The New Zealand doe was re-bred to the New Zealand buck on April 20, 2012. This re-breeding process was done 6 weeks after she gave birth to her first litter and one week before weaning her first litter. Once again, we brought her to the New Zealand buck's cage and after the buck serviced her twice, we removed her and put her back in her cage together with her first litter. She started molting soon after but she grew back some new hair after two weeks and every thing went back to normal. One month after the re-breeding, she gave birth on May 24, 2012. It came as a big surprise to us because she had only 1 pup! This is our first time to have just 1 pup from our rabbits. We even took out the nest box just to check if there are other pups that may be hidden under the litter but there was nothing except for this one pup. Satisfied that we did not miss any dead pup, we covered up the pup with its mother's fur and put back the nest box into the cage. Since the pup has no siblings, she gets to have all the milk from her mother so she is really growing fast. I think that I will have to give this doe a rest after this second litter. She can nurse her one pup for 2 months instead of the usual 1 and 1/2 months that we do for the other rabbits. She could rest for 1 month after weaning the pup and then she will have recovered enough to be re-bred again by August. This picture below shows the big baby rabbit at 3 weeks old and her mother, the New Zealand doe.
New Zealand doe and her kit
No comments:
Post a Comment