Doe pulled fur again and killed 3-day-old kit

[Hoolia]

real quick: whaT?

Im taking care of a doe for a friend. She had a litter of 3; one stillborn, one found the morning after chewed in half, and one healthy and fine baby. I went downstairs to check on mama and baby this morning and found the mother had been pulling fur again. There was fur all over the floor, so I got worried for a second. Just the day before I had checked on another litter that's already 5 weeks old and there were 3 dead newborns scattered across their mother's hutch, so i feared this was the case again. But the nest box was empty, the baby was in the middle compartment of the cardboard burrow, dead, with its limbs chewed off.

I just don't understand why this happened. This is by no means her first litter either. This was to be her last litter before retirement. Part of me thinks the new construction across the street is what stressed her to the point of killing her own baby, but then why would she be pulling fur again??

 

[Abby B]

Whoa , I've no idea ! That's awful

 

[Ratsorizzo]

That's awful I am so sorry.

 

[JimJam]

Was she looking after 2 litters at the same time? Because that would explain the aggressive behaviour...

 

[Hoolia]

It's hard to tell. She hasn't had any more babies since Sunday, but after she killed the last kit (Wednesday) I cleaned out the nest and refilled it with hay. The next morning she had built another nest partially lined with fur, but still no babies.
Theory 1 is that the construction across the road spooked her and she killed the kit.
Theory 2 is that the kit somehow crawled out of the nest too soon and she decided something was wrong with it.
Theory 3 is that she's just not a good mother because this is her 6th litter and she has a history of killing kits or delivering stillborns. That, however, we figured was because of her filthy living conditions and excessive weight. She's currently in a very clean, spacious enclosure; well fed, and at a healthy weight.
But none of these theories explain why she'd still be dripping blood, pulling fur again, or building a new nest.

 

[Cookiemonster]

she may have more kits in her...

 

[Hoolia]

Should I be concerned if that's the case??

 

[Cookiemonster]

yes... if i were you i would take her to the vet

 

[JimJam]

I agree - definitely take her to the vet - especially since you say there’s still blood excess... if you knew she had a history for being a mother who didn’t look after her kits then you shouldn’t have bred her, that just causes more stress for the mum and is unhealthy...

 

[Hoolia]

Like I said, we were looking after her for a friend who was tight on space. He's given her to us though after hearing she only produced one live baby again. So we're calling the vet to schedule an appointment. We moved her up to our room yesterday and it's like she's been a whole new bunny! She's not leaving any little droplets of blood in her litter box or pulling fur, she's adventurously exploring the room, chinning, binkying, rolling - she's loving it in here! Still, I know better than to let my guard down because she seems fine now. We also inherited her mate when he retired a few months ago. He seemed fine and happy for 2 weeks and all the sudden took a nose dive from a testicle that had begun to rot in his abdomen. We didn't know until he got to the vet, we were too late to save him and he passed waking up from the surgery. At this point, something like that happening to this sweet girl is our biggest fear.

 

[JimJam]

Oh I understand now, sorry if you were offended... that sounds like good improvement with her happy attitude! Hope she turns out fine and loves her new home

 

[Ratsorizzo]

These people gave her to you because she wasn't producing enough rabbits? No offense but seems these people are a little off.

 

[Hoolia]

I won't say too much about it, but his rabbits don't have very good lives.. it's bad enough that the whole neighborhood has been whispering about animal control. We try to do everything we can for those rabbits whenever we see them; fill their water dishes and bottles, refill their food dishes, clean out their cages if nobody's home, let the rabbits have some time to stretch their legs, offer to bunnysit a few of them at a time. But when we do bunnysit, it feels cruel to let them go back to their lives there... When you take into consideration how bad her living situation was, it's almost no wonder her litters hardly ever survived. At least she never has to go back to that.

 

[Ratsorizzo]

Someone needs to flat out call on him. If it were children someone would have already.

I swear they need to require permits for pets.

And mad props for getting her out of there.

 

[ladysown]

Hormones do weird things with rabbits. Pulling more fur anytime up to a week post kindle is normal. Kit probably got dragged out of box and momma was just tidying up. Nothing wrong with just an unsuccessful litter.