Understanding Rabbit Breeds in Choosing Your First Bunny

As rabbits come in a variety of breeds, colours and sizes, you should understand more about rabbit breeds in choosing your first bunny. It is not easy to correctly identify a rabbit breed. Even professionals make mistakes sometimes.

Note that not all pet stores sell pure breed rabbit. If you are really serious about getting a pure breed rabbit, then you should go to rabbit breeder. However, in view that there are so many rabbits in rabbit shelter that need a home, why not start there first.



Bigger rabbit breed actually makes better pet rabbit for smaller children. Rabbits have very fragile skeletal and an active child may easily injure the rabbit. On the other extreme, you would not want a giant rabbit breed as they may take up too much space.

There may be near to 100 rabbit breeds in the world but the American Rabbit Breeders Association only recognised about 45 rabbit breeds. Among some of the rabbit breeds recognised by the Association is presented below.

For the small rabbit breed weighing from 2 to 6 lbs, the Association recognised the following rabbit breeds: American Fuzzy Lop, Britannia Petite, Dutch, Dwarf Hotot, Florida White, Havana, Himilayan, Holland Lop, Jersey Wolly, Mini Lop, Mini Rex, Netherland Dwarf, Silver and Tan.

The descriptions of some of the more popular small rabbit breeds are as follows:

American Fuzzy Lop American Fuzzy Lop weighs from 3.5 to 4 lbs (1.6 to 1.8 kg). They have a variety of coat colours. They have compact muscular body, dense and coarse coat. Just like other lop-ear rabbit, their ears folded over to slightly below the jaw.

Dutch The Dutch rabbit breed is a fancy rabbit breeds weighing up to 5lbs. Breeders are always trying to breed perfectly marked examples. Miss-marked bunnies are always available and make excellent pet rabbits. The Dutch rabbit breeds come in various colours, black, blue, chocolate, yellow, tortoiseshell, steel grey, brown grey and pale grey.

Jersey Wolly The Jersey Wolly rabbit breed weighs under 3.5 lbs (1.6 kg). They come in a wide variety of colours and have long woolly coat. They are also known as the Dwarf Angora.

Netherland Dwarf This rabbit breed weighs under 2.5 lbs (1.1 kg). They were introduced into the UK in 1950. They are bad tempered, especially among bucks (male adult rabbits). However, the adult dwarf doe (female rabbits) are very docile and can make wonderful pet rabbits. They have short ears and are bred in a wide variety of colours and patterns.

For medium-size rabbit breeds that weigh from 6 to 9 lbs, the Association recognise the following rabbit breeds: Alaskan, Angora, Argente, Belgian Hare, English Spot, Harlequin, Lilac, Rex, Rhinelander, Satin Angora, Silver Marten and the Standard Chinchilla

The descriptions of some of the more popular medium rabbit breeds are as follows:

Angora

The Angora rabbit breed is one of the oldest breeds of rabbit. They are thought to have originated in Turkey hundreds of years ago and were initially breed for their wool. There are four types of Angora: English angora

5-7 lbs (2.3-3.2 kgs)

long silky hair; the French angora

7.5-10.5 lbs (3.4-4.8 kg); the Giant Angora

8.5 lbs (3.9 kg) and up

soft fine undercoat (wool), straight stiff guard hairs, and a wavy fluff with a guard tip in-between; and the Satin Angora

6.5-9.5 lbs (3-4.3 kg)

very fine wool.

The English Angora is adorned growths of wool on the tips of the ears and front feet that are known as "furnishings". They have rich ruby red eyes.



English Spot The English Spot breeds weigh from 5 to 8 lbs (2.3 to 3.6 kg). They come in white with black, blue, brown, gold, grey, lilac or tortoise colour. They have butterfly mark on the nose, colored ears, eye rings, spine marking (which is herringboned) and a spot on the cheek and a chain of spots along the body. They have long arched body like a hare.



Rex The Rex rabbit breeds weigh from 7.5 to 10.5 lbs (3.4 to 4.8 kg). All the Rex rabbit breeds are of the same type - a graceful rabbit gently sloping up to well rounded hindquarters. They are good nature rabbits and make excellent pets. They come in colours of black, black otter, blue, broken group, californian, castor, chinchilla, chocolate, lilac, lynx, opal, red, sable, seal or white.

For the large rabbit breed, the Association recognised the following rabbit breeds: American Sable, American Chinchilla, Chinchilla, Beveren, Californian, Cinnamon, English Lop, Hotot, New Zealand, Palomino, Satin and the Silver Fox.

For the giant-size rabbit breed weighing over 11 lbs, the Association recognised the following rabbit breeds: American Checkered Giant, Flemish Giant (Patagonian), French Lop, Giant Chinchilla and the Giant Papillon.





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Thinking of Choosing Rabbit as Pets

I was often asked the questions of how we decided to keep rabbits as pets. My wife had all along wanted a pet, and one day while waiting for the traffic light to turn green, I noticed a big rabbit poster outside a pet shop. I then thought, why not?





There were a lot of things that we did not know though about rabbits when I thought to get one. For example, I did not know that pet rabbit can be litter-trained. We did not know that they respond to names when being called. We did not know that they always try to outsmart us. I did not know that pet rabbit need lots of attention. I did not know that they shed off a lot of fur. I did not know that pet rabbit has temper and easily get offended by the most trivial remarks.

Anyway, it is far too late to go back since I am now the human dad to 3 rabbits, not just one. During then, I was certainly not aware of the heavy responsibility of keeping a pet rabbit. I have thought that I could just keep the rabbit at the balcony and it would be fun to see a little bunny hopping around the balcony to keep myself amused. Ah, how wrong I was!



I have first met Barney (the name that we gave to our rabbit) on 31 January 2004. Me and my wife decided to drop-by at the pet shop near to our house to enquire if the shop sells any rabbit. And there he was looking at us, pleading for us to bring him home. He was with another of his sibling. He somewhat looks disappointed when after talking to the shop owner, we decided to leave without him.

The next morning, me and my wife returned to the pet shop. I guessed perhaps his sad look must have touched our heart. We have finally decided to have rabbit for pet. First, we bought the cage, drinking bottle and the dish bowl. Then came the choosing time. My wife had wanted a more active rabbit. It happens that Barney was very alert and his sibling was sleeping at that time. He was chosen immediately by my wife. I remembered he nibbing her finger as he was just too scared to be separated from his sibling.

After buying some rabbit pellets, a toy ball, comb and nail clipper, we were ready to bring him home. His cage was placed at the balcony. Fearing that it would be very hot during the afternoon, we had decided to cover the cage with some hard board and towel. We also gave him some towel to sleep with at night. We believed that for the first time for quite a while, he was being fed adequately. He seems to feel embarrassed to be stared at for the whole day.

Then came the night, and they were many friends who drop-by the house. He looked scared. It was a good thing that I and had prohibited anyone lifting him away from the cage. We had done some research on rabbit and decided that he should be introduced to the human family environment gradually.

Two days later, we decided that it was time for the rabbit to explore the world outside his cage. With much persuasion and effort, he was tempted to leave his cage for food. We hid some pellets inside the plastic ball that we bought him, and he began to push the ball with his nose. As the ball rolls, pellets would fall out from the ball, and he got his treat. Next, is the exercise to enhance his smell sense. Of course, rabbits have strong sense of smell! We held some food in one of our hands and asked him to guess which hand. He played along. Of course he could get it right all the times, but we guessed he decided to amuse us a little by picking the wrong hand occasionally.

That was how we build my trust with him. As the trust deepens, he was more brave to explore more places in the house. He was not toilet-trained yet. I decided that it was not the right time yet, and fenced up the balcony with plastic removable fence. Without much effort, he had been able to push away the plastic fence and hop into the living room!

Next, we decided to tie the fence to the metal grill of the balcony. What a big surprise it was for us when we found that he was in the living room again! Perhaps we have forgotten that rabbit have very sharp teeth. He had bitten off the string that ties the fence. See, I told you that rabbits are smart animals, haven't I?

We finally decided that it is not possible to keep him out at the balcony and agreed to him coming into the house, but being monitored closely. That was the beginning of the rabbit campaign to conquer the human world.



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