Book Review: The Nervous New Owner's Guide...

 

The Nervous New Owner's Guide to Angora Rabbits by, Suzie Sugrue

I promised a review of this book, so here it is.  This is the only book I could find on Amazon.com that deals entirely with Angora rabbits and their care.  So of course, I felt the need to buy it imediately!  I read this book about a month before actually bringing my rabbits home and was glad to have it.  It really did give me a good amount of information on my specific breed and I appreciated her writing style as it is written in a friendly voice, not a technical manual. 

First off, it's only 126 pages including the resources section.  I was slightly distressed at the length, but after reading the book I will admit that it did cover a lot of what I needed to know.  There are really only three chapters in this book and then a resource section in the back.  The chapters are: First Things First, Life with Fiber Rabbits, and Working with Angora Wool. 

In First Things First, she gives a bit of information about finding breeders, picking the angora for you, how many and what gender would be good for what you want to get out of them and what age you should be looking for.  I found this section interesting, but not very helpful since I had already figured all of this out from my own research on-line.  I did really like the break down she has about each breed.  It is nice to have this information all in one place, but like I said, I had already looked all this stuff up.

In Life with Fiber Rabbits, she covers housing, feeding, handling, grooming, behaviors and has some health information as well.  I liked the feeding section, it had a nice amount of information about treats and healthy, safe foods that I can give the rabbits when I'd like to suppliment their diet.  The section about health issues was also nice, since there are a few (like wool block) that are kind of specific to long haired rabbits and so are not covered in books mainly dealing with meat rabbits (since they are all short haired).  She also gives the good advice to get in contact and involved with any rabbit or breed specific groups in your area to gain access to a network of people who probably know more about rabbits than you do and can help you diagnose and treat any problems with your rabbits. 

I was excited for the Working with Angora Wool section and am just counting down the months until I have enough fiber to actually start spinning my own yarn!  This section covers different ways to store and process your raw fiber.  There are tips and tricks hidden throughout the section and even discusses blending fibers.  This section was probably my favorite chapter of the entire book, since it is what I got the rabbits for to begin with. 

My other favorite part of the book was the resource section.  The back of the book has a few pages of books, websites/disscussion groups, and a fiber festival list that is a nice jumping off point for anyone getting into angora rabbits.  I have looked into a few of these and as I have time I will venture into others, but I really like having a place to start like this.  You can type "fiber festivals" in Google and wade through a million pages of garbage - or you can find a nice list of fiber festivals in a book like this.   Love that! 

Overall, I think this was a good book to have in the Library of any Angora owner.  I would suggest it to someone thinking about getting into Angoras before they actually purchase a rabbit, since it does tell about the daily requirements and grooming and things that people don't really think about if their looking at it as just a cute pet that will magically give them some yarn once in a while.  If you are an experienced angora rabbit owner however, I don't know that this book would be worth the $15 price tag.  So I guess I'm on the fence with this one.  Good book for beginners and those looking to get into Angoras, but not a requirement for those with experience.  All in all, I am glad to have it in my rabbit library.