What do you do if you have 10 or more babies?

[CanucksStar17]

So one of my Rabbits had her babies yesterday afternoon and I counted them and there were 10 babies, it got me thinking she only has 8 nipples so how does she feed two extra babies? But I have had a Rabbit that had 14 babies and all of them lived (There were like 3 runts though) Anyway I was wondering what you guys do when you have more then 8 babies? Do you feed some of them? Or do you just let nature take it's course?

 

[OakRidgeRabbits]

I have dwarf breeds, so they don't often have very large litters. But I would be inclined to leave all the kits with mom and let nature take it's course. Usually they handle it just fine. If you notice any kits struggling, you can try holding mom and letting them nurse on their own, or supplement with KMR or goat's milk.

 

[majorv]

What breed is your doe? Is she a first time mom? Personally, I would just let nature take its course. Can you foster a few to another nursing doe? If there were no other options I know some who would remove the smallest ones to give the bigger ones a better chance of growing up healthy. That's not something I could do though...I'm a bleeding heart. :agree

 

[CanucksStar17]

She is a New Zealand Californian cross, this is her second batch of babies! She is a great Mum and when I hold her babies when they are older she misses them and when I bring them back she wags her tail, she actually wags her tail and tries to jump out of the cage to met them!

 

[woahlookitsme]

If she is a good mom then I would just leave them in. Since these probably aren't going to be shown then there is no real reason to separate the litter for weight gaining purposes.

I would keep options open just in case you do have some that start fading whether that be a foster or milk on hand just in case

 

[Nancy McClelland]

If you had another with a smaller litter you could try placing a few or supplement their feeding--hard call.

 

[CanucksStar17]

The youngest babies I have are 6 weeks old. Since I only have two does I like to breed one when the other one has her kits. So none of the babies are very close

 

[majorv]

I'd just wait and see how she does. Both breeds are good about supporting large litters. Just watch, and supplement if you see some not growing like the others.

 

[Blaze_Amita]

With that size doe I'd leave 'em. I've got a red that I just sold to another friend that has a litter of 12 easily, she's a Red New Zealand. Now I have a current Holland Lop with 6 and she's got two thinner babies that I'm hawk-eyeing and watching. They're skinnier but not Skinny-skinny.

 

[CanucksStar17]

So two babies died The one was pretty big but somehow went to far forward in the nest and got cold and froze to death. Then there was the runt I started feeding him goats milk when he was 4 days old he was doing really well but last night he died His eyes were just opening to Now I went from 10 babies to 8 in exactly 2 weeks.