A bit overdue...

Not sure what happened... I don't have exact dates (it was a spur of the moment breeding as we were heading out of town, and the does haven't been cooperative at.all so I didn't expect much), but she started nesting several days ago and usually she is a nest-then-babies in a short amount of time. For several days she was making odd noises when I was out there, kind of a grunt, squeek. I kept thinking it would be anytime now. She finally had them sometime last night or this morning. When I went out at 10 I found two fat and happy ones (pictured) in the next box. 2 puny and chilled ones outside of it (one was trapped between the nest box and wire, poor thing). They were cold, but still moving... coloring was way off. I stuck them in my shirt and cupped my hand over them while I tried to clean up the cage. One was soaking wet, it looked like it was in a puddle of fluid from birth. Both were opening and closing their mouths, like they were gasping . As they warmed up one (or maybe both) squeaked a couple of times.

I got the nest box put back together, added some hay (she had eaten it all) and got them all back together. I checked on them a little while ago and the two were still pretty wrinkly but at least warm, hopefully she'll get them fed this afternoon. This is so unlike her though! I am curious as to what in the world happened - normally her litters go off without a hitch, and she has been paired with this buck each time so that's not new either. The weather is changing, it's been warmer, but nothing awful (yet).

Here they are, as "newborns!"

Awe, what adorable little poppies! All fat and tubby :in_love: two dark and two light? Glad you found them before they succumbed to mother natures unforgiving clutches!

At a guess, your doe kindled several days late and perhaps had a difficult time of it due to the size of the kits. No idea why that would happen, though. The two kits photographed do not look to me like typical newborns; they have much more fur and seem to be rather large, as best I can tell from how much space they take up in the hand.

MaggieJ":61y6qqg5 said:

At a guess, your doe kindled several days late and perhaps had a difficult time of it due to the size of the kits. No idea why that would happen, though. The two kits photographed do not look to me like typical newborns; they have much more fur and seem to be rather large, as best I can tell from how much space they take up in the hand.

Click to expand...

Crazy, isn't it?? They are good sized, but the hands are a little deceiving since they are my oldest's (it's "his" rabbit)... the fur is a pretty good giveaway though. I just hope she was able to get them all out - she seemed pretty big for just 4 and she normally has 7 or 8 :x some could have been DOA and already cleaned up, the fluid looked fresh though...