The Beginners Starting Point

Don't know where to start?

The Beginners Guide to Breeding Hollands

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*this is a resource to get you where you need to be*

Starting a herd:

Know what to look for, know what a good holland looks and feels like
1. Join the ARBA and HLRSC, this will give you the info you need to know what to look for and make the right connections to get where you need to go. The arba membership comes with a basic breeders guide book that will help you for years to come. The hlrsc will also come with a guide book specifically for hollands, this is by far one of my favorite books in my collection. Notice that neither come with a standard of perfection (I’ll get to that)
2. Show up to a show, they are free to walk into and it costs nothing unless you enter animals. Go watch the open and youth hollands, see what the judge does and how and why. Ask questions to the people watching. Walk around and see who has nice hollands, especially if they do good on the open table, let them know you are new and looking to get started. The rabbit community is very welcoming and really helpful to lend a hand and get you going and understand what you are doing.
3. Before you buy anything, learn basic genetics and rules of what colors not to mix.
4. Ask people about their prices, prices really depend on the area you are in so know what to expect.
Start looking
1. What do you look for? A solid herd buck (aka the best rabbit in your herd should be the buck, you can get so many babies out of a buck vs a doe) Solid black is the most flexible color over almost all the breeds, solid tort is the best usually for hollands, torts are what the breed was established in (not all torts will be quality but most quality is tort)
2. Buying brood does is just for the buck. The buck should be show quality but when you start, buying show does is a waste of money. Buy two does that complement the buck. Structure is very important in everything you buy and there is a difference between brood and pet so if you can’t see the doe causing more good than bad babies, don’t consider buying her. Buy something with more workable parts than not.
3. Buying rabbits with the same or similar bloodlines is better. With rabbits it gives consistency. The rule that I learned from Allen Ormond is inbreeding is mixing related and getting a degrade in quality whereas line breeding is an improvement in quality. It takes a lot to breed so close that issues come up, just make sure your pedigrees don’t become ladders. This being said I’d recommend buying a trio from one established breeder who does well on the open table.
Setting up the rabbitry; Choosing cages
1. Stacker cages are by far the most popular choice by holland breeders. You get vertical space and can fit a lot on one wall. The trays make cleaning day decent and fast. Please if you purchase plastic trays, metal trays are a nightmare. Patching rusted or open corners is also not difficult but make sure you know what it is before deciding to buy cages that need some TLC.
2. Hanging cages take up a lot of space but are less smelly if you decide to hand them up outside over dirt. People prefer them because they are easily home made and if you have the space for it are cheaper than stackers
3. Hutches can also be easily made at home. I have a few around my rabbitry for emergency purposes (like when the caldor fire came through). Mine are home made and some have wire floors while others are solid floors, the solid floors are great for babies with sore feet or does that tend to miss the box.
4. SAVE MONEY: An amazing way to save money is purchasing from a local cage maker. Buying from larger cage makers will lose you hundreds of dollars, ask your local breeders who makes cages and you should be pointed in the right direction.
Setting up a rabbitry: Choosing a Structure
1. Starting small, if you have stackers they can go in your garage or in a small shed. Remember rabbits need good ventilation and spray so nothing where it’s inside the house unless you are willing to keep it very clean
2. Outside. Rabbits can handle pretty much anything as long as they are out of the wind and rain so you really just need a form of windbreaker and a roof. With this though you need to be willing to bring babies inside during the winter and adults during the summer.
3. A shed or barn. This is my setup and I highly recommend it. The barn method is great because you can mod it with better ventilation, AC, heater, watering systems, ect. I also lined my walls with plastic and then metal on the bottom to make a deep clean easier. Hollands don’t do great in heat so having a place you can close up and turn an AC on to keep cold is amazing. The end goal with any rabbitry is good ventilation, it to be warm in winter, cool in summer, and protect from the elements.
Setting up a rabbitry: Location
1. You want a shaded and elevated location. The shade will help in the summer and the elevation will help in the winter to avoid mud. Close to the house is a nice luxury and so is being able to drive a truck to it so help with unloading feed. Remember a water source, I use a hose to fill up a water barrel.
2. If you don’t have land, a small backyard is often a good spot. A lot of people will set up a wall and a roof with a roll down tarp to close the face of the cages during weather.
3. If you are in a different situation you can figure it out relatively easily. I know people who have built their rabbitry into their living room wall. When there’s a will there’s a way.
Setting up a rabbitry: Food and water
1. I will cover the diet separately for this breed. For feed you want to be able to have an airtight container, it keeps it fresher, and I have the same for my hay. Bins are great, I have stackable ones that I will link. Most people who have the room use metal trash cans since they hold a lot and are cheap and clean.
2. For water there are a lot of choices but the water supply is very simple, either running water or a water barrel that you can fill up.
3. For feeders most prepare j-feeders. I like the ones with the holes drilled in the bottom, not the mesh since it can rust and I have heard rabbits have torn nails out with it, personally never had that. Solid floor j feeders you need to clean out the dust from every now and then. Crocks are basically clip on bowls, I don’t really like these since you need to open the cage to fill and things can get in them. They also make metal bowls that you can mount on much like parrot bowls. The plus side of crocks is they can be used for both feed and water and you should have them on hand for transport cages already.
4. For water I by far prefer bottles, they keep the water clean but they need to be refilled by hand, this is easier with a smaller herd. Once you get around 100+ rabbits the watering system is the way to go. It is basically a network of tubes with nipples that clip on the inside of the cages and it works off a main water source and gravity so you just have to fill up the source when it gets low. As for crocks, it is good for those that refuse a bottle and for babies that are just starting to drink. I also give them to my nursing moms to avoid dehydration. My biggest issue is that stuff falls into the water and you need to clean and fill them up practically daily.
Basic supplies to start:

A scale
A posing table, you can place any piece of furniture down and mount carpet on the top and boom, aka you don’t need to purchase one. In the middle of my back wall I have a shelf with a scale and a carpet square on top, below I store everything underneath and I love it.
Grooming supplies: Nail clippers (cat ones work best) a basic brush, a comb, scissors, I also recommend clippers to shave down future fuzzies if you don’t want to do it by hand.
A medical box: The HLRSC book has the list of medications you should get, medication is the one area I am not very strong in so I won’t say much beyond refer to the book.
Carriers: If you can buy them used do so. A metal pan on the bottom with a wire floor is great. Metal dividers are a must. Don’t purchase more than you need and hollands can fit in the smaller sizes very well.
For the small things there are aprons, posing tables you can take with you to shows (I DIYed mine from a tv stand table) a box to take supplies like grooming supplies with you to a show (I already keep all my meds and grooming things in one air tight box)
Tattoo pen: I recommend the tb tat, I have had mine for 6 years and only have replaced the needle once and the batteries twice. I am dyslexic and left handed and I can hold this pen. It is basically indestructible
Tattoo ink: The best by far is human black fine lining ink.
If you buy a pen new it usually comes with a bag, inkwells, cleaning brushes, and gigi numbing spray (you can find it on amazon)
Basic bottles of cleaners and junk: White vinegar is the best to get trays spotless so I usually have 2 gallons worth in my barn for the weekly cleaning of the cages. I have rubbing alcohol, hydrogen peroxide, vaseline for tattoo moisturizing and lubing stuck kits, a box of rubber gloves to stay nice and clean, baby wet wipes, paper towels, Diatomaceous earth for mites, 3 spray bottles (water, hydrogen peroxide, and white vinegar to sterilize a cage) apple cider vinegar for the rabbit water, and basic cooking flour to clot blood (like when you cut a nail too short).
Gardenwear: Gardening gloves for fighting rabbits, small garden shovel for burying DOAs and smaller kits, a pitch fork for moving compost, a headlamp, a broom for keeping the barn floor clean, a dustpan I use to scrape my cage trays clean, a scrub daddy for scrubbing down my cage trays with white vinegar, hair ties, a screwdriver, cage clamps and said clamper, my apron, and a few other small things I’ve collected over time as I need them such as a bailing knife.
The organization station: A wall calendar, a gestation chart, a chart with who’s been bred to who (and when to palpate, give the nest box, and when they are due followed by when they kindled, to how many, when to wean, and when to sell) sticking notes, pens, a pencil, and a sharpie to label doe cages with all their pregnancy and litter info. I also have a bag of cage clips and tags to keep everyone labeled. A white board is mounted on one of the doors to show who is going to what shows, who is reserved or for sale, pickup dates, who to tattoo and with what, ect. All the info on everything is also written on the wall calendar.
The feed and maintenance area: By my bins of feed I have a bag of shavings for cage cleaning and a filing cabinet with prepackaged transition feed for buyers, the binder with all the sales policies and sold rabbits dated and prices, the drawer above has the pedigrees sorted by bucks and does and previously in my herd but now sold. The bottom drawer has electrical cables and basic barn supplies I don’t want exposed. Above I have a bucket hanging to fill with hay when I feed it every night so I don’t have to make a mess and go back for more. I also have a smaller metal bucket for morning feeding where I fill in my pellets. I also have a ½ cup scoop for my feeding scoop in this bucket.
Up in my loft is my basic storage of larger supplies, I have around 10 nest boxes for 15 does, my carriers, a spare bag of feed, my barn cat, ect.

Here’s a good place to get more info: https://www.kwcages.com/rabbit-university.html

The “How to” section

Tattooing: Left ear is for your ear number, right ear is for registration tattoo. Set up your pen and ink, take out paper towels, baby wipes, vaseline, and put on rubber gloves. Decide what to put in the ear, some breeders have a system (like me) or tattoo the name of the animal in the ear, decide what you want. Everything gets tattooed at 6 weeks in my barn, whether I keep or sell and the same day I write up the pedigree to match. You start by spraying the ear down with the gigi numbing spray, wait roughly 6-10 minutes. Wipe the ear down with rubbing alcohol and let that dry, it doesn’t take long. Then wrap or hold your rabbit in such a way they can wiggle free. I usually put on music to keep me calm since babies are small and wiggly and you will need patience tattooing in general. Then dip your pen, turn it on and begin. You will notice there is a vein running down the center of the ear usually, you can shine a flashlight through the ear to see where. Tattoo above or below it. Make sure to have a finger on the other side of the ear so you are able to push down. Hold the pen straight. Once you are done, take a baby wipe and wipe away extra ink. This helps the tattoo heal cleaner, I’m not sure how but it does. Then put a thin layer of vaseline over the ear and you are done. It should peel in 2 or so weeks and you can see where you need to touch up. I recommend learning with someone in person. Your first tattoos usually aren’t great.
Filling a nestbox: I line mine with newspaper to make cleaning easy, you don’t need to do this but I recommend it. Throw in an inch or more of wood shavings, then fill half the box with soft hay like grass or timothy, then if you have straw top it off, if you don’t then just fill it entirely with hay. Give a nest box on day 28 with hollands.
Knowing when a doe kindles. You should see fur, unless you have a doe pulling fur early this is a dead giveaway. Usually they don’t pull for unlit right before and right after. Feel free to pull out the box and see what you got, if she gets upset it should be fine don’t worry. Put your hand on the fur and you should feel movement and warmth, you can uncover the kits and count them, remove anything dead.
Actually breeding the rabbits: Check the vent color, press down and see if it’s red or purple, that’s when you want to breed. If it’s pink or light red it’s a low chance she’ll actually want to breed. You can change this by throwing her into his cage every now and then over a few days and that should cause her hormones to spike. A doe that wants to breed will be dancing around her cage with her tail way in the air. Never put the buck in the does cage, always bring her to his cage or breed in a neutral place. Let him mount, you can move him around if he’s just bad at it. For a quick breed I learned to hold down the doe, run my hand down under her belly, and hold her hind legs up and her tail away from her vent with my hand and thumb, this allows the buck an easy breed. You don’t need to do this. You will know a successful breeding by the buck falling off, it’s very dramatic. You want at least 3 fall offs, the more the merrier.
1. Table breedings vs free breeding: Table breeding is where you watch and help the breeding, I recommend this highly since a sassy doe can take a nice bite out of a buck and a buck can get violent when breeding. Free breeding or cage breeding is when you throw the doe in with the buck and just let things happen. This is a common practice but it is a bit risky. I like to count fall offs and make sure no one gets hurt, table breeding can also go faster if you are good at helping, it does take more time though.
Palpating. This is something I want people to learn in person. You can start on day 10 of pregnancy but I prefer 14. You will feel and massage the sides of the abdomen to feel for babies, by day 14 they should feel grape sized. Palpating is very important and useful, you can use it to catch stuck kits, track labor, ect.
Sexing or gendering babies. Sexing babies is a skill that takes time. Start at 6 weeks and work your way down to being able to sex 3 weekers, some can even do newborns. Push down slightly above the vent and anus and if an “o” shape pops out its a buck, if a slit pops out, aka the opening goes down to almost the anus, you got a doe. I would recommend looking at photos for this.
Diet: Diet should consist of both pellets and hay. Pellets shouldn’t be older than 3 months and should have 16% protein. I suggest getting locally milled feed, it really depends on what's in your area. As for hay, it should be fed daily. I feel pellets in the morning when I open the barn and hay at night when I close it. Timothy, grass, or orchard are the most popular. Triple mix is more coarse but I use it when the hay suffers from the economy. Alfalfa is too high in sugar so don't feed it.

Evaluating a holland

There are certain traits that are linked, I’ll go over those first. Bone and ear thickness, chest depth and muzzle width and the two main ones. Limb length and bone can be seen by flipping the rabbit over and looking at the back feet, the wider they are the better bone and the shorter they are the better length. You want it short. While the animal is on it’s back, see how far apart the frost limbs are, this is chest width. See how far apart the hind feet are, this is hindwarder width. See how straight the feet are, if they are straight that’s a good full hindquarter, if they point out on the toes it’s a narrow or even pinched hindquarter. Flip the animal over and straighten out the hind feet with your hand, this is called squaring the body. Line the hips up with the shoulder so the spine is straight. Make sure the animal is relaxed, you can let them run around a bit before this step just make sure they aren’t hunched over and uneasy. Once the animal is squared off, hold the hind feet still with one hand and use the under and place it under their chin and hook your hand around their muzzle and around the face. This might take some practice to get them used to all the touching around the face. Now, making sure the body is still squared, slowly start pulling the head up. An animal with no chest depth will not be able to sit up like this. Once the head is up to the eye being the same height as the shoulder look at your animal. The body should be short and wide and deep, with short straight from feet and a big head. This is where you need your standard of perfection and a basic understanding of the body type to know what you are looking at. Run your hands down the animal and feel. Feel right above the hind legs and see how full it is, this is fullness of loin, if it's empty that’s called hollow. Apply this to the rest of the animal and see how full it is. It should have a firm feeling, called firm flesh, and should feel like this all the way from the shoulders down to the table. A good wide Holland should be hard to grab with one hand at the shoulder. This is really one of those things you can’t learn in full without physically seeing, feeling, and doing. You need to see balance to learn what it looks like and for this I really recommend going to a show and placing down your rabbits that you already have evaluated and seeing if it matches with the judge. Each judge has a different evaluation but they are roughly all the same, different judges will call attention to different traits. There are basic traits that people say are easier to fix in one generation vs many generations but what I’ve learned is it all depends on your bloodline. For me limb length and crown was an easy fix, others not so much. You need to get to know your lines to know what you can fix fast vs what will take time.

Here is a good article by LOL Rabbitry who recently became a judge: http://www.lotsoflops.com/judging-the-holland-lop.html

Here are some good visual graphs: http://hollyshollands.weebly.com/blog/archives/05-2016

The breeder basic dictionary:

Buck: Male

Doe: Female

Kindle: Birth

Kit: Young rabbits

Junior: under 6 months

Senior: Over 6 months

BOV: Best of Variety

BOSV: Best Opposite Sex of Variety

BOSB: Best Opposite Sex Breed

BOB: Best of Breed

RIS or BRIS: Reserve in Show

BIS: Best In show

G.C.: Grand Champion

Leg: A leg is awarded to a rabbit who wins out of 5 or more rabbits and 3 or more exhibitors

HEC: Head, Ear, Crown

Cull: Hard cull is kill, soft cull is pet out

I’m sure that there are terms I’m missing but these are the basics

Tips and tricks:

Stretch the animal before posing, pick it up and lay it against your body, hold the hind legs flat with one hand and with the other support the weight under the front limbs and stretchy their back, then chest, then limbs and this loosens them up to be posed
Put apple cider vinegar in the water to improve gi health, fertility, coat and flesh condition, and supply vitamins. Humans already take shots of ACV for their own health, I use it for my rabbits, as do many breeders, I give a teaspoon per 32 oz (or average water bottle size) I’m not very precise, I keep it in a syringe by my water barrel and put in a small squirt with each bottle I fill up, doesn’t matter if it’s a buck, doe baby, nursing, everyone gets it.
Give pinecones in cages to keep the teeth healthy and short. I collect pine cones from my valley and soak them in 50/50 water to white vinegar. Then they go on metal trays lined with baking paper and in they go for two hours at 250 f.

RESOURCES:

The arba website: https://arba.net

The holland lop rabbit specialty club website: https://hlrsc.org/

My feed bins: https://www.amazon.com/Vittles-Vault-Stackable-Airtight-Container/dp/B0002H3S5U?pd_rd_w=oUGCB&content-id=amzn1.sym.deffa092-2e99-4e9f-b814-0d71c40b24af&pf_rd_p=deffa092-2e99-4e9f-b814-0d71c40b24af&pf_rd_r=YE1C41N5VEKNF8EQJRN4&pd_rd_wg=Ewnac&pd_rd_r=6b389b8d-4ceb-4a06-bce9-49eb90a59813&pd_rd_i=B0002H3S5U&ref_=pd_bap_d_grid_rp_0_38_t&th=1

Gigi Numbing Spray:https://www.amazon.com/GiGi-0725-Anesthetic-Numbing-Spray/dp/B0002274FK?pd_rd_w=oUGCB&content-id=amzn1.sym.deffa092-2e99-4e9f-b814-0d71c40b24af&pf_rd_p=deffa092-2e99-4e9f-b814-0d71c40b24af&pf_rd_r=YE1C41N5VEKNF8EQJRN4&pd_rd_wg=Ewnac&pd_rd_r=6b389b8d-4ceb-4a06-bce9-49eb90a59813&pd_rd_i=B0002274FK&psc=1&ref_=pd_bap_d_grid_rp_0_28_t

TB Tat tattoo pen (you can also purchase replacement parts here): https://www.allthingsbunnies.com/TB-Tatt-Tattoo-Pen-p/tat296.htm

Baking pinecones: https://www.timbercreekfarmer.com/pine-cone-rabbit-treats-keep-bunnies-active/#:~:text=Line%20a%20baking%20sheet%20with,What%20is%20this%3F&text=Cool%20the%20pine%20cones%20completely.

Breeder chat site (this is a goldmine of information): https://rabbittalk.com/

Places to purchase basic supplies online:

All things bunny: https://www.allthingsbunnies.com/rabbit-books-s/1818.htm

KW Cages: https://www.kwcages.com/

Bunny Wood: https://www.facebook.com/profile.php?id=100054244640356&paipv=0&eav=AfYzb3dA8I0n8cGKFSkjQe5R5QkYgHB_-JaQFhDOMdT0V63lQfyd2UxAf0RRjDvZIBY