Rabbits everywhere!!!

Our rabbits have been very prolific... we have counted at least 10 babies in the rabbit stall the last few weeks, but they are hard to count, as the young ones spend most of their time below ground in burrows, and even the tastiest treats only lure the ones within view that are... not napping when the smell of fresh grass or carrots is wafting through the stall and burrows???

We are in the process of moving our rabbit colony from a modified horse stall into a new rabbit shed. So far, only our buck Spotty and his youngest daughter, Shay, who is not mature enough yet to have babies, have been moved over. Remaining in the old colony settings are Gustl, our colony matriarch, and her first daughter, Brown Sugar. I think the big litter with 10 babies is Gustl's achievement. We are guessing that they are about 5 weeks old. we will probably move them into the shed next week, as they can be weaned at 6 weeks and Gustl will deserve a break!!!

A few days ago, we accidentally broke into a burrow while excavating some dirt that has to be moved into the new shed... and found another nest of baby bunnies! These are just a few days old and have just gotten their fur and their eyes just opened. They are so cute!!!
We can't wait till they will venture above ground for trying out solid food and treats.

Last night, disaster struck: The stall door was left open and this morning, we could not see any young ones in the stall at all. Gustl Brown Sugar were still (or again) in there, but no young rabbits to be seen. We then found 4 in a corner behind some 2x4s. a little later, i found 2 more behind the feed bins. Later yet, i found 2 more again behind the constructions wood pile. When my daughter came out of school, we found 2 more. 4 + 2 + 2 + 2 --- great! seems like we got all the rabbits back! but what is that... another rabbit running through the barn! and that - is that another brown and white baby out there in the yard? At some point, I lost count but i THINK we caught at least 12 babies. We still think there might be one more rabbit at least out there... we left the barn doors open last night, too, so it is not surprising that not all young bunnies stayed in the barn. More surprising that i didnt see any half eaten rabbits on the property this morning!

So, we borrowed my friend's Skunk trap (which has proven useful in catching anything but skunks, see previous blog) and hopefully we will catch another baby rabbit or two. Here we had a new problem - how to lure a young rabbit into a trap, when there is a ton of nice lush grass growing in the lawn by the barn? :-) - We decided to give carrots and dried bread a try.

This might be a very weird situation where we start with 10 baby rabbits, then loose them all, and then find 12 more or to have more than we started out with!
You just never know with rabbits living colony style. More about our rabbit colony project in another blog...