Tragedy on the farm
Our one mature doe rabbit has been expecting. I put the nest box in last weekend...a little early maybe, but these days I have to do what I can do, when I can do it. I went out to check on her yesterday morning, and she had pulled fur and made a nest...in the corner of the cage, not in the nest box. I freaked, as cages are no impediment to baby rabbits. I scooped up all the fur I could and put it and the rabbit into the nest box. I saw that she had built up the floor of the nest with wood shavings from the box. Then she started taking the hair out. "OK, you win," I said. "Maybe you know something about this that I don't."
The lousy weather got worse at night, with wind howling. "In diesen Wetter, in diesem Braus..."
The sun was bright when I checked on them this morning. A nervous pacing mom, and a small pile of fur, not moving. Blood on the bottom of the platform she had made, so she'd given birth. In the next cage, two very dead baby rabbits. Uh-oh. I found the other 6 in back of the hutch, equally dead.
Naturally, I am kicking myself for romantic notions of animal instincts. "Dumb bunny" isn't just an expression. She guessed at "the place most like a burrow", and guessed wrong, and I, as the intelligent human, should have corrected her. She knew what a nest box was for, as she'd used it last time, so what was her aversion? Oh well, next time. But now that won't be until March. She needs 6 weeks recovery, and with the hutch outside (enclosed on 3 sides, soon 4), I don't want to breed until Frebruary at earliest.
I went out and dug turnips, a job I will finish when I post this, now that I'm warm. That hose water is way too close to freezing. If I get the daikon, and a few oddments of greens, harvest will be over.
Comments