Cobwebby Morning

It's getting light at 5.30am at the moment so the thought of Daylight Saving Time beginning tomorrow is welcome. Since all the trees on the eastern side of the driveway have been chopped down the sun has begun shining in the back yard and this morning when I glanced out the back door there were 15 perfectly round cobwebs suspended between fence wires or amongst the undergrowth. The spiders have also been busy building all round my windows but may be in for a nasty surprise as I am about to wash the outsides of these this weekend.

It's been an interesting week. A few days ago coming home from an appointment in Napier I saw a couple of wire cages sitting on the grass verge at the side of the road. Called in at the nearest cottage but no one was home so drove across the paddock to the house next door which still owns all the land. Met a very nice guy called Olly who said he used to keep angoras twenty years ago. He had nine banks (each with three cages) and also took us to his old rabbit shed where he had a roll of brand new floor mesh as well. Named a price and my brother paid straight away (I just have to pay him back now).

Last Thursday friend John arrived out with his ute and trailer piled high with the cages and mesh. A couple of banks have no bottoms and a couple had slight rust but the rest being perfectly preserved even after all these years in the open. He piled them down the back of the property so we can get to them when we start to replace my old ones.

It has been an interesting few months as angoras suddenly seem to becoming popular again. I have had quite a few enquiries about buying stock with a shocked response when I say that I no longer sell my animals. Firstly you get people thinking they're going into breeding angoras and are going to make a fortune with their fibre. I am very open with them as to the fact that the market is tiny and ever decreasing since alpaca has become so popular. So many rabbit farms went down in the 80s and 90s after China flooded the market with inferior fibre and the market will never return. Unfortunately people think I'm deliberately withholding information from them, that I'm making a fortune on the quiet and just don't want to share my spoils. In 19 years of keeping angoras I have yet to make my feed bill!

The other kind are the people who say they only want an angora as a pet. I and other breeders find these are the ones that say the same thing to a couple of breeders so they can get a pair which they then burn out breeding for the pet market. The offspring of these are then sold on to pet shops and after the new owners discover how difficult angoras are to keep the poor animals end up in the RSPCA or at vets. I have had several come through here in a bad way. Sometimes they have such severe blockages from wool they expire within a short time. Angoras are not a pet for the faint hearted and I applaud the breeders who vet prospective owners as to their intentions although many of us have still been conned. The bunny mill breeders are one of the lowest forms of life and have no regard for their animals- only the money they can make from the unsuspecting public.