May newsletter part 2 the rabbit side of 'The Warren' household :)

As usual cannot just have a quiet month at The Warren lol...you name it and it seems to happen, animals, people, weather etc. etc :)
So where to start?
Both of us are fine...well just about, Kim and myself decided to watch our health and fitness a little while ago to the point we had someone come over 1 hour a week to help Kim with her fitness and back and me to help with stamina and posture. This has been good except halfway through May she did her back in then when it sorted itself out it went again during the keepfit so we have put the fitness regime on hold for the moment.
Animal wise its been very busy as we went to a few rabbit shows which were fun the 1st was at the Essex Champs

always a show we have supported in the past. This time it was at a different venue which unfortunetly was smaller and a little cramped but still it was a good show, Kim chatted to lots of past friends

what was interesting about this show was that we had some german judges come over and did some judging to the euro standard and obviously saw our rabbits a lot differently in fact put up more of the rare breeds than the standard breeds with sallanders winning best pair and a swiss fox going best in show. The following week we went to the southern champs which was partly to see the show

but it was a nice excuse for Kim to see how the choc tort lops had advanced in type as seen above with a stunning mini of Stephanie Chambers :)

We hung around to see the end of the show but the main reason for going to the show was for me to pick up a stud of rare breed rabbits. I was contemplating starting with a new breed of rabbit and was seriously thinking of the deilenaar but saw an advert of a breeder forced to give up all her animals including a stud of Glolden Glavcots...knowing there were only 3 breeders in the country with these rabbits I did not want to see them lost so arranged to take the rabbits off the breeders hands. They are a lovely breed, delicate in bone timid yet friendly nature looking very similair to wild rabbits.

one litter even had a fostered english lop

I've also got a real character of a buck that came with the stud, a siberian which is used to help keep the colour within the breed

everyone has fallen in love with his personality one i will be keeping for a very long time his coat is lovely for a fur breed and his 5 years old :) other new additions include some Hulstlanders which i got from Harry Arnold and Trina Cook

These are a breed a did a long time back and are basically a blue eyed white rabbit

Lastly another breed of rabbit we did a long time ago...Hemp a perlfee from Botany stud :)

 Ok with so many pictures i am finishing this particular blog but I still have other pieces of information to add so i will make up a 3rd blog of the last few items....swarms....hutches and bad bee's lol so until then have a good week guys :)

What a month :)

I Know its May and the April newsletter has not been published...but this is a belated April one lol :) so let see whats April been like...wet and windy with the odd sunny day thrown in....the bee's have hated it. The bee's should be getting quite busy this time of year which judging by the activity down at the hives is an under statement lol. Anyway with the Rape starting to flower we started to panic a bit as we have no honey extractor, jars etc. luckily we got a hand spinning 4 frame extractor and Kim ordered the jars. Last weekend we decided to take some frames out and set the rest up ready for the rape honey as its not a great honey to work with as it sets very hard and very quickly. Since we took out the frames and put clean ones in, it has not stopped raining!!! which stops the bees going out and foraging, so any time the rain stops its a mass exodus lol

We need to do a brood check to be honest and we are leaving it later and later but with the weather its not getting to be easy :( anyway we decided to have a practise at honey extraction and soon got our extractor

its a nifty machine as it has a filter and settling tank fitted below it which saves a lot of time :)
the comb caps are removed and the wax caps and honey left on a heated ban marie

the heated wax and honey mix together then pour out into a bucket then once cooled the wax is taken off as a complete piece as it cools on the surface of the honey

the combs are put in the extactor and spun very fast so that the honey spins out

the empty combs are then stored for the bee's to clean and the wax to be extracted to sell or melt down :) It was a good practise run for us as its the 1st time we have done this so once we know its ok we can jar it up and start giving out.
Lets see what else has happened this month...oh yes the rabbits :) well the hutches went into the shed ok

which has had all of our old stock of mini lops put in plus some new stock from a very close friend and mentor Daren Morris and also a couple of rabbits from Cara and her daughter Charlotte. Kim has a new project up and running so is hoping to start a harliequin programme up in the shed with some babies already having been born :) this one being Kims favourite at the moment lol

well we have caught the bug again lol and i have started back up in the Rare Varieties again, Karon Malcolm (another very close friend tried to pursaude me to start up with dielenaars which initially i said yes to...in the mean time i aquired 2 of an old breed i used to keep having gone up to Bury St Edmunds to meet Harry Arnold of Rarity Stud....2 lovely does later :)

Now up until last week i was sure i would be having deilenaars  except i saw a plea for help on the Rare Varieties Rabbit Club facebook page for someone having to give up all her rabbits including an entire stud of Golden Glavcots....which i found very hard not to help out by getting the entire stud (5 adults and 3 babies) i even have a perlfee winging its way to me by the end of the month lol. So thats it i think for the month :) whoops no...one more piece of newsas you already know our other son Chris and his partner Gemma are expecting their 1st child...the lovely bit of news is the scan showed its a girl and they are naming her Skye....lovely :) so thats it people lets see what the month of May brings....more honey...more rabbits and hopefully warm weather l8rs my friends.