Unfortunately about 2 days ago my girlfriend's dogs caught a baby cottontail. They brought him in the house and we don't even know where the dogs got him from. I think hes 2-3 weeks old, and has a little scratch on his one eye that hes keeping mostly closed but other than that appears to be alright. For the past two days hes been eating for me from a eye dropper, and yesterday he was quite active and really appeared to be much more comfortable in the box we placed him in. He has plenty of towls/cut up t shirts that he snuggles up and buries himself in. I'm just not sure about how much he should be eating and if I have the right formula.
I've read lots of things different places and what I've been doing is mixing Kitten Milk Replacer with a little bit of heavy cream. Some places I see recommend adding a tbsp to a daily serving of the KMR(which im giving him about 25-30ml of kmr a day, although he usually only eats about 20 a day), and other places recommend only adding 1 tbsp to a whole can of KMR which is about 8oz, and hes only getting 1 oz a day. Currently I only put 1 tbsp in the whole can, and I've also been adding 1/2 capsule of acidophilus to each 30ml serving that I prepare for the day.
So I guess what my question is, should I continue adding 1tbsp of heavy cream to the whole can or should I add 1tbsp of heavy cream to every 30ml serving that I make for the day. It just seems like the 1 tbsp throughout the entire can wouldn't be much.
Also i've been trying to split the feedings up since I've read a lot of issues with bloating and distending their stomachs. Over the past couple days hes been getting about 5 feedings a day but they're typically only 2-5ml per feeding. Most people I see recommend doing two feedings at 6-13ml but he doesn't ever seem to want to eat this much and I'm always concerned with overfeeding him since hes pretty small. It's more time consuming but I'm hoping that the smaller more frequent feedings will help increase his chances of not having some of the many stomach issues i've read about. He also has some timothy hay in his box that he seems to be nibbling on.
Just kinda worried about the next week, since I want to make sure hes getting adequate calories. Also is the timothy hay ok? When we got him his eyes were already open, ears erect, and he had a full coat. He was very still and shaky the first day but seems much more comfortable now, and hes starting to take more in during the feedings.
Any advice is appreciated, especially involving the kmr formula and giving him solids. Also should I put a small dish of water in the box for him? Thanks
I've read lots of things different places and what I've been doing is mixing Kitten Milk Replacer with a little bit of heavy cream. Some places I see recommend adding a tbsp to a daily serving of the KMR(which im giving him about 25-30ml of kmr a day, although he usually only eats about 20 a day), and other places recommend only adding 1 tbsp to a whole can of KMR which is about 8oz, and hes only getting 1 oz a day. Currently I only put 1 tbsp in the whole can, and I've also been adding 1/2 capsule of acidophilus to each 30ml serving that I prepare for the day.
So I guess what my question is, should I continue adding 1tbsp of heavy cream to the whole can or should I add 1tbsp of heavy cream to every 30ml serving that I make for the day. It just seems like the 1 tbsp throughout the entire can wouldn't be much.
Also i've been trying to split the feedings up since I've read a lot of issues with bloating and distending their stomachs. Over the past couple days hes been getting about 5 feedings a day but they're typically only 2-5ml per feeding. Most people I see recommend doing two feedings at 6-13ml but he doesn't ever seem to want to eat this much and I'm always concerned with overfeeding him since hes pretty small. It's more time consuming but I'm hoping that the smaller more frequent feedings will help increase his chances of not having some of the many stomach issues i've read about. He also has some timothy hay in his box that he seems to be nibbling on.
Just kinda worried about the next week, since I want to make sure hes getting adequate calories. Also is the timothy hay ok? When we got him his eyes were already open, ears erect, and he had a full coat. He was very still and shaky the first day but seems much more comfortable now, and hes starting to take more in during the feedings.
Any advice is appreciated, especially involving the kmr formula and giving him solids. Also should I put a small dish of water in the box for him? Thanks