Advice needed for inherited rabbits

[mamalana]

Hi y'all.

We recently bought a property with feral meat rabbits. When we got here there were a breeding pair of escaped, yet very present meat rabbits. The mother was large and silver and the father is a red New Zealand. There were at least 3 ages of young that were around as well.

Our dogs killed at least 4 including the mother and I caught in a live trap 4, including the sire buck. As of now I have them in 2 cages separated by does and bucks. Two of the youngest, which appear to be about 5 weeks old, are both a doe and a buck. The little buckling is with the father and little doeling is with her older sister, who aprears to be from the first "freed" litter. I thibkbshe may be 4 months. I'm not sure their ages.

The sweetest one is the young buckling, but we can't breed him with his sisters and we can't breed the father with his daughters. Our kids wanted pet rabbits, but we have a toddler and dogs that kill and eat rabbit. I am thinking about setting up a colony to raise meat rabbits. That way the kids can go in and hang out with the rabbits, but they are protected from the dogs.

All of then have fleas and probably parasites. I am not sure what to do. There is probably at least one more out in the property, so I will continue to bait cages. We saw 2 black ones and one was killed by the dogs. Any advice on what to do would be deeply appreciated. I'll attach pics so y'all can see them. I don't know their breed.

Thanks.

 

[ladysown]

You will need to remove the young buck from being with dad. That is a fight waiting to happen as soon as the young buck gets a bit older. Rabbits can interbreed quite easily.

My suggestion... keep whichever is the healthiest or "most loveable" buck and then get rid of the rest (cull them, feed them to your dogs, or sell them after treating them for parasites). and then get in a couple of young unrelated does and build up your colony. OR invest in a few more cages and keep rabbits that way. Then you can keep the young buck and doe and simply get another pair of young buck and doe and breed as you will.

 

[mamalana]

Could a neutered buck live in peace within a colony?

 

[ladysown]

should be able to. Lots of folks (pet types) keep a neutered buck in with their does.

 

[Scooter1A]

i have visions of you chasing down these released rabbits and after all that work it would be hard to get rid of the ones you saved BUT the above advice is right on. If you can sell them use ivermectin to get rid of the fleas and worms. I don't know anything about colonies but if you go cages build the hutch 4 feet up so the dogs don't scare them. you have work cut out for you but it will be worth it.