Raising Baby Rabbits

As some might remember I was trying to name a second rabbit I had received from a friend. I guess one day while cleaning my male rabbits cage he got to the female's cage and opened the latch. I thought I got to him in time but I was wrong.

Yesterday morning I was giving them both water. As I reached into the female's cage I noticed some blood on some of the litter. When I come back with the water there's a baby rabbit wiggling around on the bottom of the cage. I built a nesting box and relocated the baby inside.

I attempted to allow the mom to do her own thing but that seemed like a no-go as the mom was neglectful. She's super young and was ignoring them and at one point even dug the entire contents of the nesting box, including the now two baby rabbits, into the floor of her cage. After some thorough reading I decided to raise them without the mom.

The house rabbit society, and basically everywhere else I read, suggested KMR (Kitten Milk Replacer) for syringe feeding and to use cotton balls soaked in warm water to stimulate urination and defecation; until they open their eyes in 10 days their mom was responsible for that.

Here's the three of them. There is now a 4th one that I will update on soon. She had 7 total. Two were stillborn and one she stepped on.




I'll update my progress as the days go by.

 

All fat after today's syringe feeding. This is before they moved back to the nestingbox.

 

DAWWW they are soo ADORABLE!! was mom pushing them away yesterday after having them or have you tried seeing if she will take over. sometimes with new mothers you have to coax them into taking over. Try seeing how she reponds to them, if she was doing it yesterday she might have just been tired and didnt want to be bothered by them A friend of mine mother cat did the same with her kittens but after a few times mom finally took over. Best of luck to you and the little ones

 

After she had the last one her instincts finally kicked in and she started building the nest. Although it was a very violent process and if they were still in the cage with her they would have no doubt been trampled. Cats are a little more maternal than rabbits, a lot of first time kitten mothers do pretty well but it's not the same for rabbits unfortunately. They need to be a certain age and go through at least one trial litter before getting everything down.

The House Rabbit Society website confirmed that the handling thing is a myth. The mother will not ignore them if they're touched. Same goes for baby birds that fall out of their nest. The correlation with the mother neglecting them and people touching the nest is usually only from stressing the mother out with your presence. And that only really goes for rabbits who don't like their humans very much.


This is day three since they have been alive. The runt passed away yesterday so I'm down to three left now. Hopefully it goes well as this is not a "for sure" type of deal.

 

Well it's worth trying maybe when they get a little bigger see how she acts with it, every mother has a maternal instinct its just some take longer to kick in then others (tho there are some that i can say don't deserve to be a mother but that beside the point) maybe she might just take over especially if she is nesting she just might be a little behind as a first time mom it takes time for them, but if you do I would just monitor. I used to work at a pet store with everything from gerbiles, hamsters, rabbits, guinea pigs, snakes, birds to cats and dogs. I remember having to give advice to people who had found baby squirrels. Sadly for squirrels they are a lot harder to work with as babies and harder to keep alive. I had to do the same as you with a baby squirrel a guy brought into my work once. did all I could but the squirrel didn't make it. I wish you the best with the baby rabbits they are in god hands keep us updated.

 

She's only really needed for the feedings so I tried ho0lding her down to see if she would be calm enough to force feed the buns. But she struggled too much and it's important to not improperly restrain rabbits as their kicks can break their own back. So I have to stick to the syringe feedings.

Unfortunately I'm now down to only two of them.

 

Welp, I just lost the last baby rabbit. The last two went this morning. I just wish the mother would have given them at least one feeding as the first few days of her milk is a colostrum that has protective ingredients, mostly antimicrobial fatty acids, that artificial milk replacements cannot duplicate. Baby bunnies receive protective antibodies from their mothers while they are still in the womb. But during the first few days of their lives, this antibody is lost. Hand-raised bunnies are at a major disadvantage if they're not receiving them and they are more likely to succumb to early mortality.