# Allie and her babies



## thumpingBerry (May 31, 2016)

For more on Allie, please see this post ... http://www.rabbitsonline.net/showthread.php?t=86383

I decided to go ahead and make a blog for Allie and her babies.

But first, a "trip down memory lane" on some memories of my first litter.

Holly (female) and Davis (male) were both broken black tort Holland Lops out of show breeders. Holly was in fact show quality. I got both bunnies at a local rabbit show in May 2014. Holly was about 5 months old and Davis was about 2 years old if I remember correctly. In late May, I started trying to breed them. Holly would just plant herself in the corner of Davis' cage and not move. This went on for several attempts. Then, about a week later, Holly mounted Davis, but then again went to the corner and refused to cooperate. The next morning, after deciding that neither one would kill the other, I left them together and for the most part, stayed out of the area. Each time I would check on them, they were just laying around. Holly was returned to her cage that evening.

Being my first attempt at a rabbit breeding/litter, I read all I could on the internet on when I could (and how I could) start palpating her. The first attempt resulted in me getting excited when feeling something, then, realizing it was poop. Ultimately, I did feel something suspiciously like a baby, then a few days later, felt movement of the babies. Holly was given a nesting box on day 28 and pulled fur and gave birth on day 31 (July 1st). However, one little one was not getting fed, and finally on day 2 or 3, I acted and gave him time with Holly. I got him caught up, but then he fell back behind and it was a struggle from that time on, despite my attempts to help him by supplement feeding him. At a little over 4 weeks old, he passed away from a struggle with enteritis. Sadly, the other two developed enteritis about a week later and were dead within 12 to 24 hours. Due to the loss of the babies, I ended up rehoming both rabbits and not trying to breed again.

Fast forward to a few weeks ago (5/15? has it only been a little over 2 weeks? seems longer than that) ... when I brought home Allie, who was believed to be pregnant. She indeed was, and on 5/25, had 7 babies with 6 survivors. This post is mostly dedicated to the "rest of the story."

Now, the babies are 5 days old and growing quickly. There is one that could be called a runt, but he seems to be doing ok. I love the colors and markings on the babies. It will be hard not to keep one (or two). If I am correct on genders (hard to tell at this age), I have 3 females and 3 males. The first three pictures are from yesterday (4 days old). The yellow object is a sticky note pad and I think is 3 x 3 inches to show size. The other two pictures are from today. The last picture has the potential males on the left side and the females on the right side ("runt" in bottom left corner). The last picture is Allie just relaxing in the cage (picture taken a few days ago).


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## thumpingBerry (Jun 1, 2016)

After carefully looking at the black/white babies, I do see some cream tints in the white/light areas, so there goes my thoughts they may be magpies. This makes me think even more that one of the black/light colored males may have been the father of this litter. They are pretty, though. I took out the smallest one today and basically placed him near his mom, and she cleaned him and let him nurse a bit, then decided to go jump in the nestbox to feed them all. She didn't stay in there for more than 2 or 3 minutes though.


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## thumpingBerry (Jun 2, 2016)

8 days old! In the first pic you can see the cream coloring on the "lighter" colored babies. I think the lighter colored orange/darker color is a chocolate harlequin ... any thoughts on that one? They are growing fast, doing well, and just so precious.


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## woahlookitsme (Jun 3, 2016)

They're cute! You definitely have a chocolate Japanese harlequin color on the one baby. The rest just looks like variations on magpie and Japanese. They'll definitely make cute pets


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## thumpingBerry (Jun 11, 2016)

Babies are now 17 days old now. Everyone had their eyes open by 2 weeks old. They are becoming more active now. I just cut down the height of their nest box so it would be easier for them to go in and out.

Weights range from 4 1/2 ounces to 5 1/4 ounces. Does that sound about right for their age? I'm assuming these will be Holland Lop size, but there is no way to know for certain.

Momma Allie loves her pellets and would eat those exclusively if I kept her food bowl full. I try to scatter pellets in the nest box and she knows the pellets are in there, so gets in there to eat pellets intended for the babies. If the babies start nursing, she jumps out. So I'm not sure how the babies will be introduced to pellets. They are nibbling on hay.


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## woahlookitsme (Jun 12, 2016)

For our does we free feed them pretty much. They get their bowls filled twice a day. As the babies started venturing out they would nibble on the pellets in the bowl but didn't do this till almost 3-4 weeks of age. Starting to nibble on hay at this point is just fine.

If these are mixed breed babies with a mom and dad of different size I would guess the babies will be somewhere in the middle as far as adult size


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## BlackMiniRex (Jun 12, 2016)

aww! all of them are so cute! i love their tiny ears! :weee:


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## thumpingBerry (Jun 13, 2016)

Here are some more recent pictures, taken 6/11 and 6/12.


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## BlackMiniRex (Jun 13, 2016)

AHHH!!! their so cute!!!! I love they black and white ones, I love baby rabbits at this age, they are tiny and fuzzy! How is Allie?


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## RavenousDragon (Jun 15, 2016)

Those pictures are so cute I almost died from overload. <3


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## thumpingBerry (Jun 15, 2016)

BlackMiniRex said:


> AHHH!!! their so cute!!!! I love they black and white ones, I love baby rabbits at this age, they are tiny and fuzzy! How is Allie?



Allie is doing great. She seems to want to nurse her babies exclusively in the nesting box, although the babies have now pretty much deserted the box and generally hide out behind a litter box in the corner. Due to the heat, I may move them inside. They are in my screened in patio and the ceiling fan is running constantly for air movement, but still, I can see they are hot. It is supposed to get into the mid 90's tomorrow.

But for the most part everything seems to be going ok. If you read my much earlier post regarding the thought that Allie didn't want to nurse her babies (possible sore teats) ... well, that issue apparently was possibly caused by some tiny ants and once I cleaned out the nest box and put new bedding in there, she soon hopped in there and fed her babies. As far as the cream markings I saw ... it was just staining (I have "magpies", which was a welcome surprise.).

These little babies are so cute and looking and acting more and more like miniature rabbits. Thanks for the comments.


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## thumpingBerry (Jun 15, 2016)

Speaking of Allie nursing, I just took this picture a couple of minutes ago.


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## BlackMiniRex (Jun 15, 2016)

Nice!


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## Nancy McClelland (Jun 17, 2016)

Very cute!


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## thumpingBerry (Jun 19, 2016)

I did end up moving Allie and her babies inside to a big but store-bought-type cage (Marchioro Tommy 120 ... nearly 2 feet wide by nearly 4 feet long).

Here's a picture of two of my babies I took today ... one of the magpies and the chocolate/orange harlequin baby.


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## thumpingBerry (Oct 28, 2016)

A long overdue update ...

One by one (except for two females who went together), Allie and her babies found homes ... at this time I still have one male, Grayson (one of my nieces named him Gray, I added son on the end to become Grayson). Grayson was the biggest baby of the litter but also the shyest, still is a bit shy but a sweet and gentle boy. I haven't weighed him lately, but I'm guessing he is around 4 pounds.

I kept my little chocolate harlequin for a while, named her Hazel, but ended up letting her go to a new home.

Attached are 6 pictures from 7/15 when I first was trying to find them homes.


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## thumpingBerry (Oct 28, 2016)

Well, I thought I had more pictures of Hazel, but it looks like the last ones I took were in early August. She seemed to lose most of her markings in about 2 weeks, probably because I suspect she was a harlequin-tort.

Anyway, here's a couple more pictures of the last pictures I took of Hazel, then one of Grayson I took today.


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