Daily Archives: July 22, 2009

A candle for Hans

I am in a total shock at the moment. One of my dearest bunny friends lost one of her rabbits today. Many have known Hans of furrybutts.wordpress.com and I am lost for words to learn that he left us yesterday.

My heartfelt condolences to both SB and her husband. Hope they will be able to move on. I truly understand how hard it is to loose one of your precious.

Binky free little Hans. I am sure Luna and Latara will be opening up the gates at Rainbow Bridge for you. You will be truly missed!

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Lineage Tracing

I spend most of my free time tracing back Holland Lop lineages of breeders I admire and have high regards for. Most of the time, I literally drool over rabbit photos on their websites. So here I am again trying to figure out who’s who in my rabbits. LOL!

Some of these photos I am sharing does not belong to me nor have I asked the permission to use them. I would like to apologize if any of the photo owners are offended. Please let me know so that I can remove them without question. But I do hope the owners to these photos do not mind me using them. I will put a note at the bottom of the photos specifying the websites I have taken them from. I would like to thank Todd Naragon & Scott Rodriguez for some of the photos featured in this post. They were very kind to allow me to take photos off their websites.

When I first started out researching on Holland Lops, I came across many websites and some of which are breeders who have quit raising rabbits altogether. The two breeders that have carved a very deep impression on my mind about Holland Lops are:

1) Belokonny – Dr. Mark (wife Sarah) & David Belokonny

2) Pitney – Sarah & Dan Pitney

These 2 Holland Lop breeders have made a huge impact on most of the lineages we have today. Sadly, both rabbitries no longer exist but their stocks are all over the US. To be able to get hold of the descendants of their lines is a really huge honor. And owning them would be like my wildest dream come true. I am very proud and happy to say that I do own descendants of their lines of Holland Lops. I really have got Scott Rodriguez to thank (again!) for making this a dream come true.

Tracing back both Thunder and Haley’s lineage, I could find some familiar names and I am grateful to even put faces to these names.

Some of the names behind Thunder:

Troy Boy (Thunder's sire) - Photo taken from www.ivycrescenthollands.com

Thunder's sire - Photo taken from http://www.ivycrescenthollands.com

Thunder's Grand Dam - Photo taken from www.ivycrescenthollands.com

Thunder's Grand Dam - Photo taken from http://www.ivycrescenthollands.com

Sarah's Isabelly (Thunder's Great Grand Dam) - Photo taken from http://www.geocities.com/pitneyhollandlops/

Sarah's Isabelle (Thunder's Great Grand Dam) - Photo taken from http://www.geocities.com/pitneyhollandlops/

Naragon's Anubis (Thunder's Great Grand Sire) - Photo taken from http://www.angelfire.com/in4/naragon/

Naragon's Anubis (Thunder's Great Grand Sire) - Photo taken from http://www.angelfire.com/in4/naragon/

Thunder's Great Grand Dam - Photo taken from www.ivycrescenthollands.com

Thunder's Great Grand Dam - Photo taken from http://www.ivycrescenthollands.com

Some of the names behind Haley:

Sarah's Lewis (Haley's Great Grand Sire) 2004 ARBA Convention 1st BSB - Photo taken from http://www.geocities.com/pitneyhollandlops/

Sarah's Lewis (Haley's Great Grand Sire) 2004 ARBA Convention 1st BSB - Photo taken from http://www.geocities.com/pitneyhollandlops/

Haley's Dam - Photo taken from www.ivycrescenthollands.com

Haley's Dam - Photo taken from http://www.ivycrescenthollands.com

Haley's Great Grand Sire - Photo taken from www.ivycrescenthollands.com

Haley's Great Grand Sire - Photo taken from http://www.ivycrescenthollands.com

Looking back at all these photos and lineages, I am compelled to write this post in celebration and to take my hats off these breeders that have developed the Holland Lops we have today. We continue to thank those that has left this wonderful hobby and yet have their legacy continued by those who are working with the descendants of their rabbits. I also would also like to dedicate this post to all those still going strong in their chase for perfection for all the hard work they have done and still striving tirelessly.

A few names I would love to mention with their websites included. I know that I will definitely miss out a lot of breeders, please forgive me but here are just a few more Holland Lop “heavy weights” that I would like to mention besides from Scott Rodriguez (Ivy Crescent Hollands) & Todd Naragon (Naragon’s Holland Lops) as mentioned above and no offense intended to those not mentioned here (I will feature more breeders individually):

1) L.O.V. Bunnies Rabbitry – Ardis Hartwig & Tim Waddell

2) BunnyLand USA – Becky & Allan Ormond

3) Critter Co*op Rabbitry – Chris Zemny

4) THF Saynora – Tracy Lukeman & Jenna Buchenauer

Celebrate LIFE, Celebrate the Holland Lop!

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Definition of a Breeder

I love the way the free online dictionary Wikipedia.org describes the word Breeder.

A breeder is a person who practices the vocation of mating carefully selected specimens of the same breed to reproduce specific, consistently replicable qualities and characteristics.

This might be as a farmer, agriculturalist, or hobbyist, and can be practiced on a large or small scale, for food, fun, or profit.

And it further described Hobbyist as:

A person who is interested in a subject or an activity as a hobby

And it further described Hobby as:

A hobby is a spare-time recreational pursuit

That is exactly what I would like to be referred to maybe minus the profit part on the definition of breeder. Time and time again, I strongly believe that for me, passion outweighs profit anytime. The word profit only means cost cutting in my opinion. Cost cutting ultimately equates to suffering animals.

Profit or fun aside, let’s bring ourselves back to the subject matter. What a breeder means to me?

Not too far in the distant past, breeders are people who consciously put 2 animals of opposite gender together with the intention to produce more. That was about all what a breeder’s role is. Produce more, sell more and earn more. Today I am proud that there is an awareness sweeping across the face of the earth. People are starting to realize that beside from just producing more, they should also produce healthy and good stocks.

Not only breeders are called to produce healthy and good stocks but they now have an even more important role to play. Which is to disseminate crucial information. There are of course breeders from the dark ages still mingling around lurking to pounce on innocent preys caught unaware and off guard. They tend to play with their words and tell of the many lies to get their stock sold.

Some breeders have no qualms passing around genetically challenged stocks, sick animals which causes an outbreak at a fellow breeder’s location and the list goes on. Whatever it is, truth shall always prevail.

So you see, what I am trying to say is that, indeed a breeder is someone that puts two animals together to produce more but there are many more that meets the eye. And the point however I twist and go round the bushes with my words, a breeder remains a breeder whether they are good or bad in our own definitions and expectations.

You do not call a person who puts 2 rabbits of opposite gender together a rabbit PIMP. You call him/her a breeder. Again, not a rabbit PIMP but a BREEDER.

And by all standards, when you breed 2 rabbits of the opposite gender and these 2 rabbits are bought from someone else, the offspring will be considered of your breeding.

The reason for that is that these 2 rabbits did not open the latches to their cage doors and came together to have a jolly good time. No, the breeder will open up the doe’s cage door, pick her up gently and put her into the buck’s cage (after opening the door that is).

So you tell me, in that act of a human being opening the door and placing a female rabbit into a cage where a male rabbit is, what would this action be called?

We in the rabbit world calls it breeding rabbits. And the breeding is done by? The breeder of course! DuHHHhhhHHHhhhhhhHHHhhh…..

If you have been in the rabbit world long enough, you will hear breeders saying, “I am breeding rabbits”.

That means they are deliberately putting together 2 rabbits of their liking and in their best ability judged to be a good match. No breeder with the right frame of mind would say that they own offspring of 2 rabbits not owned by them and are bred by their rightful owner. To say that is totally utter nonsense and outrageous!

In the case of rabbit shows, if someone wins with rabbits bred from my stocks that I have sold him/her earlier. I would be proud that they did well with my stocks. But I could never and should never take credit for those rabbits that won. For it was the good judgment of the winner that he/she bred the rabbits I sold him/her that produced these winning specimens.

Basically, I cannot say that the tallest building in the world is built by me. PERIOD!

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