Rabbit questions

yram_slim

My daughter's boyfriend acquired two rabbits - male and female - and you can guess that happened. A litter of five babies appeared one night. Mama plucked out her fur to make a soft nest, but by the following morning three kits were found dead. We only knew she'd had another two because she had hidden them in the corner and we found them when we cleaned out the dead ones. Unfortunately, three/four days later they too were dead. We had some conflicting advice - the babies can be handled, move the entire nest, babies and mama, to a quiet room, or alternatively, don't handle at all for five days. Any advice please - this was her first litter, so maybe we could breed again more successfully?

Smashing

Why on earth would you want to breed more given the huge numbers of rabbits in rescues needing homes? Get them neutered and enjoy them for their original purpose - that of pets, rather than a quick way to make some money.

yram_slim

No-one said anything about breeding rabbits for money. I am extremely offended by your suggestion. The initial pregnancy was an accident, and if they want to breed their rabbits again, that's up to them. They had homes for all the first litter of babies. All I was asking was opinions on raising the babies to avoid unnecessary deaths and distress.

ClareEmily

Hi sorry can't give you advise about baby bunnies, however why are they trying to breed them?

There are so many rabbit rescues with unwanted bunnies once they pass the cute baby bun stage.

Look at the bobtails website as an example

The best thing to do is to get them both neutered and they should live very happily together.

From the rabbit Welfare Association

The main reason to have your rabbit neutered is so you can keep more than one rabbit without them fighting or causing a population explosion.
But there are other advantages too.
Neutered rabbits are less aggressive and territorial, and are more easily
litter-trained if you want to keep your pet indoors as a houserabbit.

Smashing

It is up to them, but the best way to avoid unecessary deaths and stress is to leave it to the experts.

yram_slim

Thanks for your comments. I don't know if they will try again and I know they were planning on neutering afterwards. They were delighted with the babies and everyone was really upset when they died. I suppose until you make a hobby, or even a living out out of breeding rabbits, one cannot imagine that it is difficult to breed rabbits!

ClareEmily

Sorry just re-read my post and I hope I didn't sound too "I know better" etc, must have been very unsetting to find bunnies dead, I do believe it is quite common and sometimes the mother will eat her young too.

Glad to hear that they are planning to neuter, will have much happier and healthier bunnies in long run.

Clare x

sharkbait_2

Did they seperate the male rabbit into a separate hutch? In my experience we had to remove the male rabbit as it was him that injured the babies.

mrcow

The rabbits need to be neutered straight away. Especially the male. If you don't neuter the female, she has a 90% chance of contracting uterine cancer anyway.

It is cruel to be breeding them when you don't have the knowledge, experience or facilities to do so safely. Rabbits are amongst the most abused pets in this country because of irresponsible ownership.

They need to take responsiblity for their pets and prevent this happening again. If they or any of their contacts want more bunnies, then they should contact a rescue centre......as i can assure you there are many.

millypede

I did do a huge post but the forums logged me out for some reason.

Basicly - Get male neutered, make him smell less, angry, and marking every were, our experience is that Females dont like operations, we lost our first female rabbit due to stress, and operation stuff.

Babies, fuss the mum rabbit for a while and move them 24 hours after birth if you have to, other wise take the male out and move them later on, but make sure you take the whole nest, with mums fur and staw/hay.

If you get a load like we did (26 during Christmas 2006, from two females) look after them and them look at taking them to some were like Pets at Home who do adoption sevices, we did most of ours there and they are now at other home adopted from P&H.

Just to give you a quick insight, we had to put on of the litters into our Kitchen, and one of my huge Christmas Hampers boxes were their home for 16 weeks.


All very happy, but make sure mum rabbit gets enough fluids and vitamins, and potassium, we use monkey nuts as its seems to cover enough of their requirements, plus they go mad for them, they can hear the packets being rustled before we even open the outside door so say goodnight!

At the end of the day, make sure the rabbits are happy and they will look after you too, Sox likes to lick me lots to know that he still thinks im great, hes stupid, but make sure they are happy, rabbits just need love and attention and company.