How to identify gender and breed of young rabbits?

hi, I'm interested in buying a rabbit but i want to know how to identify the gender before choosing one. Also, the seller mentioned they were "mini" rabbits and don't grow to even a kilo. How can I verify this? Is there some kind of way to find out by looking at the rabbit?

thank you for any help!

Go to a rescue and they are more competant to give you a good idea of breed and gender. They have babies in all the time and pregnant females if you want a real youngun - small and big breeds/all colours.

Surely if the breeders cant give you an answer you will trust regarding breed and especially gender then they arent the sort of people to be getting a rabbit from?

Its good you want to double check things but the breeder should be capable of veryfying the exact breed or mix, and the gender surely?

I would stick to a rescue though :lol:

I would love to go to a rescue but there is one problem... There are no rescues as far as I'm aware...

where are you from?

If theres no rescues then id personally hunt out a really good breeder, really good breeders will be upfront and honest with you about the size the rabbit will grow (some breeders will just tell you what you want to hear for a quick sale) they will make sure 100% the sex of the rabbit aswell as offer a lifetime support on care/health if ever you need some advice aswell as taking back teh rabbit if for any reason you cant have it anymore

I live in Cyprus. I know there's another member here who is from Cyprus, and our only route to adopting rabbits is from pet shops. Any help is appreciated.

since most guinea pigs are a kilo, I can't imagine a rabbit that small except for a netherland dwarf breed - and they're still a bit bigger than that. There are mini lops, but they're not particularly small, they're just called mini lops for some reason!

rabbits are notoriously hard to sex correctly, which is why when you buy a pair of babies, you can end up with them mating after a few months, when one turns out to be the opposite sex to the other! So I would advise just getting one rabbit for now - boys make better pets but females can be spayed, if you can find a competant vet - it's a delicate operation and rabbits must NOT be starved before surgery, unlike cats and dogs - and also they should have a different type of anaesthetic, and often chew out stitches or have a bad reaction to them.

Really I think see if a breeder who cares for their rabbits well, has an adult rabbit she doesn't want any more. This way you will be able to see if the rabbit is easy to handle, tame, healthy - whereas a baby rabbit will be easy to handle for about 3 months, and then when it starts to reach sexual maturity, behaviour and aggression problems usually start too.

Here are some rescues in Cyprus, the first one has a rabbit on the front page pic and even if the others don't mention rabbits on the websites its worth phoning as they probably do take the odd one in or at the very least will know someone that does rescue buns over there!

http://www.cyprusanimalwelfare.com/

http://www.kyreniaanimalrescue.org/index.html

http://www.cypruscatrescue.co.uk/

http://www.parc-cyprus.org/


Good luck!

Wow! thank you so much for the help Elve and Leanne! :thumb::thumb:

Much appreciated!