Best way to improve?

[golden rabbitry]

I'd like to preface this by saying I breed towards the SOP of the ARBA in holland lops and I'm a perfectionist to a flaw.

I've never out a rabbit on the table, I always feel they aren't good enough and I've been working on my herd for two years, breeding for five. I sell anything I don't think is worth my time and money and cull hard but I feel like I'm not getting anywhere. I've had alot of random and terrible setbacks, random deaths mainly. I am tempted to breed back to sires, reduce my herd size, yet I can't see any rabbit being worth getting rid of, and all my srs are pregnant or just kindled so I will have an influx of new babies.
Advice on choosing who to grow out at such a young age? Is is smarter to breed back to the sire or cull? Should I just put a rabbit up on the table after so long to rip the metaphorical band-aid off and not worry about getting it perfect? I tend to underestimate myself in fear of failure but I feel like two years of just going to shows to look and help out is just getting ridiculous!

 

[WyoWool]

1.) take a breath. It’s rabbits, not rockets, it’s almost impossible to screw up. And if you do screw up, most times it’s fixable. You got this


2.) Do you know what line breeding is? Line breeding is what many breeders who have established (or are trying to establish) their own bloodlines use to keep their goals moving forward. It’s almost exactly as you said: take a daughter and breed her back to her sire or son to dam. Keep moving forward from there.

3.) You gotta be ruthless when culling. You don’t have to terminally (kill) cull, you just have got to truly get rid of “pieces/parts” rabbits. What’s a parts rabbit? Any rabbit that is only good for 1 or 2 pieces. Example: “this little rabbit is poor in his hq and long in the midsection, but he’s got such good depth of color. I really need color, so I’m keeping him. I’ll breed him to my low Rufus girls.” NO!!! NO!!! NO!!! You do not need any rabbits that a parts/pieces rabbits right now. You need rabbits that are the most conforming to the standard- so 100% any rabbit that has a DQ should be out of your barn. White nails, over weight, bad teeth, poor crowns… anything with a DQ or severe fault should go. If it’s just a non- recognized color that is fine, because color is the last thing to worry about. But get rid of the pieces rabbits and, this is not a popular idea, get rid of your brood does. You don’t need a brood doe unless you have a bomb-tastic herd buck. Key word is “bomb” herd buck- a foundation buck that meets all the SOP guidelines, and has completely rocked a Championship already. If you don’t have one, no biggie because you can *breed* your own. But don’t keep chunky oversized brood does unless you have a bomb herd sire.

4.) Know what you’re looking for. Or feeling for. Do you know how to gauge depth of shoulders? Width of midsection or hindquarters? Can you tell if one of your rabbits is long? Keel boned? If no, get thee to a show table. I don’t care if you think your rabbit is the ugliest the Lord ever allowed on this planet- pay the entry fees and plop that rabbit on a table in front of a judge! When you get your comments back, see who’s around. Often there are judges, registrars, secretaries, etc who can help you feel and see what the heck “low in the shoulders” means if you don’t know.

5.) Once you know what you’re looking for, that’s when you can start looking at your own homegrown babies. You’ll be able to start identifying patterns. If momma Muffin has a pinched crown, and she throws babies that all are pinched? You can cull all those babies and breed Muffin to a different sire in hopes that you’ll get a baby that doesn’t have mom’s squished head too… or you can roll the dice and keep the best baby that has a pinched crown like momma Muffin but has a much better body than Muffin ever could dream for. Either scenario, you’ve got a baby better than momma Muffin so you don’t need Muffin anymore, especially if that baby is a doe. You’re moving up- not continuing breeding at the same level, and you have to keep thinking that way. And when you move up- you have to leave some rabbits behind.


I bred 11 does. All grand champion pairings, red white and blue registered both sides, all parents with numerous legs each. I ended up with 42 babies. From those 42 babies, wanna guess how many were “keepers” for my program? At 8 weeks, I held onto just 7 babies. The rest were culled out. Of Those 7 babies, I culled 3 more before the group hit ten weeks.
I have 4 babies out of 42 that are actually worth keeping- only 4 that will better my line. Two of those 4 are going to National Convention in a week. That’s right- 38 rabbits have been culled out of my program and only 4 remain. The 4 who made the cut will replace some aging out seniors, and continue to better my line closer to that Standard of Perfection.

 

[golden rabbitry]

Thank you so much! Ironically all my herd bucks are bombs! They are perfect (except one with has a slightly long ear but that's minor) I do line breed and I will defiantly cull "parts" rabbits since I didn't even realize I was doing that! How long did it take to establish your herd and start keeping home growns?