Thursday 31 July 2008

Another Milestone

This is the second month in a row that I am able to fill up this blog on a daily basis. Looking back at all the post I cannot help but to realize that many things has happened throughout the past months.

Some are good experiences and some are bad. Some are recursive situations.

I pray that there will be many more good experiences in the next coming month. Just wanted to thank those that enjoy my blog and encouragements showed by many other bloggers and readers. I pray that this blog will continue to bear fruit for the good of our rabbits in general.

May all you have the best bunny experiences ever!

Thank you all for reading and I shall continue writing.

Wednesday 30 July 2008

Day 26: They are alright

Last night Little Bold did not look too good. So I gave her some water and just a little probiotics to help her out.

She was looking all droopy and depressed:

These photos are taken when I came home from work:

Dinner with the family

Diggin' In Part 1

Diggin' in Part 2 (Little Bold lying down in front)

Slurp Slurp....

Talking about taking advantage (Can you kits give me a break so that I could enjoy my hay?)

Mummy's it's really dark down here!

Guess who's down under?

Diggin almost IN it...

High level meditation. HummmmMmmmmm...

I am totally IN it!

I guess they are alright for now. Hope they will continue to thrive.

Tuesday 29 July 2008

We got an AWARD!!!

I am so happy to announce that Mrs. Sniffles has given Tru-Luv Rabbitry the BRILLANTE WEBLOG award in lieu with being an official HLRSC member. A great celebration gift indeed!

Thank you so very much for passing on the award to me. I am truly flattered!

And to pass on the tradition, I would love to pass the award to 7 of my favorite rabbit blogs:

1) Wooly World Rabbitry

2) 4 Kings Rabbitry

3) The Nature Trail Rabbitry Blog

4) Three Little Ladies Rabbitry Blog

5) Keep's Rabbitry Blog

6) My House Rabbit's Bunny Blog

7) Sunny Brook Rabbitry Blog

Now, all you have got to do is:

1) Put the logo on your blog.
2) Add a link to the person who awarded you.
3) Nominate at least 7 other blogs.
4) Add links to those blogs on yours.
5) Leave a message for your nominees on their blogs.

May the cyber bunny world expand to every ends of the earth!

Happy Hoppin's everyone!

E = Emergency

The kits has since started nibbling on BlueBerry's food. Since I have removed the nest box, I am using a big crock for the alfafa hay. These rascals will take turns to conquer the entire crock by going into it and munching on the alfafa hay.

I woke up this morning to find Little Bold sitting alone at a corner cleaning his vent area quite excessively. The thought of Enteritis dawned on me immediately amidst of being sleepy still. I checked on her vent area and found that it was a little wet. So I wiped it dry and went to work with a heavy heart. Her fur texture wasn't showing that she was in top condition. She didn't look too good.

I was expecting a dead kit when I rush home after work. But to my surprise, she was still pretty active and I hope it was not anything near Enteritis. I hope it was just my paranoia and sleepiness. Or better, I hope she was sleepy and did not look too active to begin with. LOL.

I am still keeping my fingers crossed. This is the exact situation that I dread breeding my rabbits. It is nerve wreaking needing to worry about the kits. That is why I usually keep my fingers crossed all the way till 8 weeks but still, thing can go wrong even after 8 weeks.

Just allow me to share the meaning of Enteritis or better known as Weanling Enteritis. It usually happens to kits at 4 weeks or older (especially during the weaning phase). What really happens is that, during the switch between the doe's milk to solid, an imbalance of the stomach flora happens because the delicate stomach of a kit cannot yet digest the solids fully and thus causes more build up of bad bacterias. With too much bad bacterias in the stomach, toxins soon start to increase and if the good bacterias are not able to reverse the situation, the kit will suffer a painful death.

I usually keep a tube of Probiotics like Bene-bac in case I am caught in such a situation. I will need to see how Little Bold progress from here. If she becomes lethargic, I may need to give her a little probiotics to help her out.

On the other hand, I have given Noobie her nest box to practice and she has indeed found a good use for it:

Monday 28 July 2008

Officially A HLRSC Member!

I am so happy to announce that Tru-Luv Rabbitry is a proud member of HLRSC (Holland Lop Rabbit Specialty Club)!

I finally received my membership card and also an Official Guidebook to the HOLLAND LOP breed.

Looking through the handbook is so interesting and at the same time made me felt really ashamed of some kennel club we have here in Malaysia. Although we're not comparing an apple to an apple, it is very obvious that our animal clubs here are way behind time. Just imagine this is just a Rabbit Specialty club specializing in just one breed - Holland Lop. They can come up with such a great guidebook whereas this kennel club that I mention cannot even come up with a decent guidebook when their club covers all the dog breeds under the Malaysia sun.

But who the hell cares about kennel clubs anyway, I love Holland Lops!

I cannot wait to receive the four issues of Hollander soon!

YeahoooOooooOoooooOoooo....gonna have sleepless nights going through every single page of the guidebook!

Love it! My appreciation goes out to Ms. Pandora Allen the secretary of HLRSC for looking into my application and getting it processed in a breeze. A big thumbs up to all the contributors of articles on the guidebook. Although I have not read it, at first glance the topics covered in the 200 pages are so relevant to the breed!

Sunday 27 July 2008

Day 23: A bunch of furballs

They are 3 weeks old this weekend and guess what I have to show?

PHOTOS!

Saturday 26 July 2008

Tails From Meadow Haven: Chapter 3 - House Rules

"Hey lagos, master's coming with something in his hands"


"This does not sound all that good"


"Wonder what it is that he wants from us this time"


"He is attaching something on the Water Curtain. There are something inscribed on it"


"Can you make anything out of it?"


"There are 5 lines of codes on it"


"What the lines say?"


"It says HOUSE RULES IN MEADOW HAVEN"


"Anything else?"


"Be patient will ya, I am trying to read with these WIDE ANGLE eyes. I am sure you will need sometime too"


"Alright, just take your time then"


"Number 1, NO RAPING"


"Meaning?"


"I think he meant to tell us that we should not be rapping, you know like those people that goes YO YO, UHUH UHUH and YEAH YEAH?"


"I guess master hates RAP music but that cannot be, I always hear him putting on some beaty music with all these people mumbling real quickly as if they are trying to catch a train"


"Were they able to catch one?"


"I really do not know, they sounded as if they are angry or something"


"Probably not then"


"What else is written, Skor?"


"Number 2, No Spraying"


"Number 3, Pee At One Spot Only"


"I have nothing to worry about that, I always do it at this corner"


"Yeah right...and it spill all over me down here"


"Oh my, I am sorry for that. Well, I still love this spot. It is my favourite spot because I get all the nice view while easing myself"


"Do warn me before you send the Golden Showers down alright?"


"I will"


"But I have got problem controlling my bladder & bowel mummy"


"I know that Holly Hope dear, kits are not meant to control their bladder and bowel so young. You take your time alright. Keep on trying there"


"Number 4, Do Not Waste Cecals"


"Now, that's a hard one. I get so grossed out shoving those soft smelly you know what into my mouth and sometimes I just cannot take it anymore. How are we gonna possibly do that?"


"Number 5, Love Your Kits"


"Is he mad or something? How can we possibly love our kits when we are meant to have tons of them? The best we could do is care for them to a certain point of time and we should be saying good bye. If we do not do that, it will disrupt the Circle Of Lives. Definitely no attachments for me!"


"Me too! Do not expect me to sit here all day without having some fun with the handsome one next door (literally)! I am all for the LUV! And, when I get so frustrated not having a buck, I will start biting and going mad. ArgghHhhh talking about a buck, I really need one now!"


"Calm down now everyone. I couldn't be bothered with these if I were you. Come on, they are not around most of the time to know what we are up. Just some crappy rules to follow. Try asking him to be us for once"


"Here they go again. Out the door as usual"

Friday 25 July 2008

Tails From Meadow Haven: Chapter 2.5

"Mummy! Mummy! Look what I have got"

"I can't see you my dear. I can hear you from here though"

"Mummy, can you just look over there, I can see you through this piece of upright water (humans call it glass panel)"

"Oh! Is that you? You have grown so much. And what have you got there in your mouth?"

"Master gave this to me yesterday. They are my chewing toys. I could still smell myself on them but this time, I just can't find the rope"

"Alright Alright, you go play with your toys then. Mummy has got lots to do"

"LOTS to do? Are you sure Noob? All I know is that we just sit and lie down here all day. I'll call that doing nothing if I were you!"

"Oh darn, you don't have to tell it out loud, I am just bored of her telling me about small kit toys. I have got one here which is blocking my way. What are they for, these colorful blocks (mind you, rabbits may be color blind)?"

"Holly Hope just said it, they are chewing blocks!"

"Sigh"

"What's the sigh for Latara?"

"Told ya we're heading for doom. I just felt that this is NOT us! We aren't meant to be here!"

"There she goes again..."

"Really there is a greater place out there. I am not sure about you guys but I have got this innate feeling that we are not meant to be here. We are meant to be....to be....Fhhhh.....Fhrrr......Frrrrr......Free! Yeah, that's the word!"

"What does free means?"

"It means we have bigger space to run and to meet others when we need to"

"How can you prove the existence of FREE?"

"You see, I was out with master the other day and they had this huge piece of light. I saw this lion and his friends, if I remember correctly, one of them was a giraffe. They made a pact to get out of this small place that they were confined in. They ended up in this place called MegaGasCar"

"Bah! Mega Gas what?"

"MegaaaAaa GasssSss CarrrRRRr!"

"You mean that thing that gives a loud fart!?"

"HAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA"

"Mummy I want to go Mega Gassy Car!! Sounds fun!"

"Hey Skor, master's back do your thing!"

"HUSH!"

STOMP STOMP STOMP

Thursday 24 July 2008

Holly Hope: Up Close & Personal

Holly Hope is 3 months and 1 week old today. She allows me to pick her up and enjoys her freedom in the living room. I love to see her dashing around the living room and the camera just cannot capture what my eyes perceive. But anyhow here are some candid shots I took of her.

Tails From Meadow Haven: Chapter 2

“Psst, what can you see from where you are?”

“Nothing. I just heard the usual noise. It sounds like as if someone’s gnawing a tree buck underground (The sound of a key in a keyhole). Just a little milder version”

“Oh no, here comes the dark floaties. The humans are always behind those dark floaties. One, Two, Three, see I told ya”

“That is master’s wife holding that baby again. I wonder why they bring her in and out every single day. Can’t they just stay put here”

“I prefer them not being around. It makes me feel so nervous”

“Mummy, their kit loves me. It pats me and hugs me whenever master let me out”

“You sure it was not the other way around?”

“ShhHhhhh….quiet!”

“Here he comes! Here he comes!”

“Stay still BlueBerry!”

“Here comes those tentacles!”

“No sudden movements BlueBerry!”

“I am gonna strike those tentacles if they come any closer. They are kidnaping one of my babies!”

“Oh dear…”

“They are back again and my baby is safe”

“You are over reacting. He is just checking out the kits”

“Alright now, he’s gone”

~~ After 10 Bunny Hours (10 minutes in human understanding) ~~

“You guys smell that?”

“Yeah, sweet aroma of fresh vegetables”

“Take a guess what’s for dinner”

“Celery!”

“Bok Choy!”

“Carrots!”

“And here he comes again”

“WHAT!? Not those darn pellets again. My throat is so sore eating those darn hard pieces of crap. My jaws are tired from chewing!”

“There goes your hallucination of having a Vege Feast!”

“I just have to stick with these Western Timothy Hay then”

~ To be continue (master needs to get back to work) ~

Wednesday 23 July 2008

Day 19: Disapproving Faces

Their faces tell it all:

Little SHY One

Little BOLD One

Little PURE One

Little COOL One

Tails From Meadow Haven: Introduction

Tails From Meadow Haven is my latest attempt to write a series of short stories based on the lives of my rabbits. It will evolve around the lives of the main casts - Skor, Noobie, BlueBerry, Latara & Holly Hope.

The fun part is to get my readers guessing who’s who in the dialogues. And I find it very interesting to include some humor by describing the way our domesticated pets live as compared to their wild ancestors.

Hope you enjoy my articulate descriptions on what's life being behind those wires!

Tuesday 22 July 2008

Tails From Meadow Haven: Chapter 1

"Hush, I heard something!"

"Come on BlueBerry, you're at it again!"

"No seriously, I thought I heard something. You know I am quite paranoid especially with these kits around. They are just so precious and I cannot possibly loose any of them"

"Don't you worry, we'll be looking out for any intruder coming your way. Just stay alert and hear out for the stomp"

"Thanks guys. By the way, how do you guys look like? I could only remember before the Season of Great Thunder, I was placed with this handsome black buck. Can't remember his name but we had a lot of fun together. Then the Season of Great Thunder came and I could feel that I was floating quite high up. It lasted for quite sometime"

"Was it you that was beside me on the other compartment?"

"I guess so, I was not really in the mood of chatting because I was trying very hard to stay comfortable with kits inside me"

"I was doing the same too"

"The Great Thunder went away for a while and I could see people walking all around being real busy. For a short period of time before the Great Thunder returned, I could hear people talking in foreign language. It wasn't like the language Christina and our master speak. Somehow different"

"If I remember correctly, the Great Thunder brought us to a place called Japan"

"Oh yeah, that was what I heard too"

"I kindled not too long after the Season of Great Thunder. I had 6 kits and only 1 survived"

"Oh dear. I had 4 and only one survived for a short while. But I met this really handsome black & white buck last month and these kits I am having now is his"

"Hmmm, black & white? That sounds like me"

"I met this black & white buck over a week ago and he was great. We got the job done in just a little below 5 minutes"

"Hey gals, I think you're talking about me. I met this beautiful blue doe a month or there about. And recently this broken chocolate chick was so good. Geez, that black & white buck is ME! I am the super alpha buck, RoarrRrrrrgggHHhh. I guess not anymore since I just can't get this fur coat out of me. I am feeling rather warm and master kept on combing me lately. I hate fur getting stuck between my teeth. Thank God for master, he helps me out a little"

"I like that chocolate buck more actually. I really do miss him sometimes. He gave me Holly Hope, that's what master calls her. I can still hear her sometimes"

"Mummy, I am here!"

"Holly Hope, is that really you? Oh dear, I am hearing things again"

"No mummy, I am here. Up here!"

"Goodness, I thought I'll never hear from you again. Where did master take you"

"I can hear you too mummy. Master took me to this higher place. It is really cool up here. The breeze is amazing and scenery is fantastic"

"Ouch! Watch it! If you kits are not careful mummy may get mastitis. Go easy suckling alright?"

"I am bored"

"Who's that?"

"I miss my mummy"

"Come on grow up will ya, Latara"

"Master says I spray a lot when we first came here. So he placed me way down here with no view. All I could see are these walls"

"This is the prestigious Meadow Haven! A lot of our kind could only dream to be here. Count your blessings alright?"

"I heard that our ancestors have fields to run and land to burrow. What prestige is there here?"

"Don't you believe in those mother goose tales. They are just make beliefs. We are so comfortable here. I do not know about you but I have tasty Western Timothy Hay every single day!"

"And I have got this colorful teething toy dangling from the top of my quarters"

"Me too!"

"Master took mine away. I was chewing the rope away and the colorful parts just fell off"

"Hush! Someone's coming"

STOMP STOMP STOMP

Monday 21 July 2008

Heart Bunny?

If you keep multiple rabbits, I am sure you would agree with me that there sure to be one super favorite among the herd. My all time favorite is still Skor but he is molting at the moment so I am not giving him too much cuddles (I will die inhaling those fur). I can only spend time combing those loose fur out. Collected a bucketful today.

BlueBerry's too pre-occupied with her kits at the moment so I am leaving her alone.

Noobie is busy being pregnant but she gets some pats from me everyday. She is as sweet as ever!

I must admit, Latara is the most neglected bunny at the moment. LOL! No physical abuse or anything just that she dun really like me touching her. That's her behavior since young. She is high strung and does not like cuddles. I guess she has got more testosterones than progesterones (since she is the only doe that sprays). She is a little Tom Boyish. She does get her free run in the kitchen like the rest.

So I turned my attention to Holly Hope. I wanted to make her a full house bunny without the spaying but it is quite difficult to have fur and bunny poop around the house when you have a toddler around picking up every little thing that is in her path. There goes my intention of having a house bunny! LOL. Nonetheless when everyone's in bed, I brought her into he living room and guess what!? She loves exploring the entire place!

The amazing things about Holly Hope is that, she is somehow very attached to me. I believe it was because I handled her so much since the day she was born, so much so that she sort of recognize me and is not afraid of me.

As for the title of this post, after reading through everything I have wrote so far, you must be thinking that Holly Hope is thus far my favorite?

You are wrong! I love all my bunnies the same! LOL!

And I am just so happy that I actually have more time to spend with them now as compared to previously when I only had the time to clean the cages.

Day 17: 80% Sleeping

Kits usually spend most of their time taking naps. Therefore, most of the time you will see them in this position:

Sunday 20 July 2008

Day 16: Three Butts & A Head

Caught some moments of the kits having their afternoon nap. They are just so adorable at this stage. I have taken out their nest box because they do not go in there anymore. They have found their freedom since the day they saw the world.

A video to go with this post:


Saturday 19 July 2008

Day 15: They finally turn bluish

Now I can see that they are turning blue. LOL!

And for once, I am able to recognize young kits! Prior to this, I realize it took me quite long to get into my mind the differences between kits from my previous litters. This time I have no problem remember each and everyone of them because of their patterns!

Here's the darling of the litter. It's the smallest compared to the other 3. How I recognize this one? The full colored ears.



This the little one which is darker than the rest. The color remained darker than the rest so I can spot this one right away.



The other two is almost similar. Their white ears make them look so super cute. One of them have more white on its face.




Very cute little fellows. I just cannot resist not taking any photos of them. They look so different every single day!