First Babies!!

[AndreaGS]

Hi all! I'm new here. My husband and I live in Northern California and are working towards becoming more sustainable, despite our extremely suburban location. Houses that are thisclose together, small yards, five miles from downtown...you get the idea. We've been fortunate to have tolerant and like-minded neighbors.

We've got four chickens, and have converted a lot of our lawn into gardening space (planning on converting more...) and have recently got into meat rabbits! We picked up a Californian buck back in December, then picked up a Satin/Rex mix doe shortly after. Since the buck was still young, we didn't breed them until March.

And now we have our first babies! I'm so excited!

There are nine, all alive and seemingly healthy. I do think it's funny that they are all this dark color. The Californian is, well, Californian colored, and the doe is a light chestnut. I never expected this sort of coloration! I'm curious to see what color their fur grows out.

Can't wait to delve into the recipes section of the site.

 

[MaggieJ]

Welcome to RabbitTalk, AndreaGS. :hi:

Nice looking kit! Nine is a nice big litter. Congratulations!

 

[akane]

If they have pink bellies they will likely all be chestnuts which is common when you cross a chestnut to any color. If there are any without pink bellies they will probably be solid black.

 

[BoxerMom]

Congrats on the babies!

 

[AndreaGS]

Oooh, thanks for the info, akane! I'd have to look at them again, but I think they're all dark-bellied. The genetics of this is really fascinating.

 

[Rock'N 4 Rabbitry]

Black is the most dominate coloring. But in Chestnuts not really sure how that works.

 

[Anntann]

Welcome! Congratulations on the kits!

 

[mountainrabbits]

Welcome and congratulations on your first litter!

 

[JT_Hunter]

Congrats on the kits and the new life...yea, very exciting...I am interested in your nest.. ...can you explain it for me please...I am also new here...well...maybe 2 months worth any way..

 

[RunninMI]

Black is the most dominate coloring. But in Chestnuts not really sure how that works.

It has something to do with chestnut and black being close in the gene pool or someting like that i didnt get it either but the girlfriend is big into the whole color thing and she explained it and it made sense to me but yea something to do with the chestnut gene being very close to the black gene

 

[eco2pia]

Black is the most dominate coloring. But in Chestnuts not really sure how that works.

It has something to do with chestnut and black being close in the gene pool or someting like that i didnt get it either but the girlfriend is big into the whole color thing and she explained it and it made sense to me but yea something to do with the chestnut gene being very close to the black gene

actually, one gene controls black/not black(aka brown) and a whole other gene controls agouti/not agouti. So you can have a black agouti or a brown agouti (two different shades of "chestnut" and they look really alike to me), or you can have a black rabbit or a brown rabbit, both non-agouti, and they will be solid black, or solid brown.

You have further genes that make white/not white, red shades/not red shades, pointed/not pointed (like a Siamese cat), etc. all of these genes are inherited independently of each other, which means that while they may interact, they do not have to GO together necessarily, and that accounts for the extremely wide variation of colors you can get on a rabbit. it also means that dominance and recessiveness of a particular COLOR is very hard to determine. Black is, for instance, dominant to brown, but agouti is dominant to non-agouti, so you get chestnuts instead of blacks...it is a little like a soap opera, figuring out all the interactions.

 

[fuzzy9]

Welcome! Congrats on your first kits! :wbounce:

 

[Miss M]

Congratulations! :bouncy:

 

[AndreaGS]

Awww, thanks! They're growing so quickly, it's crazy!

JT_Hunter, uhhh...the nest... Well, we converted our old double-decker quail hutch into a rabbit hutch, and that's the shelter area. I gave her a nestbox, but she pulled all the hay and grass out of there and put it in the shelter area. It does make it really easy to access the kits without disturbing the doe. They're wiggling about though, so I have to drop them all back in the nest at the end of the day so they can be warm at night.

The fur is coming in, it looks black but has a slight copper-ish sheen at the neck. I'll post some photos once it grows out more. My husband is planning on tanning the hides, so I'm excited to see what they look like!

 

[Cattle Cait]

Congratulations on the babies!