hi everyone!
My rabbit had a litter of babies roughly 24 hours a go....
-she stands on them
-she has nipples but they are empty
-she has extra food
-some of them ar blue some are pink
-they have empty stomachs
PLEASE help me...what am i doing wrong? do i need to feed them myself? is yes what do i use?
Answers:
Don't listen to Joanne. When they have pot bellies that is when they are getting plenty of milk. If they look gaunted then they aren't getting milk like they should. The fat ones are the healthy ones. You'll probably notice that the ones with pot bellies are the bigger ones. They wouldn't be bigger if they weren't growing and doing better.
The ones that are blue are the ones that aren't doing too well. Either they are cold and need placed with the rest of the litter to get more warmth or they are not being fed milk like they should and are close to dying. You'll notice that the blue ones will move slower. The pink ones are the ones doing fine.
Most of the time rabbits have more babies than they can handle. Many rabbit breeders will do away with the weaker ones to help the rest of the litter.
You shouldn't see the mother sitting in the nestbox all the time. You should rarely to never see her sitting in it. If she is in it all the time, then something is wrong.
My recommendation is to add some Calf Manna to her feed. Add about a tablespoon of Calf Manna to her bowl of rabbit pellets each day. You can pick Calf Manna up at most any feed store for cattle or Grower's Co-op. Calf Manna is high in protein. The extra protein should help your doe milk better. Protein is essential to milk production no matter what animal it is. Rabbits need more protein when they are milking and raising babies than they normally do. Also make sure she gets all she wants to eat. She should barely clean up all of her feed at the end of 24 hours.
Check the nestbox at least once a day to see if any have died. Remove dead babies ASAP. The stench of dead babies in the nestbox could prevent the mother from milking the rest of the babies and it could also draw bot flies to lay eggs on the nest (neither good).
Lastly, if you used wood shavings or hay as the bedding for the nestbox you may want to switch that out now or at least in the future with straw instead. Wood shavings and hay have a strong scent and some does do not like to conceive or milk babies in a nestbox with a strong scent. That's why the nestbox should also be aired out before it is used and why the flooring of the nestbox should have holes in it to allow the urine to drain out so ammonia doesn't build up inside it. Pegboard makes a good nestbox flooring.
You have to remove the babies, and take them to the mother for feedings. If you don't, they will step on them and kill them.
My rabbit had babies, while I was at work, and they pushed them out of the cage, and killed them b4 I got home. You need to make them a bed in the cage, with something soft.
Some female rabbits don't take very good care of their babies. Some even eat them. In most cases I would suggest not breeding her. She is never going to be good with them. They only feed their babies a few times throughout the day. If you see that she has no milk or isn't taking care of them then you feed them with milk replacement. You can start weening them at 3 weeks. The mom may be stepping on them to because to many people are bothering her.
Rabbits only nurse their babies once or twice a day, so you may just not be noticing. Here is an article with all the information you need in case you do have to nurse them:
http://www.rabbit.org/care/babies.html...
Please be sure the male is far away or your female can get pregnant again. When she heals, you can get her spayed which will help her live longer as unspayed females fun a high risk of uterine cancer.
Good luck
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