I. The Arrival

Gran's journal, page one

My dear, If Mr. Pell has given you this, then I have gone, and the warren is yours, or at least, you are its tenant until the paperwork untangles itself. Mr. Pell enjoys paperwork the way rabbits enjoy hay. There are three left: Biscuit, Clover and old Barnaby. They know their names and they know the sound of the greens bag. Hay first, always. Carrots are a treat, whatever the picture books say. Start small. Watch them. A rabbit tells you everything with its ears. All my love, Gran

The first page of the journal you inherit in the game, word for word.

Your rabbits

Every rabbit is somebody: a name, a personality, quirks and a pedigree. In Gentle mode, the default, no rabbit ever dies.

II. The First Litter

What a rabbit shows, and what it carries

Kits! You will want to count them every hour. You may. They will not mind. Notice the colours. Two plain parents can make a surprising baby: what a rabbit shows and what a rabbit carries are two different stories. When a kit shows something neither parent did, both parents were secretly carrying it. That is how you learn what is hidden.

From Gran's journal, chapter II.

Fourteen real rabbit coat genes, the ones breeders use, with hidden copies that only a litter gives away. Barnaby and Biscuit are both hiding something. Pair them and see: this runs the game's own inheritance, and its own rule for what a litter reveals.

Try any two rabbits in the Coat Lab

Pairing

Possible kits, from what you know about their genes. Hidden carriers can still surprise you.

The nest is empty.

Thistledown Village Show
Ambrose has judged the village show for forty years and has opinions about ear carriage that would end friendships.

IV. Rosettes

Real breeds, real shows

Breed toward 32 real breed standards in the free game, from the Holland Lop and Netherland Dwarf to the Rhinelander and the Checkered Giant. The judge scores every rabbit against its breed's ideal, the same way the tent above does. Breed a line true for three generations and register it as your own.

The Breed Book

All 44 standards, and Gran's lost breed

The estate

Clear the land, build it up

Estate

Clear the thicket clump by clump and draw your own pens. Buy the fields next door from Mr. Pell, plant an orchard, lay paths, dig a pond and hire the village carpenter. Restore Gran's cottage. Open the gates and the village comes to look. Two hired hands, Chan and Beth, help with the chores.

The bonsai garden

A bonsai garden, free

Day 1

Grow trees from seed over real days in Gran's bonsai garden: twenty-eight species, each grown from its own seed. Snip, pinch, wire and repot, pick one of eight styles, and show your best tree at the season's exhibition. The Bonsai Almanac has every one.

Cherry blossom

Informal upright · young trunk

VigourBranchingRoot areaTrunk

Real time

One week each, the same for everyone

The warren keeps living while you're away: kits are born, the seasons turn, snow falls on the hutches, and a letter tells you everything that happened. Each season lasts one real week, and every player's warren is in the same one.

Afield