Help! Dead baby rabbits

[thienthanhtran]

Hi i have been breeding bunnies for 4 years now and nothing has turned out bad until
Recently.
My new hollabd lop a first time mom had 8 kits
They all seemed healthy but at 5 days I found
One really weak with flat bellies and it died.
I checked the other 7 kits and they all had round bellies.
The next morning...at 7 am I found 2 more
Dead with skinny bellies.
I checked the other 5 and their bellies R super fat!
I have 5 kits of 8
What's wrong? Could it be that the mom
Is not producing enough milk ?
Funny thing is the 3 that died were not the runts they were the bigger ones of the litter!
The smaller ones R fine so far.
They r almost a week old now
Could the mom have stepped on them by mistake ?

Any help would be appreciated !

 

[TwoCrows]

Hello there and welcome to BYC!

I am so sorry about your bunnies.

I don't know anything about rabbits. You might want to post this in a couple places. We have lots of rabbit owners in our Other Pets and Livestock forums....https://www.backyardchickens.com/f/22/other-pets-livestock

And we also have a sister site, Back Yard Herds that might be of some help as well...http://www.backyardherds.com/

I sure hope someone can help you with your babies in one or both of these places.

 

[drumstick diva]

Sorry to hear of your losses. I can't offer any advice but, a similar thing used to happen with litters of puppies I had.

You described it just the way it was - they had flat bellies and they would end up dying. I haven't had a litter since 1980 but, now and then that would happen in random litters. They would start out fine and once their shape turned flat I lost them. When this shape change happened it also looked like their heads were smaller and laying flat nursing they had a triangular shape. I never knew what it was or why. It has devastating to me. Could you have one of the dead bunnies necropsied by the vet?

I hope someone can make sense of this. Maybe the internal organs were deformed or defective - once they started nursing they couldn't digest the milk ???? I lost the healthiest looking pups maybe because they nursed more than the smaller ones.

 

[ChickyChickens]

Welcome to BYC!!! There are loads of members on here…so if you have ANY questions…just ASK!!!

Hope you have loads of fun and all your answers answered here on BYC the BEST CHICKEN KEEPING FORUM on EARTH!!

 

[Wyandottes7]

Welcome to BYC!

We're glad to have you.

I'm sorry about your bunnies. I'm not sure what exactly is wrong. My first guess would be that the mother may not have been feeding them. Be sure to check them each morning- their bellies should be full and round, with few wrinkles.

It's also possible that they had something internally wrong. I've never lost baby rabbits, except when they were stillborn. But, I've heard that some baby rabbits just die for no apparent reason. Sometimes, the mother do trample them- a friend of mine had a Holland Lop baby that got stepped on by its mother at a couple weeks old and died.

Good luck with the rest of them! For more advice on rabbits, you may definitely want to check out the Backyard Herds website. Another good website that I've found has been Rabbittalk.com.

 

[Book Em Danno25]

 

[BantamLover21]

Glad you joined us!

 

[BantamFan4Life]

Welcome to BYC! I'm glad you joined us!

 

[Kelsie2290]

Hello and Welcome To BYC! Sorry about your kits, hope you are able to figure out what it going on.

 

[CrazyChookz]

Welcome to BYC! Enjoy the site and don't hesitate to ask about any queries.