Florida Jeff new guy on the block (blog).

[Florida Jeff]

Ahoy fellow rabbit growers out there. I hail from North Florida and have started Deer Point Rabbitry last march with young New Zealand Whites had to wait out summer to start breading as temps in Florida last year were brutal. Wanting to start a line of TAMUKS for more heat tolerance. Looking forward to talking to everyone.
THANKS for the welcome aboard.

 

[LoveMyBarnyard]

Ahoy Florida Jeff,
We're new too. New to rabbits and new to this site. We have already found terrific support with our newbie questions. We are picking up our first TAMUKs this coming week. We're in TX and wanted a heat tolerant breed for meat rabbits. We'll see how it goes!
Cheers

 

[Florida Jeff]

Ahoy Love my Barnyard: I was wondering if the selective breeding of the TAMUKs for heat tolerance makes them less cold tolerant. Have you found out that to be true?
Thanks again.

 

[LoveMyBarnyard]

Ahoy Love my Barnyard: I was wondering if the selective breeding of the TAMUKs for heat tolerance makes them less cold tolerant. Have you found out that to be true?
Thanks again.

Well we have no personal experience to share yet, but my understanding is that the reason they are heat tolerant is because of their particularly long ears and their thin hair. I know that the ears have something to do with thermoregulation but I don't know how that works?? Anyway, I'm betting we will need to be a bit more careful with them in the winter. We get our first ones on Friday. If I find out more from our breeder I will pass it on!

 

[Captaincatholic]

Ahoy Love my Barnyard: I was wondering if the selective breeding of the TAMUKs for heat tolerance makes them less cold tolerant. Have you found out that to be true?
Thanks again.

I am picking up some TAMUK rabbits from a PA breeder next week. He says he has them in a building that got down to 14* and they did just fine. As long as they can get out of the wind, they will be fine.

 

[Florida Jeff]

Chaptianchatolic: Thanks for the heads up on the TAMUK cold tolerance. That is good to know. I am thinking about adding a pair to my herd of NZ Whites

 

[ladysown]

welcome to RT.

 

[Florida Jeff]

THANKS for the welcome aboard!

 

[HTAcres]

Ahoy Love my Barnyard: I was wondering if the selective breeding of the TAMUKs for heat tolerance makes them less cold tolerant. Have you found out that to be true?
Thanks again.

It gets below freezing at times where I raise Tamuk in Texas. They do fine.

 

[HTAcres]

Well we have no personal experience to share yet, but my understanding is that the reason they are heat tolerant is because of their particularly long ears and their thin hair. I know that the ears have something to do with thermoregulation but I don't know how that works?? Anyway, I'm betting we will need to be a bit more careful with them in the winter. We get our first ones on Friday. If I find out more from our breeder I will pass it on!

Heat is radiated from the ears so the thin fur covering and large upright shape helps to facilitate that.
One other factor is that they have more of a mandolin or semi arch shape versus the commercial "round" shape of something like New Zealands. You do give up just a little bit of meatiness but the trade off has been worth it to me.