Inbred to the point of infertility?

Is it possible to have a doe so inbred she's infertile? She's not mine personally but she is a part of my breeding does group.. I bred her twice over the span of 3 days with two different bucks both known fertile *I have babies* So I know she lifted and she gained weight at first but then dropped it all again and her nipples don't have any milk. Although her cage did end up unexpectedly having to be moved.. Could that have caused her to absorb babies? Because I also moved another pregnant doe and she's fine and hopefully going to have babies in a few days.. I know she is inbred because the true owners have said so.. Apparently the lady who bred them was just breeding mom to son and dad to daughter and mom to grandson and so on.. So they are stupidish? I mean she's not like handicapped but she has issues and it's obvious. You can NOT move her water or food around her cage, if you do she can't find it any more until shown multiple times. She's went an entire day without water because she couldn't find the bottle. I didn't notice till the next day because the bottle drips just a bit but by the morning everyone usually has half or less left but she still had it all so I tapped the nipple and her ears turned towards me with a look of excitement and she went to the same spot her water had been and started chewing and licking the metal looking for water. I felt absolutely terrible and I showed her the bottle but she seemed to forget a bit and then I had to show her again. She knows where it is now of course but she has took up this habit of chewing the metal wire on her cage *She's got enough space, it helps she is a smaller doe.*


-- PMpTue, 10 May 2016 14:29:16 --

I probably should've mentioned my question. It's more an opinion/thought thing than anything ya know? I wanna know if it's possible for a rabbit to literally be SO inbred that it's infertile. I don't think anyone else has ever pushed it this far before or not but opinions would be helpful.. I feel like it's possible but I don't wanna give up all hope.

You may like to read up about inbreeding/linebreeding of rabbits, very interesting matter - it is not as bad as rumors tell, and line breeding (that's more like what you describe here) with proper culling is how all our domestic rabbits were created. "Introducing fresh blood" can actually cause problems too.

There are a lot of other, more likely reasons for a doe to be infertile, I would rate stress high on that scale, but I don't think just moving the cage is really stressful. And there is always the possibility to get a dud. That's why many think the 3 strikes rule ist the way to go.
I would bet she never was actually pregnant - wait, when did you breed her? Did she show any signs of a false pregnancy around day 20, and is it well past 31 days?


I once had a chicken that was like this, any redworm was too fast or strong to be prey, useless as a chicken can be, but kind of cute and fun to watch... opcorn:

Um. No signs only she got big and a few of her nipples have got bigger but no milk in them.. My other doe when she was pregnant you could tell her nipples were full as well as the one who absorbed her babies, *She's been rebred since.*, She has like 1 or 2 nipples bigger than the rest but they looked deflated so I felt of one and there was no milk at all.. She did get rounder for a bit but then appeared to drop all the weight at once... It's day 29 today but I haven't gave her a box. Could she still be pregnant and not have produced milk? She don't look pregnant at all... I'm not sure what to do now come to think of it.

My does produce milk only after kindling. I thinks it takes about half a day before they can feed. But I did not palpate them, they hate that.

Give her a box anyway, doesn't hurt. They often just start nestbuilding and fur pulling right before kindling, or confused first timers sometimes after that, and I was sometimes wrong about if they are pregnant or not.

I too have a doe now I'm trying to breed, she was stressed out by the 2 other does she was living with, so now she's living in my vestibule. Should be due around the 25th, no way to tell if she's pregnant but to wait...

I can't palpate don't know how even after what seems like a million different youtube videos. I guess I'll switch her and another doe and give her a box with some hay tonight or tomorrow and see if she might have some. I didn't know it could take a bit for them to get milk. Jeez rabbits aren't exactly as easy to up keep as they make it sound huh?

Always, ALWAYS assume a doe is bred. Put a nestbox in and leave it until day 37ish. If you want to be a little more sure if a doe is bred, you can try to learn how to palpate, but it is not always easy, and until you are very experienced, it can fool you.

Does do not always let their milk down right away. Some can go 24 hours AFTER kindling to drop their milk. I am not sure that feeling nipples is a reliable way to determine if a doe is bred.

Some thing caught my attention, are you sure she cannot see? If she truly cannot see, it is a BAD idea to be trying to breed her. Inbreeding is NOT a problem unless you're breeding rabbits with genetic defects to begin with. If there's a bad trait, inbreeding is the quickest way to bring it out and then make sure whom ever shows it does not breed and is not used for breeding one way or another.

Moving can cause a doe to absorb, change in diet can too. Moving a strange rabbit next to her could set it off too. ANY change can make a nervous nelly abort and absorb a litter. What kind of attitude does she have? Does she deal well with stress? How long have you had her? What's her diet like? Her body condition? Much more goes into breeding rabbits than just picking a doe and buck.

We added Timothy hay pellets to their diet simply by adding some to their food. I don't know if she is blind she doesn't seem to fumble around or anything and her eyes don't have the white layer thing they normally would.. What would be a good way to see if she is blind? She seems to have a pretty calm tude. If I open her cage she will come sit at the door and look out but that's it. I'm not sure about how she handles stress but she doesn't freak out over being picked up but they said she don't like her cage items *water and food* being moved around. She's been here about as long as my does which is about 3-4ish months. I moved recently. They've all settled in well and I already have 2 babies and more on the way. Her body condition looks good she's not too fat not too thin. She's not boney.. Her diet is the pellets we get from the local feed store as well as some timothy hay pellets from Tractor Supply. I had a neighbor who used to breed rabbits come look at her and he said she might just be a dud but it could also be because she is a virgin. I'll try again and see what happens and we will go from there.