Sad Rabbit Moments

As with all things when you are raising animals or growing things it seems there is always the downside.  I am sharing this not to be depressing, but to be "real".  I think often people look at various blog posts of people farming and homesteading and they see the blissfulness of it all.  While that is one side of it, that is not the only side and we need to paint a clear picture of the harsh reality that it sometimes brings.  There are lots of failures and lots of death.  And these deaths are not always the ones we choose... like culling our flocks, for instance. 

Today we awoke to find four baby lop bunnies.  These much awaited bunnies did not turn out how we had hope for this new little mommy bunny.  Often this happens with a bunny or rabbits first litter.  They just don't always know what to do.  "Little Stacy" did not even pull hair and line her nesting box.  It should be said that she did not have the best of nesting boxes either.  The box that was in her cage did not have piece of wood across the front entrance.  It is possible she did, at least, give birth to them in the box and they just got out of it somehow.  Three of the babies were out of the there embryonic sacks, so she did that part of the job correctly; however, there was one that was not out of it's embryonic sac.  That one was left in the nesting box. 

This is not my pic.  I am borrowing this to show what little bunnies look like at birth.

I tried to find a pic of a baby in the embryonic sac, but could not find one quickly online.  Anyway, I guess that is depressing anyway, right?!  So, I guess in the coming days we should have more litters, since my crazy kids bred all the rabbits and bunnies (lops) at the same time.  Time will tell.  I hope we have some new life and we will have something to celebrate out at our little rabbit area. 

It really is just the way it is... it is a part of the deal.