Wedgwood Rabbitry
Wedgwood is a small rabbitry in Georgia specializing in Blue Eyed White Mini Rex. I already had another rabbitry name for my tri colored and other rabbits by the name of The Velvet Touch Rabbitry, but I wanted a different name for my Blue Eyed White Rabbitry. The first ones I bought just sat there looking back at me like white porcelain figurines with blue eyes. I was trying to find a name that would compliment their beauty. Then I ask myself what is blue and white, beautiful and classy. They reminded me of China, my favorite of which is Wedgwood which dates back to the late 18th century. I looked up Wedgwood on the ARBA registered rabbitries list and no one else had it. I applied and that is how the Wedgwood Rabbitry # A096 came to be.
About me, well I have always loved animals, but I always had horses and ran in barrel racing competition, drove big teams of draft horses, rode mules, showed cattle and hogs at the county fairs and did all as a child and teenager. I grew up on a working farm and we had chickens, horses, cattle and most farm animals. I was able to gain quite an ability to handle just about any kind of critter. I brought home almost every kind of wild thing from the forests on the farm much to my mother's dismay and she always made sure I turned them all loose after I studied them awhile. I fondly remember many of them still from my childhood along with some pretty powerful lessons taught to me the hard way about why I needed to respect all animals.
It was only natural for me to realize as an adult that I needed to make a living with animals. I had big dreams of being an animal trainer for motion pictures, TV, Commercials, and print work. When I say big dreams, I really had to work hard to make my dream come true and had to knock on a lot of doors. My friends and family were like wow, when you dream, you really dream big (along with some insulting sniggers). In spite of everyone's skeptism, I did make my dream come true. I have quite a few movies under my belt along with a long list of commercials and TV projects as I have been doing the work as an animal trainer over 19 years. You can see my hard earned credits on the IMDb website at my credits. I love what I do very much but the more work I have done, the smaller the size of my personal animals seem to have become. I still have my film dog and cat stars, but my interest in rabbits just took off within the last two years. As I have gotten older it is not so easy to handle livestock and the even larger exotic and wild animals I have had to deal with in my career. All of the sudden rabbits just seemed to appeal to me like they never had before, so small, fuzzy and warm. I had trained them for jobs, but now I wanted them just for me, just to enjoy. I found a local rabbit show breeder named Deidre Edder who had a few tri colored mini rex left from where she was selling out. That got me started. I love my tri colored rabbits and am still raising them, but I have found mini rex rabbits are like potato chips..... You can't just have one and then you want one in every color. It is like an addiction!!!
So I needed a tri buck, and Diedre was going to a rabbit show and bumped into Brad Edmonson. She picked up a beautiful tri buck from him to add to my growing menagerie of rabbits. It worked out well and I began to have some really nice marked babies. Then I called Brad one day to talk to him and tell him how much I liked his buck "Noble" and we started talking about does and the next thing I knew, I was in my van headed to his house. I left with some tri does and then I was able to raise beautiful tri colored babies. Another call from Brad produced a few more does he decided to part with and one more trip ended in me leaving with 15 more rabbits of all colors. It is hard to leave Brad's without a van full of bunnies and a ton of expert advice. You can read more about Brad and Deidre on my mentor page.
I found my first Blue Eyed Whites on a trip to buy some English Lops. Interestingly enough, they were from Brad's breeding although he had gotten out of breeding blue eyed whites. I was not even looking to get any mini rex on that trip but there they were. Two tiny white live rabbit figurines with deep blue eyes. I did not even think twice and in the carrier they went. Oh wait, they have a full brother from an earlier litter and in he goes on the other side. That started my love of Blue Eyed Whites and it has grown steadily. Then one day I decided I needed some new bloodlines since all three of mine were full siblings, so I went on the internet and did a search on Blue Eye White Mini Rex. Up popped Berlena Reynolds in California. We started emailing and talking on the phone and she told me what she had to sell and If I had somebody going to the ARBA convention, they could hitch a ride home with them. Deidre again came to my rescue and agreed to bring them home to me. Now I had some Grand Champions of my own and a few about to Grand. Even though I did not show them myself, I am so proud of them.
So, I was able to purchase great BEW foundation lines to start from. I bought a few Vienna Carriers and Vienna Marked rabbits who are all carriers of the Blue Eyed White gene. I got what I wanted and even more than I wanted because Berlena was so helpful and an expert on how to breed them. She is the number one BEW exhibitor in the country and in time, will even part with her best rabbits because she constantly improves on them all the time. As for all the other rabbits, I still have most of them but I am moving on the ones I won't be needing. I am going to breed to produce as nice a quality mini rex as I can. Now if I can only curb my appetite for wanting two in every single color!!! You can visit my Tri colored rabbits at The Velvet Touch Rabbitry and my other favorite breed, english lops at Olde English Lop Rabbitry although now, I only have one. I found I could feed 4 mini rex on what I would feed ONE english lop.
Last updated on: 6/8/09
