#Rabbit Breeder

[mosneakers]

Coni: So the Bella clone was... you? [Eyes welled with tears] And the real Bella ...she wanted to call me Belladonna?

Coni's breath trembles as she listens to her alien parents give a rather clinical, emotionless version of events that paint the story of what happened to Bella Goth. She's engulfed in a kaleidoscope of glowing colors that signify a mixture of both anger and sadness. The betrayal she feels towards the Breeder Unit, or the family she once trusted, begins to fester.

Cacti: According to her records, upon reviewing them.

Coni: Why didn't you tell me? Cacti: It was years later that we reviewed her personal records, Concept. Coni: No. About any of this? Why didn't you tell me about her? Her family has been worried sick about her for years. Her children.

Pollination-Technician No. 12: [Shouting] You've become too emotional and fragile, like a human. You've lost your place, Concept. You forgot your purpose. You've grown up surrounded by human influence and fallen victim to their emotions. Cacti: Polly, stop-

Coni: [Shouting] She considered me her daughter! Pollination-Technician No. 12: [Coldly] She was mistaken! A mere surrogate, incapable of comprehending beyond her limited scope. Humans waste their energy on emotional attachments and family ties, overlooking the importance of survival. Look at the consequences it led her to. Cacti: [Screaming] POLLY, ENOUGH!

Coni: Please don't tell me you...

Cacti: I'm sorry Coni you had to find out like this, sweetie. But at the very least, we weren't the ones to- Pollination-Technician No. 12: She's dead. She endangered our species and all extra-terrestrial beings with her foolish behavior. She was transported to Sixam and handed over to the Eradication Unit and promptly eliminated.

Cacti: We had no choice, sweetie... if it were to get exposed-

Rabbit: We would all be contained in a government facility, subjected to endless tests, including you, Concept. And you wouldn't be running around playing house with humans right now. Coni: You could have erased her memory. Rabbit: Oh that seems to work well for your friend, doesn't it? There couldn't be any trace of her. Eradication would've found her eventually, anyway. You can't hide from them.

Coni: You... You're all monsters! All of you... [Cries]

Cacti: [Gasp] Coni, I raised you!!! Pollination-Technician No. 12: The humans have corrupted your mind. You used to be so intelligent. We may be monsters, Concept, but you're one of us. You're just like us.

Coni: No. I'm nothing like you...

Pollination-Technician No. 12: [Scoffs] Oh, how typical...

Coni: I want nothing to do with any of you ever again. Never contact me or my family again.

With tears streaming down her face, Coni rounds up her pet goat, and storms out of her childhood home for the last time.

[bunposting]

Much to the dismay of Silver breeders everywhere, she's sticking around.

{don't mind how patchy she looks she's still molting out her baby coat}

[mulberryfox]

Next up in farm chat is picking your hold back stock!

TW: Animal death, meat animal, animal farming

This is Arizona, an 8 week old satin x silver doe. She is my hold back doe out of her litter of 5, and I want to talk about some of the reasons why she’s staying!

The traits I am looking for:

1. Nice, smooth shoulders. I don’t want to see low shoulders, or any pronounced semi-arch type.

2. Nice width throughout. I don’t want thin, narrow rabbits who lack muscling over their topline, or appear to be long and lean.

3. Large size. Because silvers are a slightly smaller breed, I want to make sure I am retaining the heaviest, fastest growing offspring. This doe is the largest by several ounces, and is almost a full pound larger than the smallest littermate.

4. Handleable. I am okay if a rabbit is a little bit squirrely, but I do not tolerate extreme fear or aggression. This whole litter is a little squirrely, but not bad.

5. Color, fur, and sex. I knew i would be retaining a doe from this litter, with the potential of retaining a buck. The only buck in litter is the smallest, and so it was easy to pick based on sex. The four does are all the same shade of fawn, with one being a booted broken and therefore less useful in my program right now as my bucks are both broken and I don’t want charlies. The buck is a better shade of red, but thats okay. All five have identical fur.

In the end, her size is what won her a longer term cage because this litter was surprisingly consistent on type. The other four will go on to help provide food for my family in about a month, and anything left over will go into our garden as fertilizer to bring us abundance in the summer.

[auggiez-animalz]

The bunnies got tomatoes today 🍅

[mockva]

[isthedogawolfdog]

Unrelated but does anyone here breed rabbits? I know a breeder whose had some weird happenings with the limbs of some babies in their recent litters and was wondering if anyone knew what it could be. If anyone wants you can dm me and I can show you some pictures (they aren’t graphic, don’t worry!) so we can determine what it is.

[exoticghosts]

Can anyone point me to amchin breeders in the Maryland/Delaware/Pennsylvania area?? I'm looking to get a breeding trio

[bunposting]

[EDIT: OP has apologized for the name calling and will be deleting their og post, and stated that a lot of their frustration comes from how little good information really is out there - which is so true and valid!! In the hopes of providing a little bit more access to official published information on rabbit welfare/care, I've created a Google Drive folder containing PDFs of a select few publications I have downloaded and will be sharing that in a pinned post here shortly. The only reason I am keeping this post up is because I do want to make my qualifications super clear, and I think the message that experiential evidence can be just as significant as (if not more significant than in some cases) academic research is a super important message to send.] Heyo! I've been waiting to reply to your initial tags on my Masterpost of HRS Bullshit post for a bit mostly just because I haven't had the time to get around to it, but I figure I'll respond to this instead. I apologize for the long post - I am nothing if not a rambler, I'm afraid.

Since you're curious about my qualifications: To make a long story short, I have gone to school for animal ag.

If you'd like more details, I started out my entire journey of interest in livestock (and rabbits in particular) thanks to a Veterinary Science class (which ended up being more of a livestock science class) I took in high school, and ended up dedicating more or less my entire life to studying livestock science and welfare ever since then. I took Veterinary Science II the very next semester, which was the highest level that my school offered.

For my senior year of high school I opted out of normal high school and instead went to my local tech school for a full day, full year program in Animal Production Science and Technology (essentially - livestock science). I earned the highest class-specific scholarship award available at my tech school for my involvement in this program thanks to my dedication to learning everything I possibly could about livestock science and sharing that knowledge with others, as well as of course significant academic and extracurricular (FFA) achievements.

Initially I was going to go to college for animal science, but due to some life issues, I had to switch schools, and ended up going to a college that did not have a specific animal science degree. I got my degree in Sustainable Agriculture & Food Systems, with a high level of focus on sustainable livestock production systems, and completed multiple independent studies focusing on rabbits specifically. Someday I hope to get a masters in Animal/Livestock Science, but we'll see if/when that happens.

As for my extracurricular knowledge, I've been in and around the rabbit world on various levels for over a decade now. All of my information comes from a combination of the following: 1. Personal experience with my own rabbits and the rabbits of others who I am very close to 2. Knowledge shared among rabbit enthusiasts of all kinds, from show breeders to meat breeders to, yes, even those who have owned pet rabbits 3. Research ranging from personal websites of rabbit enthusiasts and breeders, organization websites and publications such as those from the ARBA, textbooks such as Rabbit Production (10th Edition, Steven Lukefahr et al.), and various scientific studies 4. Information gathered from observing various pet rabbit centric spaces over the years, and from interacting with those I dub "pet rabbit people."

When you get to a certain point in your academic and professional career, citing sources can be difficult because, frankly, I couldn't tell you exactly where I learned each specific detail of knowledge I have accumulated over the years. Sure, I could go to Google Scholar and cherry pick some studies to back me up, but to be honest, one of the reasons I don't especially when it comes to rabbits is that it is extremely difficult to find well conducted, unbiased studies. I genuinely find that in some cases, it is more accurate to reference a combination of personal experience, experience I've witnessed from others, and independent investigations. This is especially true when it comes to cataloguing the health and welfare of breeders' rabbits compared to those being kept by "pet rabbit people."

I don't know of any official large studies that have been conducted long-term studying the health and welfare of rabbits kept by "pet rabbit people" following (or attempting to follow) HRS standards and those kept by breeders. I'm also not going to sit here and pretend I've been meticulously cataloguing every single instance of every single case of GI Stasis, sore hocks, bloat, cancer, etc. that I have seen on both sides over the years. That's not to say I haven't been keeping track, though. For example, in the years I was much more active in HRS groups, I saw more than 20 cases of GI Stasis mentioned - in breeder-centric spaces, including those dedicated to documenting and educating about health issues, I have seen maybe two or three total over the years. Those numbers may not be exact, but even just 2 or 3 compared to 20+ is enough to tell you that there is a massive disparity between rabbits being kept by standards recommended by other breeders vs. those kept by folks following/attempting to follow HRS standards.

Now, just like every other study, there are other factors at work here - I won't pretend there aren't. For example, HRS folks tend to have rabbits adopted from who-knows-where, rabbits with unknown genetics, likely coming from accidental litters unethical breeders, whereas many of the rabbits in breeder-centric groups are coming from people who are to at least some extent trying to breed for genetically healthier rabbits. But the numbers still speak for themselves - there is something going on there.

Finally, I would just like to point out that in my original HRS Bullshit post, I don't believe that I mentioned any specific statistics other than those that the HRS has been claiming itself (such as the "80% of intact doe rabbits develop uterine cancer" statistic).

I will never claim that I am the be all end all to rabbit knowledge. I never have, I never will. I am always learning more, and I am always open to changing my perspective when given enough evidence.

But I also won't sit here and say that I am just talking out of my ass when it comes to rabbits and most livestock things. I've put in the work, I've put in the research, and I continue to do so to this day.

If you've read all of this OP, thank you for taking the time to listen. I hope I don't come across as being angry or anything, because really - I'm not. You've done the right thing by being skeptical! However, my post is a tumblr post, not an actual literal thesis, and certainly not an official publication. My post was intended to be a starting point for people do be more cautious about HRS as an organization, more curious about rabbit husbandry, and more open to the idea that maybe, if an animal is genuinely healthy and happy, that's far more important than keeping an animal to any one standard or another. If you want sources, you are welcome to do some more research yourself, or to send me an ask about specific parts of my post or my claims that you would like to see some sources about.

I will say, though, I don't appreciate myself or my fellow breeders who speak out on these issues being called "cunts" and having our education and experience called into question. If you are curious about someone's qualifications and where they get their information from, maybe just ask nicely next time!

P.S. I would argue that you shouldn't immediately trust someone who went to school for animal ag either. You have no idea how well they actually did in school, how much information they absorbed, how many animal ag related courses they took, the quality of those courses, how current and unbiased the information they received was, and how much direct experience they gained working with animals (very different than just learning about them in a textbook/classroom). Having been to school with other animal ag students, I would easily trust a farmer with 20 years of real lived experience far sooner than I would trust someone who only has an animal ag degree. There are so many things you will ONLY learn if you have actually seen and experienced them yourself, and yes - those things should still be backed up by extra research if extra research is available.

its just that ive seen more than one rabbit breeder post about this stuff with NO sources linked despite many of them bringing up specific "statistics" like. source the fucking statistics youre talking about then cunt!!!!!!!!!! dont just expect us to believe you when thats the same damn thing that PETA is doing!!!!! Sorry but unless u went to school for animal ag im not just gonna blindly believe you because you SAID it even IF youve been a farmer for 20 years! ANIMAL RIGHTS ACTIVISTS DONT INTERACT I DONT WANT U HERE this is for non peta idiots only tysm

[spitepenny]

Lemon the bristlenose pleco eats some sweet potato

One of the rabbit snails attempts a ring trick

[tetedurfarm]

a polite little lad

[mosneakers]

Coni pedals her bike all the way to Shady Acres. She storms into her childhood home—a little farmhouse built into a rock at the very top of the Plateau. She swiftly draws the curtains shut, gathers all the members of the Breeder Unit in the living area, and slams the flash drive onto the coffee table.

Rabbit: [Croaky voice] What is the meaning of this, Concept?

Coni: Bella Goth. She went missing several years ago, leaving her family devastated and confused, with no answers as to what happened to her. Reports on a doppelgänger were linked HERE. To this address. [Voice trembling] What did you do?

[bunposting]

Got my first ever grand champion leg! Constellations' Dark Lightning ("Electra") won Best in Show for Show A at the South Jersey RCBA show today!

[mulberryfox]

TW: meat animals, animal processing, animal death.

A part of coming back to Tumblr is so that I have an outlet for my homesteading/home farming projects. Because it’s winter and the midwest, not a whole lot is happening out in the garden, which means its rabbit content time!

Did you know, domestic rabbits actually handle the cold better than the heat? This can make them great alternative meat source on cold-climate homesteads, especially in the winter months! Rabbits are the most efficient small homestead meat source, because you can breed them yourselves, unlike Cornish cross chickens. Other breeds of chicken can be bred and hatched on farm, but yield smaller quantities of meat.

Rabbit manure is also great for your garden, and does not require any other processing to be garden ready, unlike most other manure types.

Pictured is Boris, one of my meat rabbit program herd bucks. His purpose is breeding, and when he is eventually retired (if he is ever retired!) he will be placed in a pet home thanks to his wonderful temperament, or passed on to another homesteader looking for a starter buck.

Reasons for retiring him would include: low rate of gain/production on his offspring, producing genetic ailments, sterility, or if he produces a son that is a significant improvement on his own faults. Boris is still a junior, meaning he is young and still developing. He is also a “mystery mutt”, so it is still up in the air on how he will finish out. Based on his current development, I am excited to see where he finishes at!

In a future post I will share some of the qualities he has that are useful in my herd, and I hope to introduce some of my other production (and show animals) soon!

[rwnjun]

my booger

[anoras]

retail sale of dogs banned in ny????? :0

[h0ney8ee]

i went to a cat expo today and saw so many cute cats and got sooo many freebies, my girlies are going to have a new treat and toy to try every week for months 🥺