hopefully their new owner will be pleased with them and do well showing.  :)  

Two girlies (I think)....last week I thought one might be a buck so no promises at this point.  Most likely keeping the one female as my son is quite intrigued by her.  he may claim her for his own, he hasn't decided yet.

Being quite determined to winnow down my herd I sent Button to a new home today.   She'll be living the life of a pampered pet bun.  :)

five kits born today.  William is dad.  Three DOA.  Living are two solid chocolates. 

Button has done a fine job raising up this kits.  She's a calm, very even tempered doe who has been a pleasure to monitor during this whole first time raising a litter time.  two of the kits are fair impressing me, the potential doe has been spoken for long before her birth.  :)

Mitch (pictured above) and Button (below) gave four kits today.    Button is a very pretty doe and I'm hopeful she will be in shape to show for the rabbit show in October.  Time will tell for sure.  :)   All th epups are dark, do not sure yet which are black and which are chocolate.

Today I got some rabbits bred, I have a fellow wanting a solid coloured polish for his job, so I thought I'd try to get him one. :)   Hopefully I will get some nice kits from the matches I made today.  Button, pictured below, I bred to Mitch.

One of the things I find fascinating about raising rabbits is the sheer amount of ways people choose to breed their rabbits.

My methodology: I breed in 2 or 4's normally.  I check does for signs of readiness, I pick times when I know I'll be around to see them kindle and to sell their offspring.   I stick the doe in with the buck and allow him to mount her 2-3 times and then I pull her out and I'm done.

Other methods I've heard about

1. put doe in with buck, allow to mate as often as they wish until they no longer wish to do so.  Remove doe to own cage.  Done.

2. bring buck to doe's cage.   This can be risky as many does don't much like having their space invaded.   Done.

3. Bring doe to buck, allow to mate 2-3 times, then remove doe.  anywhere from 2-12 hours later, return doe to the bucks cage for a repeat breeding.

4. Breed a doe to a variety of bucks.   Those who do this say that it increases the amount of offspring desired.   This would NOT be useful in a show/pedigree program as you'd never to be sure which offspring belongs to whom.

5. MOST methods allow to independent breeding, but there are some folks who will ONLY table breed and have trained their bucks to wait until they position the doe and then assist in the breeding.   Table breeding has it's place and time, but is not a method I tend to utilize though I have on the odd occasion (like when you have a doe who WANTS to be bred but simply won't lift for the chosen buck).   

NOW, with all methodologies used it is good to be able to see what other folks do so you can try things differently if you have a problem doe.

For instance... I had a doe once who was a bear to breed until I learned that she prefers the buck to come to her.   If I did so, she would breed eagerly.   Her daughters were the same way.  :)

I've had does that I've purchased in or had given to me that could be challenging to breed and learned that sometimes table breeding can be an aid.

I had one doe that I struggled to get kits off of, and one time decided I'd go out every four hours and breed her...and finally I got a litter of five kits off her.   Previous attempts at breeding had resulted in litters of ONE.   Rather tiresome that.

I have one buck that won't breed rapidly.  he will breed once, and then he'll cuddle and make nice for the next five minutes.  I've learned, let him breed, let him cuddle for a minute, remove the doe and 10 minutes later give the doe back.  I dislike this prolonged breeding routine and will be looking to replace him at some point.

So different methods sometimes work.

MY preferred method is to let the rabbits simply do their thing without any more interference than necessary.   That's what works best for me.  :)