New member who's... kind of new to rabbits...

Hi everyone! First off let me say that it's great that you all have this forum here dedicated to bunnies... I'm so glad I stumbled upon it and I hope that it can be of great help to me and my dear babies.

I am mainly a dog/cat person, with 3 dogs, 9 cats, and 1 hermit crab and 1 betta fish. It was only last year, in August, that I decided to take on the role of bunny mom along with the rest. I started out with two rabbits that I bought at our local county fair (the conditions there are awful for the poor rabbits, to say the least), one white Angora male and a sable point Lionhead baby. We didn't know the gender of the Lionhead, and we only had one hutch, so we took our chances...

The result, obviously, was three healthy baby bunnies... although we're still not sure of the genders. :-/ The oldest is a completely white babe named Basil, with a Lionhead coat. The middle child is a sable point like mama with a matching Lionhead coat. And finally the youngest and tiniest (also the odd one out in color) is a grey with an Angora coat. Despite this "oops" litter, I'm very glad that we have them and wouldn't trade them for anything...

Right now, though, I'm trying to figure out a better setup for them. They are outdoor rabbits due to limited space inside as well as our cats and dogs... but they are practically forced to live in wire hutches, with Sugar (the Angora male) in one hutch and Spice (the mama) and her three babes in the other. I'm hoping this forum can provide me with ideas as to how to build them a rabbit "condo" so that they have a nice place to live and exercise... so I'll bring up that point later on on another board.

So with all that said, I'd just like to say hi from me and my five babies.

Hi and welcome to the forum! :wave:

Your buns sound adorable.

Do you mind if I ask how old the babies are? If they are different sexes you will need to seperate them in time to prevent further babies.

They were born around the beginning of April, so they're going on seven months now.

Haha, that's the problem... I'm not sure what they are because I have very limited knowledge of how to sex rabbits and I haven't gotten any help from online sites because all my rabbits look the same to me, lol.

Hey,

Welcome to the forum

You might be finding you have a little on the way, or multiple litters, so ideally you need to either separate them all and go from there, or maybe take them to be sexed, or have a look yourself.

Girls have slits, and boys have donuts (and at this age, they will probably also have testicles which look like long beans either side of his genitals).

It may help you to find a rabbit savvy vet to look at spays and neuters too.

I hope you find the site useful and I look forward to seeing you around.

Take care

Tracy

Welcome to the forum

If they are seven months old your very lucky your not into double figures already Just imagine, if one's a boy that means you have 3 females which could each produce 2 babies... that's 9 more bunnies. Once they've started delivering they do so every 4 weeks.... population explosion :lol:

You really need to sex and seperate asap. It should usually be done by 3 months old.

There are some photos here that might help you: http://forums.rabbitrehome.org.uk/showthread.php?t=46514

Or if you post where you are someone might be able to come and look or know a rescue that will help you sex them

For four bunnies the best option would be a shed... you can pick these up second hand if your on a budget. Getting the male neutered so they can go back together will save you space too.

Tamsin

I wasn't sure about separating them because I didn't want to make a mistake and accidentally stick a girl in with a male and then end up with more. From what I can tell, I was pretty sure that all three are girls. I've been checking them multiple times in the past, I just wasn't absolutely sure what they were. I've done comparisons between them all... the babies all look like the mother to me.

Getting them spayed and neutered isn't really an option now with how much it costs... it might be viable to get any males neutered, as I'm pretty sure Sugar is the only one. I haven't seen any mounting at all between them either.

Thanks for your help!

Bunnies are very similar so it would be an idea to get someone experience to double check.

Neutering the male would be a good start then you could get the girls spayed gradually. Boys are cheaper to do and it's definately worth phoning around cos vets can vary a lot in price Some rescue/rspca branches do neutering vouchers/discount neutering that might help you

Hello and welcome to the forum. :wave:

If you wish to get a rabbit sexed, you can always pop to the vets, who for me, did it for free.
Are they vaccinated?If not, they need to be done and you can get them sexed there
It'd be an idea to have them living toether in a huge setup, but you'd need to neuter and spay them first
How much room have you got for hutches, runs and sheds etc.?

Really? They checked them for free? I'll have to call my vet and see if I can get that done this week... that's a definite must, cause I'm not having any more oops litters! Either way though I'm hoping that I can get all my boys (if there's more than just one) fixed so there's no more worry.

The space we have is limited, but I'm in the process of trying to design a suitable hutch/run/shed... or something for them so that they can all have a very nice place. I have a post about my rabbit space in the Housing area if you have any ideas about building rabbit hutches. I'm a very unconventional designer... which tends to make things a little too complex.