04/12/10, 09:49 AM
|
 |
I love South Dakota
|
|
Join Date: Jun 2006
Location: South Dakota
Posts: 5,261
|
|
|
Putting kits with an young adult buck
I am currently dealing with this issue, I need room for a grow out pen and the only space availabe was to make one of the buck pens larger and house the kits with one of my bucks. I had not planned on keeping two breeding bucks, but my husband is attached to both these guys and they are both sweethearst - so I'm short what was suppose to be my grow out pen.
In the colony, I never saw any evidence of the buck showing "interest" in the kits, and once the doe had a second litter, the kits spent more time hanging around the buck as Mom no longer wanted anything to do with them. More often the does would be by themselves and the kits would all be with the buck.
One thing I noticed different about a colony setup, the buck did not assume that any other rabbit in his cage was for him to mate with.
The expanded pen is 5'x6' and has one partial divider about 2' long and has lots of places for the kits to get away from the buck. This buck is just about a year old and has only been used for breeding once. He kept going up to them and trying to mount, they would just walk right out from underneath him and didn't seem to mind. The buck was not sure what to think when they turned the tables and started looking for nipples under his belly.
I did notice that after a short time the buck was concentrating his efforts on two of the kits. I wonder if he knew which were females (I don't). They are about 7 weeks old. I am aware of the risks here, but all the kits are freezer bound.
The buck never showed any aggression during all this time. He never tried to bite to hang on to a kit, if that would have happened the buck would have found himself in a wire pen. The kits seemed totally unphased by this. They showed no fear of the buck.
I am hoping I can get this younger buck use to sharing his pen with the youngsters. If not I'll go to plan B - what ever that may be.
Cathy
|
