Should I worry? First time getting them to breed

[AdventureIQ]

I have loved this forum since joining and have read tons of post on here.

I think I'm more jittery than my jr buck in getting them to breed. We brought home a new doe today with a proven track record. We were told she is slow to start. When I put here in our jr buck's run he came up and was interested in her while she was still in a small transport crate. Thought this was a good sign.

So I moved him into a cage for the afternoon--one that I could easily control if things went wrong. I brought her in a bit later, taking her out of the transport crate and placed her in the cage. He came up and went nose to nose and (I think) gave her a bit of a nip on the neck.

She just stayed prone with ears back. I moved him into a position to mount her but he did nothing but sit there on her back. I took him off after about a minute --I was getting worried that she was going to hurt him. She is a pretty big lady and he's about half her size (age probably about 6 months. He is full Cali and she is Cali-mix (again with several liters under her belt).

I know this is the first gal he has been with so thinking he knows a bit less about rabbit breeding than I do. Do I need to back of and give them a minute? Should I be concerned that fur is going to fly? Do I pick up Barry White music, candles, and dim the lights?

 

[Preitler]

Welcome

One thing I had to learn with rabbits was patience. You can't hurry rabbits, they do what they do at their pace.
How old is your buck? It can take them some time to figure out what to do. But when they know, they can be fast, getting out of the cage for 30 seconds was all it needed to get me a surprise litter last fall :?


So, grab a good book, and sit somewhere where they can't see you to not distract them. Just let them do. It's ok as long as they don't fight, or the doe chases the buck. What you wrote sounds pretty good and normal.
Most do breeding in the hours the bunnys are most active, morning and late afternoon

 

[Rainey]

We started raising meat rabbits in 2014 but this year is our first time trying to breed with a young buck we raised ourselves. Last year we had young first time does saved from the previous year but kept the same buck. I had been wondering how it would go because the buck is not quite 6 months when we wanted to start breeding and I wasn't sure how to know when he'd be ready.

Friday we put in the proven doe that has the mildest disposition (none of them bad-tempered--culled that) and the first time the buck backed into the corner under his bucket, then started chasing her around after he'd thought it over for a bit. She growled at him and we took her out, mindful of the advice not to let him get attacked. Again in the afternoon, same thing. She was somewhat pink, acceptable but not great on the doe readiness scale. Yesterday morning when we tried her with our old buck she jumped up into his bucket facing out and wouldn't come out to play. Checked her again and saw she was paler, not darker.
So put her back into her cage and checked the other proven doe. She was bright pink bordering on purple. Put her in with the new buck (Beau), he didn't retreat into any corners, she lifted, he covered, one fall off. When he tried for another time she growled and we took her out. We tried her again in the afternoon and there was one cover but no fall-off, but we're hoping for a litter in a month. We've had good-sized litters with just one fall-off.

I suggest checking the doe and putting her in when she looks really ready and see if things go better then. Welcome to RT and good luck with your rabbits.

 

[AdventureIQ]

Perfect-- thanks for the insight! Will try it again today using the advice.

 

[Marinea]

*fingers crossed for kits*

And you get bonus points for a Barry reference in your first post. Love some Barry.

 

[AdventureIQ]

Well we matched her up with a different buck--- put on some mood music, put a lava lamp in the cage and it didn't take long and the new buck was in action 4 times in about 5 minutes or so…..that was 5 weeks ago--- and we were expectant grandparents-- built a nesting box….and no kits. Going to try them again on Monday. In the mean time we did pay $10 to have our other doe bred with another buck in the area. So the wait begins again!