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[deborah g pendleton]

HI from Fort Worth TX. I just brought home my Netherland Dwarf yesterday. I got him from a top breeder who has been raising Netherlands for over 100 years, specializing in longevity and lack of malocclusion. He's pedigreed but was disqualified at show for having a small bump on his back, apparently common, but still a defect. Other than that, he is a perfect chestnut. We paid top dollar for him, probably too much in some people's eyes), but we wanted to avoid expensive medical costs in the future and have him with us a long time(up to 15 years per this breeder). We got a couple of siamese cats for free and were dumbfounded with all their medical costs. I guess you get what you pay for. We routinely pay $500 for our silver persian cats.

 

[Nancy McClelland]

Welcome to the forum. Pedigree is no guaranty of longevity. All of ours have been rescues and we've had 2 that reached 15, one that was over 16 and Bambi who passed a month short of 19. Most of the others between 10 to 12 years.

 

[deborah g pendleton]

you got lucky. I wanted to increase my odds with a breeder who has great success and specializes in that.

 

[deborah g pendleton]

if negative people like you are creating me I'm getting off of here

 

[Popsicles]

Nobody is being negative, you’ve done a good thing researching, and I hope it does work out for you! Larry is right that mixed breeds also can be healthy and live an equally long time, I don’t want anyone on here to think that because they spent money less on a rabbit they won’t get a long life out of them, because that isn’t true, but as long as you are happy with the rabbits you have that’s what matters! Welcome to the forum.

 

[Nancy McClelland]

WE have mixed and pures live a long time. The Mini Rexes seemed to have done best as they were very old--16 and almost 19. Our Checkered Giant was here for 12 years. Some of our mixes have lived from 12 to 15 years with us also. Likewise, we have had some that were with us less than 4 years, both pure and mixed. Also, I'm a high I. Q. with a type A+++ personality so if I go negative you'd know it, but this is a forum for helping so anyone that is out of line gets reported by me to the moderators and so far I see nothing that is report worthy.