I am so thankful for today's results at the rabbit show in Monroe! 

I still don't think it's completely sunk in yet. But as I'm typing this, I'm so amazed at the results and comments and I had so much fun talking to friends. 

The trio of young juniors, who were all blowing their coats did good. Holly's Missy got 1st place in two of the shows and 2nd place, behind her sister Beth, in one of them. Holly's Beth got 1st place in one show and 2nd place in the other two, behind her sister Missy. Holly's Glenn got third and last place in all three shows but that's okay. The judges had good comments and he's still just a baby. 

The numbers were small today, which is sad for the class winners since they don't get a leg. Youth shows are often small in WA unfortunately, we need more youth breeders around here!!

Holly's Butterfly and Holly's Clementine were the does I was most excited about. Clementine and her crazy ears were promising, but I wasn't hoping for too much because of her ears. She was DQ'ed in the first show because they stood straight up. In the second and third shows, the judge posed her and let her relax before evaluating her ears, and she got 1st place out of 2. 
I was really hopeful Butterfly would do well, but tried to keep my expectations low because I didn't want to get disappointed. 

I wasn't disappointed. 

There were a lot of amazing rabbits there today in youth. During the first show I was sure the highest placement she would get would be 1st. Nope, Butterfly had her sights set on something bigger. I was over the moon when the judge, Cliff Dick, announced that she was Best Opposite of Variety. Then when I heard him announce best opposite of breed - "The broken doe" - I was astonished!

In the second show, Holland Lop specialty, Butterfly got BEST OF BREED. It still hasn't quite sunk in yet, but her pretty ribbon reminds me that it really happened - and it wasn't a dream. This is only my second time getting a placement this noteworthy. The first time was with a junior, Holly's Saige, who is Butterfly's aunt. 

In the final show, Butterfly didn't do AS well, but still got a leg with Best Opposite Sex Variety. 

Butterfly is the fourth generation of Holly's Hollands line on her mom's side. I couldn't be happier with where my line is going. Butterfly won 3 legs today which puts her total up to 4. The perfect time to breed her again and expand my herd. This is the first time I've done so well in a show so consistently. What a great day. I feel so blessed and thankful for this. 

​Thank you so much to anyone who helped me out with my rabbits in any way. Whether you gave me a constructive comment on a rabbit, sold me my foundation stock, or congratulated me, I thank you. I wouldn't be breeding rabbits if it weren't for you - the amazing people and friends this hobby so much more fun and enjoyable. 

At the show, I also bought a new 4-hole carrier for all the rabbits I plan on showing this summer and fall. I also bought some new crocks for the carriers. I bought a few tickets for the raffle to support an ARBA youth club, and surprisingly, I won a J-feeder! I have been needing more J-feeders so that's exciting!

I hope you guys enjoyed seeing a little bit of how my day went. See you next time :) 

~Holly

Okay, get prepared....this is a long one. 

I had so much fun at the WSHLRC Cluster show yesterday! What a great day! In the first show, both Wicket and Butterfly got second place in their very large classes, under judge Allen Mesick.

In the second show, with judge Jenny Poprawski, I table wrote. In this show, Wicket only got 5th place out of 7, but the rabbits above him had awesome bone and massive heads so it was totally understandable. In Butterfly's class, BJD, she got 1st place out of 6 and then went on to score BOSV!!!!! She gets her first leg at only 15 weeks old! I kind of in shock when it happened, because since I was table writing I didn't see it coming! 

What is BOSV (feel free to skip this part if you already know)?

After a rabbit has won its class, it stays on the table to compete for  Best of Variety and Best of Breed, with all the other rabbits of that breed that got first in their classes. 

Varieties are judges within the solid or broken pattern. Since there are 8 classes, there will be 8 class winners. 4 of these class winners will be solid and the other 4 will be broken. The judge chooses one out of the solids to be Best Solid, which Best of Variety, and then the runner-up to the Best Solid is the Best Opposite Sex Variety. Two of the same sex cannot win BOV and BOSV. If the BOV is a buck, the BOSV is a doe. This was the case with Butterfly in the broken category. 

THEN, (wait, there's more!), the BOVs and BOSVs (there are now 4, two for each categories - broken and solid), compete for BOB and BOSB. Best of Breed is the best rabbit on the table, within that breed. Best Opposite Sex Breed is the runner-up to BOB, and is of the opposite sex. 
Butterfly didn't make it that far, which is perfectly fine with me! She did so well for her second show!

Ok, back to the show news....sadly we were unable to participate in the third and final show, because my cousin's 17th birthday party was that afternoon and it was over an hour away. 

Over lunch, around noon, there was a rabbit auction to raise funds for the WSHLRC. They hold one at this show every year. A lot of amazing rabbits were donated by lots of amazing breeders. 

From the auction I got a fantastic new buck!!! SURPRISE!!!! He's opal! He can produce colors like chinchilla, other opals, squirrel, maybe even blue....I'm going to have some amazing colors in the agouti program I am finally starting up! He has great short bone which my herd needs, and a nice body! His head isn't very good but he's in a crazy molt right now it probably looks worse because of that. His name is Bramblehedge's Typhoon, but around here he's going to be fondly called Ty: 

I got Ty for such a deal, because he was the first Holland to go up for auction and everyone was waiting for the does that wouldn't be displayed until closer to the end of the auction. Lots of people have too many bucks right now and not enough does, so they didn't want another buck. Some of these does went for $390 and $375!!!! These were some super nice does too! This is so much money for our club! We're all really pleased at the turnout. 

Ty is proven and registered, and he has two legs. He is almost exactly a year old (in August), and he is related to L&R's McMolly, who is a famous rabbit that won a Convention show in recent years!

What I find pretty interesting too is that he shares a lot of the same rabbits in his pedigree as Hazelnut does. I sold her so these guys can't make babies together, but Zuzu has her lines and so Ty, Zuzu and Wicket are all somewhat related! It's good to breed rabbits together that are partially related because then you can "fix in" good traits and get more reliability in your offspring. 

Also something I noticed is that he shares one or two rabbits in his line with my first breeding doe, Gracie. They are also distantly related! 

Super fun day! I hope you guys all enjoyed the news, see you in my next blog! 

On Saturday, July 11, I had a show in Monroe. It was a pretty small youth Holland show, so unfortunately, even though my rabbits placed well, neither of them received any legs. 
In youth show A, Wicket scored 1/2 and Butterfly won 1/2. In show B, Wicket got 3/3 (due to his small size - he was only 3 months old and the others were easily 4-5 months), and Butterfly got 1/2. 

I'm pretty pleased with how my little juniors did, especially since they are so young! Both judges LOVED them, and Wicket and Butterfly both got comments on how promising they are. Butterfly wowed the judges with her cuteness, haha! 

I'm only a month late on posting pictures from the show. That's ok, though, right?! 

I had a blast at the rabbit shows today! Saige didn't do very well but there were several awesome wider BSDs in her class, so it was to be expected. She placed 4th and 5th pretty consistently throughout the day, out of 6 Hollands. 

Jet did VERY well, which I am super excited about! He placed 3rd out of 8, 3rd out of 9, and 2nd out of 10!!! This was his first show and he acted like it was his hundredth, posing beautifully and showing off for the judges. 

I table wrote for a couple of the judges for the youth Holland shows for the first time today. It was really fun, but super tiring and so much work! I will never take that position for granted again. When a million things are going on so quickly at the same time, in a showroom with a million people all having conversations, you can see how stressful that would be! It was still really fun and something that I definitely want to do again at my next show. I just need some practice :) Plus it helps keep me from getting nervous because I'm so busy!

I also picked up 6 new cages (WOOHOO! Jumping from 6 holes to 12!), 12 new water bottles (so many cracked in Nov/Dec last year and I prefer bottles over crocks), and cage tags! I spent over $300 (probably closer to $400 total) at the show today.....well, that is why rabbit breeders save up, isn't it?! So you can buy more rabbit stuff?!

Ok, so after this incredibly crazy show day....I need to go see my babies. See ya later! 

Show prep starts about 2 weeks before the show date. I pose, groom, and do health checks on all the rabbits I intend to show. I'm going to the May 2nd show in Monroe and I'm so excited! It's the first show of the year for Holly's Hollands Rabbitry. If you know what it's like to be at a rabbit show, you know it's been a looooong time since my last one (December), and I'm going crazy for another. 
Jet and Saige will be shown this time. This is my first time showing a buck, and Jet's first show as well. I'm excited to see how he does! 
I'll also be picking up 6 new cages in Monroe. I'm excited to have my rabbitry jump from being 6-9 holes to 12-15 holes. Of course I won't have enough room to put these cages into use until I get the shed. Oh boy, I need that shed soon!

The 7 babies are doing wonderfully! I already have my eye on a couple. Make that all of them, lol. They have such nice huge heads and wide bodies already! Obviously the little guy with one ear will be sold for sure, but I don't know who else. Our tiny black might be pinched in the hindquarter...and if so, I should know for sure in a few weeks, he or she will be sold as well. I'm hoping for some nice quality bucks and does for these summer shows and ARBA Convention. 

Hopefully I'll be breeding Saige after this show, probably mid-May. Her babies will be Convention juniors (Lord willing). I'll rebreed Rosie after this current litter is weaned, but those babies would be too small to compete at Convention most likely. I planned this all out wrong, oh well...it's my first convention so I don't expect to place well anyway lol.

For the first time EVER, I have no idea how these kits got here. Their color is crazy. I was positive they were blue torts, because, well, that's all they could be, right?! Nope. Looks like I have my first sable points! Never thought I'd raise this color! LOVING them. They are smutty for sure though, sadly. Even though I'm not raising this color, if their type is nice I'll keep them, for at least a little while anyway. Only time will tell. 

I knew Jet carried the sable gene, his dam is sable point, but I have NO IDEA where Rosie got her sable gene. Her pedigree has NO shaded rabbits on it (besides tort, which doesn't count). Guess it just got passed down the generations. So intriguing! 

The rest of the babies are doing fantastic. Little one-ear is healing perfectly and so sweet and big. I love him (or her). Here he or she is with one of the foster siblings. 

Each breed has a certain pose the judge puts them into while showing. A proper pose shows the person looking at the rabbit the good and bad points of the rabbit, whatever the breed may be. The rabbit will be easier to evaluate, and the judge will have a harder time getting the proper pose out of the rabbit, if it is used to being posed by its owner, and used to being touched in the places that you touch to coax the rabbit into a pose. 
I have learned some very valuable things recently on posing. 

• Start young. A 4-week old being taken out of the cage and posed will probably pose better as an adult then a 4-month old being posed for the first time. 
• Poses happen naturally. A Holland Lop has to be structurally built correctly to pose in the right way. You can tell a natural poser from an unnatural poser just from a picture. A natural poser is relaxed, not uptight and irritated. A natural poser finds the form usual, and comfortable. Natural posers will often pose perfectly in their cages, no teaching necessary! 

A correct Holland Lop pose is the rabbit's eye in line with its front feet, eyes in line with the topline (back), and back feet in line with the hip.

Video HERE has helped me extremely with posing. It's very informative. 
This THREAD perfectly explains correct and incorrect Holland Lop poses. 

I'm getting so excited for all the rabbit shows I'm planning on going to this year. Last year I only went to one. This year, I have 6-7 shows planned. That's about a show every other month, on average, but October has about two I want to attend.

To most serious breeders, this probably seems like not very many shows at all. I've realized that most breeders go to about a show every single weekend. To be competitive enough nationwide, and to grand all your stock (most breeders have over 20 Hollands), you need to attend that many shows to achieve your goals. I understand that. 

Since I'm still a new breeder, I'm gradually getting into the swing of things still. I love rabbit shows, I can sense a serious addiction about to brew (I'll need to control that!). My parents would never give up every weekend to take me to a show, and I don't expect them to at all. I don't want this hobby of mine to become a burden on anybody. 
I'll be driving soon and even then I probably still won't go to a show every weekend. My rabbits are my hobby, my passion. I don't want all the traveling to become a bore.

There isn't even a show in WA every week. They have about 2 a month. Traveling outside the state just isn't practical for me or my family, at this point in our lives. Maybe once I move out...I want to attend a Convention and Holland Lop Nationals, but I have years to keep learning and trying to produce something worth showing at such a big show like that!

If you are considering becoming a rabbit breeder, or are a rabbit breeder, or are just a budding rabbit lover/owner, becoming a member of one or all of these popular clubs is a good idea and a thing that should be looked into. 
The ARBA - American Rabbit Breeders Association
site is here
This club is for all breeds. The ARBA is the main club/organization. All the other clubs usually follow their rules, and endorse their breeds. The ARBA has many recognized breeds. A breed can only be shown at ARBA shows if it is recognized. The ARBA also has having a book that is published every three years and stating what the perfect rabbit of each breed (that the ARBA recognizes), is supposed to look like. When you join, you get 6 issues per year of Domestic Rabbits magazine, as well as a guidebook written by the ARBA. 

The WSHLRC -Washington State Holland Lop Rabbit Club
site is here
This club is really only useful if you live in WA state or attend many WA shows. Membership fee is very cheap (only $5 for youth, $7 for an adult), and when you join, you get a discount off the fee that is charged per rabbit when you enter in a show. 

The HLRSC - Holland Lop Rabbit Specialty Club
site is here
This club is very helpful. When you join you get an official guidebook, 4 issues of The Hollander, a magazine exploring several different aspects of raising rabbits with articles by various authors. 

There are many other rabbit clubs for many other breeds. These are only a few.