Had a NZ White male when I was 3 years old!!
by Elaine M. Hasenkamp
(Lindsay, CA - just 63 miles N of Bakersfield, CA)
When I was about 3 or 4 years old, now I am almost 60, I had a New Zealand White male as a pet. I named him "Billy" but of course, at that stage in my life, every pet was named "Billy!!" The dog, a beef steer, etc. I would put my rabbit in a clutch purse that my mother gave to me. He didn't flinch when I put him in it and zippered him in. I would play for hours with him. Mom and Dad sold him, because they got out of the rabbit business and went into the puppy business.
I also had a NZ white female that I got, back in 1994. She had one litter of kits for me, but none of them lived. So, I traded her for a cat, which was even sillier than the rabbit.
This rabbit - named Sissy, was kept in the house, and she mentally adopted one of our male cats, who was almost grown. She would eat with him, lay around him, and she just loved him, for some reason. He would get on my bed, and here she would come, jumping up on the bed, to be near him. A lot of times, he looked like he was saying, "Help me!!"
I don't know if breeding her to a Silver Satin-Cottontail cross male rabbit caused the kits to die, but I know that this female wasn't a good mother. But, she was a lovely pet. I didn't want to birth any more babies, so I gave her up to a lady who wanted to get rid of a cat. My daughter was the cat lover of the family, and I was the bunny lover. Still am. You have a wonderful website, and I have learned a lot. I knew that there was NZ whites and blacks, but not the reds. See, at almost 60, I learned something new!!!
Thanks for the great website, and I have saved your website in my favorites.
***** Karen Sez *****Great story! Glad you like our site.
I'm very curious about the Satin-cottontail cross male rabbit you mention, as I was under the belief that cottontails and domestic rabbits could not interbreed successfully. Was the cottontail a new-world wild rabbit or simply another domestic rabbit?? Do you know?