up, but He’ll surely make room for the set-up we were meant to have! Here I'll talk a bit more about myself.
I'm Jenna Luikart. I finally turn 18 this April and I've been raising rabbits now for two years this August. I've raised poultry since I was like 2 and was pretty much born to be a farmer/homesteader. My mom raises dairy goats and my dad pays the bills (LOLOL). I'm over here being the aspiring auto mechanic with my chickens and rabbits like, "Dude, I couldn't keep a goat alive so I'm gonna do these rabbits." Yeah, I love cars about as much as I do my farm. Even since I was little, I never collected Barbie Dolls or Disney Princesses; I've always collected Matchbox Cars and Hot Wheels! I had a few Breyer horses but they broke too easily so I couldn't really collect them. I did have a bunch of Littlest Pet Shop toys and I still have my collection of 24 Zhu-Zhu Pet hamsters. But I always had more cars and a few of them are over 10 years old (fun fact, I have a 2005 black Dodge Ram die-cast truck that looks just like the real Ram in our driveway now I got when I was four. My dream truck was always that 2005 2500, a black extended cab with the roof marker lights. Guess what; the real truck came like 8 years later and I still laugh about the irony to this day). So back on the subject (because I WILL sit here and talk cars all day long), I currently have 27 rabbits, 40 chickens, 3 pigeons, 3 guinea pigs, and a dog. I'll go in more on the dog in his own separate post, but yeah. I run a circus LOL. While my mom runs a sanctuary farm on the same property, I'm still a proud breeder, but will take in unwanted rabbits and chickens when I get a chance. Those I generally re-home, however, unless they're decent quality purebreds, and those I'll keep and breed. I also write A LOT, whether i'm updating my website, FaceBook pages, or my stories. It's a laughable subject to me, of course; after 5 years of rescuing human aggressive roosters--huge ones, too-it's only fitting I wind up with a mean doe or two.
Well, Audra isn't really mean; she growls at you and that's the end of that. And she hardly even growls; it's more of a gruff grunt. She and Gale were from a good Jewish friend of ours that raises Alpine, Mini Alpine, and Nigerian Dwarf dairy goats up in Mineral Wells, West Virginia. Her and her family gave Audie and Gale to me along with all their treats, remaining feed, and water bottles, so I gladly obliged and hopefully await a litter out of the two New Zealands. Nova the Californian, however, will pin her ears back and charge at you. Grab her food bowl, she charges you to knock it out of your hand. She digs at you as you try to change her water bottle. She's not very fun for most people, being a 12 pound doe that growls and claws at you. I personally like her, though, and I like to think she likes me, even just a little. Nova was one of the Californian pair I bought from the 2018 fair last year. Atlas the buck is a little pushy, but he's pretty cool. And Nova was actually fine in the first two weeks after I brought her home. I bred her to Atlas and her mood changed. I thought she was pregnant and her crankiness just came from her pregnancy. Nope. Her crankiness came from her. In fact, I can't even get her bred! I personally think she absorbs the babies and puts them in her dewlap. I wouldn't be surprised! The funniest thing is that everybody who has raised both Calis and NZ have warned me NZ are the mean ones. Nope; my NZ just growls! It's my Cali that mauls! I have a healthy respect for all my rabbits, Nova included. Though she can be a royal pain sometimes and she's already chewed through every inch of the hutch she's in (to the point that she chewed a hole in the back wall and her boyfriend actually escaped through it one morning like she evicted him!), I really do like her. Like with the roosters, it's fun having an odd ball and being able to say you have a mean rabbit to the visitors. Its also really fun to see them avoid the mean animal like the plague when it comes around the corner. I recently noticed most of the pictures I had of all the rabbits were pretty out of date. Most as in all. I also noticed it was time to do nails. On all 24 rabbits. We live in WV, and of course it's cold and muddy and unfavorable to be outside right now, making tasks a struggle and the sunless, rain filled sky making photos dreary and just impossible to take. So bringing in a couple does for a session with Orion, I noticed their nails were in need of a trim and they had a couple tiny knots of wool in their manes. So i decide to trim them while they're inside. I then go ahead, set up a backdrop of towels, and take a couple of pictures. Walla; the nightly photo shoot and trim was born at BSAR. We've been busy with farm calls the last few days, so I've mainly been doing everything after dark (which is at 5 PM now. *wistful sigh*). Last night, I did up Sirius (above picture) and took a picture of him to brand and a few more for the archives. He ended up spending the night chilling inside and hanging out in my lap on the recliner like he was Orion. I also did up his father, Angus, and his half siblings Crow and Nova (below). So i decided this supermodel/manny-peddy thing would be a good idea after all. A quick nail trim turned into a great picture taking opportunity and a nice time to bond with the rabbits without freezing my hiney off out in the rain and mud. I just dread bringing in cranky Nova the Californian doe for a trim, man. She's going to be real fun! Maybe she'll have to spend the night in, too, in my bed, even. It might help her attitude out LOL. She might maul anybody that tries to tickle me in my sleep, too! This is only our second winter in operation, I know. I didn't think raising rabbits would be easy, but I also didn't expect it to be this hard.
We entered into our first year doing fabulously. Does would take on their first breeding, they'd throw 3 does and two bucks every time, sales were fantastic! And now, we've more or less farted out into nothingness. I've bred these Lionhead/NZ cross does four times since September, and nothing. Absolutely nothing. I'm having issues breeding everybody now, even the does that took at first breeding this time last year. I even had a virgin two year old take and have twin bucks! But now, I don't think there's a doe in the herd I haven't bred less than 3 times since the end of fall last year. Spring sell kits and fall meat kits, I said. It'd be fun, I said. And now it's looking like not only no fall kits, but no spring kits, either. And you wonder why i'm losing hope? Don't get me wrong; I love these rabbits. I might give up breeding and might consider letting a couple buns go to pet or breeder homes, but there's a handful I'll keep indefinitely. But I really am considering hanging this up until I get a car, a job, and my own house to make everything easier on both the rabbits and I. I'd like to get a nice Amish-built barn to put my stock in, with a heater and an A/C unit. I'd like to do some ground hutches and runs, but I can't do that because my mom's dog will kill everything like she did Sandstorm, so that's totally out of the question. I'd like to build better hutches and runs, another thing I can't do right now because i'm living with my parents on my mom's farm, so i'm really limited even now. I can't really build much and I really can't build anything where I actually want to to make it easier for my animals and I because those places are already "taken" (okay, so there isn't any real plans for these places yet, as projects can take years to get done around here :-/ but yet they're still taken, so.) I'd like to make a really kicking chicken coop, or at least one that isn't outdated, leaky, and tacky as poop. I'd also like to make a coop for rescue birds to keep the roosters separate. I'd like to keep my dog indoors, and my rabbit in my room, and not have to answer to anybody (besides my boss and my farm of bosses, LOL), and to drive a nice little car I'll actually do the maintenance on and have a dang garage for! A decent job would be great so I can feed higher dollar feed to my animals, too. 18% feed for everybody! Wooo! And all of this will probably only happen if I hang it up for now and work with what I can. There's no point in watching out for a herd liquidation. Most of these animals have had 2 previous owners before me alone. I really think 3 owners is enough for anything, be it a car, animal, house, whatever. I'll sell what I currently have for sale and let nature do the rest. I'll keep everything until it passes. I was about done with the birds anyways; predators have me run ragged, waiting on a new coop for a year now has me aggravated and it seems like I'll be the one building it anyhow. Of course, if breeding picks back up and all gets better for me, I'll call off the shut down. Right now, I just don't know how much more I can take. I have these dreams of getting top notch stock, but I have doubts of anything selling, because if I can't even sell these happy, cute pet quality kits at $15, I'm not sure what tells me higher priced stock at $50+ will sell. I guess it's my area, because nobody else around here seem to be selling rabbits well, either. I guess it could be these big, corporate feed stores selling their cross bred rabbits at $12 and killing our profits, because another rabbitry with better stock than ours came to the last Ohio swap, parked right next to us, and didn't sell a thing, either. Maybe that will improve with a break, too. Maybe people don't take me seriously because I'm a teen girl trying to run a farm. Whatever it is, I wish it would wear off already! Either way, continue to follow us to stay informed about future decisions. Maybe even a short break will improve things. So I've finally decided to sell out of pet crosses and go purely into Lionheads, New Zealands, Californians, and New Zealand/Lionhead crosses because they have really nice meat potential in a relatively small frame. I decided against Flemish Giants after my big buck, Sandstorm, was killed by my mom's dog late summer of 2018 before I could even find him a mate. It looks like Californians will be my biggest breed for now until I feel like Flems again. Anyways, here I am, starting out 2019, patiently waiting on my only Lionhead buck to figure out what in the heck he's supposed to do with these does. He has so far, had no successful matings or fall offs and this is his fourth doe i've exposed him to! In fact, as I write this, i hear him stomping around his cage with his date. Still no success. Now I've decided to find me a better buck. Go figure now that i'm finally ready to breed these four REW Lionheads, my only REW buck dies of sudden illness and forces me to resort to my backup buck, Orion, Now, Orion is over a year old, and he's a very pretty silver marten (though not a recognized color in the LH world!) He's lovable and kind... that is, to his owner. The does he will get aggravated at and bite when things don't happen soon enough. Luckily, I was planning on a new buck anyways, as the only thing the REW buck I just lost had going for him was that he was, well, REW like my does. I was never really impressed with his conformation or mane, or even his attitude. It's still frustrating that I lost him to something I still don't know what it was and that he died before I could even breed him to anything! If Orion keeps it up, it looks like i'll be breeding these four to one of my LH/NZ cross bucks until I get my next PB Lionhead that does know how to breed! So stay tuned for the next update! (No, Orion will not be going anywhere; he's the house pet and I swear he thinks he's a human!) |
Welcome to the
|