Kit progress

Over the Thanksgiving holiday weekend lost our runt, and found out that our doe Blueberry does not have a full set of working nipples. She almost developed mastitis in two teats, as she produced milk in the ducts, but lacked working nipples for the kits to extract the milk. She had to go to the vet, and get antibiotics to prevent infection in the two teats that are lacking a nipple. This is also the same day that our garbage disposal backed up, and I had pies to bake without working overhead stove hood lights, as those burned out that day too.

So our basket of 10 healthy looking kits pre-Thanksgiving has turned into a basket of four large, healthy kits, and three skinny kits, and two kits that are small and starving. 

We began supplementing the kits that were not gaining weight with this:

1/2 c. Evap. Goats milk

1 egg yolk

1/2 T. Cane syrup

It is really difficult to try to get a rabbit kit to nurse, and have to feed from syringe 1-2 drops at a time. We fed 3 times a day. Then, some kits developed diahhrea that we were supplementing. Not good. They cannot stand a loss of fluid that way. 

 So now, the plan is to feed the 1/2 of kits that are skinny/starving in p.m., withhold nest box through night, then feed big kits in a.m. Rabbits only nurse 1-2 times a day, so this way we are trying to encourage her to nurse 2 times a day and making sure all kits have a chance to feed, and are not being pushed around by the larger kits. We shall see if this works.

The big kits

The starving kits

A glimpse of cute tummies.