Cute Power

If we could power our house on Cute...

...then this would be our carbon footprint.

Tis the Season

Tis the season for snakes and breeding.  Farmer Girl picked this one up and waved it at me.  You can imagine my response.  Thankfully it was already dead.  And also, especially thankfully, its a harmless scarlet king snake and not a coral.  (Coral snakes are more predominately black than red).  I can only assume that Angel is the one that took care of this one.  It clearly was dealt a fatal blow.  It sets my mind somewhat at ease believing Angel will take care of slithering foes, but on the other hand, I don't want to lose Angel to venomous bite suffered during the defense of her territory.  I've read that to administer anti-venom, you must know the species of snake that bit.  But injectable vitamin C in high doses can save animals (and people) when the species is unknown.  I've been on a local hunt for this magical goodness called Injectable Vitamin C to no avail.  I think, before snake breeding season carries on much more, I will hit the all-providing internet to acquire such a spectacular potion.

Another snake-bite preventative motion is to attach bells around an animal's neck.  The loud clanging alerts snakes that this is a large animal not suitable for a meal and they slither back to protect themselves.  I can't imagine the racket that would be heard if I attached bells to all 10 of the 4-legged creatures.  I think instead I'll just be cautious (as I've done other years) to make sure the sheep are keeping up with the height of the grass and I scope out the yard before releasing the kids to play each morning.

The Rabbit operation expands

The drama a 3-lb rabbit can produce is astounding.

 As previously posted, Mona had babies which fell out of pen #1 because she had them outside of nestbox #2.  We got them back into nestbox #2 which stayed inside pen #1.  Eventually 2 of the 5 died but not by foul play, or at least not what we can tell. 

Then all 3 babies were soon climbing out of nestbox #2.  We happened to be right there to witness it... and watch them climb/fall right out of pen #1.  One poor bunny fell right into the poop collection pan that also held rainwater.  Husbandman heard the splash, fished it out and cleaned it up.

 To fix that problem, we moved Mona and all 3 babies to Brownies pen (pen #2)... obviously moving Brownie to pen#1.  The kids liked that better so they could see the babies better.  Here they are watching our version of Saturday morning cartoons.  Even in their pajamas (in their defense it WAS still quite early).  But Farmer Boy  1 was found parked there much of the day.  Afterall, if he went through the trouble to haul his own little Mickey Mouse Lazyboy to the scene, you know he intends to spend some time there.

 Unfortunately, when we got home from church the next day, the little tan bunny was missing.  We went on a hunt and Farmer Girl was the one who figured out to check Angel's hidey holes.  Yep, little tan bunny was laying there dead.  It either fell through the chickenwire floor of pen #2 or Angel pulled it through.  Just so happened that the day before Husbandman and a friend finished building our new 3-hole rabbit hutch.  We moved it into position and moved Mona and the 2 remaining babies into one of the holes.

So here they are in pen #3.  So cute and cuddley.  We named the brown one Thumper, but have no name for the black one yet.  One will be for Farmer Girl to show at the fair this year and the fate of the other is undecided.

But since we had 3 empty holes, we went hunting for meat rabbits.  I found nothing worthwhile on Craig's List and was bemoaning such to my friends at the hardware store.  They responded with, "Why not call Ms. ___?  She sells meat rabbits and her sign with her phone number is posted on the wall by the feed."  Sure enough, Ms. Rabbit herself lives about a mile away.  I went over and was highly impressed with her level of knowledge and all she can do on a typical city lot.  She gave me a great tutorial about rabbit health and sold me 2 New Zealand/Californian cross does.  They were born on May 25 and will be ready to breed when the weather cools.  We'll keep looking for a buck from a different gene pool with good breeding genetics.

This is Thumper looking so cute. Picture was taken this morning.  They are each a good handful-sized. 

Mona likes to snuggle with her little ones too.  I can see why.