Well, yesterday, I left to hang out with friends at around 5 pm, and all of a sudden, the wind descends onto the Piedmont (45-50 mph gusts). I got home around 10 PM, and my rabbit stand was toppled over.

And of course, the wind chill was at or below zero. Of course, my first thought was for Magician’s litter of 7 born just three days ago.

I rush outside, and Magician is sitting in her nestbox, which is upside down. There are kits strewn everywhere. Three  were dead, two were not doing well, and two were OK. I did triage on the poor two, and one of them lasted the night. Two of the rabbits were loose and running around the yard.

I knock on the pastors door and he helped me move the top set of rabbits indoors ( so there is only one stack) and pick the assembly up. This was a hollow victory, as it fell back down right away.

Both of the crawlspaces were open too, so our pipes wound up freezing too.

I went out early, and cut off the top of the cage to stand everything back up, using the tarp to cover them.

So now, I needed to do triage and put a roof on a new shelter, and picked up some plastic painters dropcloth for wind protection.

It is a good stopgap measure for now. It is soooo cold out still, but at least the water is sort of unfrozen now.