Chapter 694: Evening in the Greenhouse: Trouble with the Mother Rabbit

By the time all the bamboo was planted, it was already dusk.

Xia Qing grabbed Old Goat and carried a big bamboo basket as they headed into the breeding greenhouse to catch chickens.

After the Yellow Weasel family moved out of the sheep shed, Xia Qing took the chance to thoroughly clean out both the chicken house and the yard. Now, with most of the flock roosting for the night, it was the perfect time to round up the hens that weren’t brooding or guarding chicks and bring them back into the chicken house.

With more and more chicks hatching every day, the already cramped chicken yard inside the greenhouse was getting even tighter. If she didn’t clear out some of the bigger hens soon, there’d be a real risk of a trample accident.

Besides, mid-March had brought daytime highs of twenty degrees and nights that no longer dipped below freezing. The grown hens could freely roam outside, so the safer chicken yard in the breeding greenhouse should be left for the brooding hens, hens with chicks, the little ones, the pregnant does, and the spring fish heavy with eggs.

As for the chicken flock, they were fine. But the mother rabbits needed peace to give birth, and the Black-Feathered Rooster insisted on starting his daily crowing warm-ups well before dawn—just too noisy.

Wanting to avoid startling the rabbits or the hens on the nest, Xia Qing made sure to catch the chickens without making a sound.

How did she pull that off?

Simple. Once you got a chicken in hand, pinch its beak, fold its wings, and tie it up.

Her first catch was the evolved Black-Feathered Rooster. But as soon as Xia Qing tied his beak and wings and stuffed him into the cage, the White-Feathered Hen started causing trouble. She hopped out of her nest, clucking and pecking at Xia Qing’s hand, not having any of it.

She moved fast, but the poor light meant her night vision was awful. As she rushed over, she failed to peck Xia Qing and ended up getting caught and tied up too.

Since this hen was brooding, Xia Qing didn’t take her back to the chicken house and put her aside, continuing to focus on the non-brooding hens.

The rest of the Green Lantern Chickens weren’t evolved breeds. It was easy for Xia Qing to round them up and load them into the cage for Old Goat to carry home.

After untying the White-Feathered Hen, the advanced evolved chicken promptly delivered a hard peck to Xia Qing’s hand.

Even a high-grade evolved chicken couldn’t hurt Xia Qing through her snakeskin gloves. Flicking the hen’s head and giving her a little rub on the neck, Xia Qing patted the Yi Stone pellets she wore there and let the bird go.

“Ungrateful thing, get back to your eggs! If you don’t hatch at least ten chicks, you’ll be wasting all the effort and investment I’ve put into you!”

That said, Xia Qing flipped on the light inside the breeding greenhouse.

The White-Feathered Hen clucked as she circled twice, then returned to her nest. The other hens busy brooding or tending chicks hadn’t budged since Xia Qing began catching chickens.

When the chickens had plenty of water, Xia Qing checked in on the mother rabbit in the cage. Once she was sure the rabbit was calm and undisturbed, she topped up both water and hay, switched off the light, picked two cucumbers and a handful of chives from the next greenhouse, and headed home to make dinner.

Even after leaving the greenhouse, Xia Qing paused to listen, only heading home when she was sure everything inside was quiet and normal.

All that caution was because the pregnant mother rabbit had started pulling fur from her belly and sides that very morning.

This made Xia Qing genuinely happy. Since Blue Star’s evolution, wild-caught rabbits had proven difficult to raise, let alone breed. So even with a pregnant doe, she worried whether it would survive the birth, let alone raise the kits.

But with the mother rabbit now pulling fur to build a cozy, warm nest, Xia Qing knew the babies would arrive within a day or two.

It was a fantastic omen. With a new generation of hens already in her territory, she was about to welcome a second generation of rabbits, too!

Humming a little tune, Xia Qing returned home and released the chickens into the coop. The Black-Feathered Rooster strutted around, then hopped up to his perch like he owned the place. The hens settled in for the night and Xia Qing turned off the coop light, heading inside with Old Goat.

After a full day of work, Xia Qing felt both spent and satisfied. As the lords of her domain relaxed and listened to the radio, she got to work on dinner.

A day this tiring deserved a good meal. She pulled some ribs from the fridge and made bamboo shoot and pork rib soup, then chive and egg stir-fry, and smashed cucumber salad.

There were two cucumbers in total—one for her, one for Old Goat.

After eating her fill, Xia Qing tuned in to an agricultural radio broadcast. Leaving Old Goat on guard at home, she headed out for an evening patrol of the territory.

The cameras couldn’t see every part of her land, so since Er left, Xia Qing had to conduct two patrols each night before she could rest easy.

The first patrol was uneventful. On her second round at ten o’clock, as she passed the breeding greenhouse, she caught an odd gnawing noise.

That was… the sound of a predator tearing into its prey!

Clutching her gun, Xia Qing charged inside. When she saw what was happening in the rabbit cage, she pressed her lips tight.

The good news: her rabbit had finally given birth.

The bad news: the mother rabbit was eating her own newborn kits.

Stowing away her gun, Xia Qing crept over and gently removed the half-eaten kit, placing it in a plastic bag.

Making sure the water and feed in the cage were still topped up, she stepped aside and watched the mother rabbit closely.

Books on raising rabbits mentioned this exact phenomenon—mother rabbits eating their newborns—a behavior called ‘infanticide.’

Possible causes included nutritional deficiencies, dehydration during birth, noise-induced stress, or simply weak maternal instincts.

First, water shortages were off the table. There was still plenty of pure spring water in the cage.

Second, noise-induced stress seemed unlikely. It had been four hours since the chickens were moved out, and the rabbit had been calm all that time.

Third, nutrition. Xia Qing always fed the rabbits Green Lantern Plants. Worried about the pregnant one’s diet, she’d followed textbook recipes and mixed the hay with a little salt, wheat bran, and corn. All three rabbits were plump and healthy at a glance. Whether they truly lacked something, she’d only know by testing.

For now, the most likely cause of the infanticide was simply the mother’s weak maternal instinct.

Xia Qing felt a bit helpless.

About ten minutes later, the mother gave birth to a second kit and started licking it—a good sign.

But while she was cleaning the newborn, Xia Qing heard a tiny squeak and rushed over.

Digging out the little rabbit, she found its skin already torn by rough licking.

Frowning, Xia Qing quickly disinfected and medicated the wound before settling it into a small basket she’d prepared ahead of time.

With every new baby—the third, fourth, all the way to the sixth— the pattern repeated. The mother rabbit licked, then bit. Soon enough, Xia Qing’s basket held five wounded newborn kits, each just minutes old.