Had a litter this morning and found this underdeveloped fetus in the nestbox. (35th litter / 288 kits so far this year)
Doe is a New Zealand - a year and three months old - fourth litter - had 8, 6, 8, and then 9 this time.
Three stillborn but normal size this litter. She had two stillborn in Dec. All other litters and kits fine.
I had another litter that had two little kits like this. Different doe. Litter of 10 and all are doing fine.
I wouldn't be giving this much thought, but I've never seen anything like this before and now it's the second time it's happened in the past month. I checked the record and turns out that the sire is the same for both litters.
Buck is NZ and will be 4 years old in a couple of weeks. Never seen anything like this in his previous litters. He's sired more than 16 litters since Dec of 2013 (records only go back to end of 2013 - lost em all in a computer crash - go back up your data right now). Averaged 8 kits a litter. My first thoughts were to look at the buck but then I get to thinking that once the egg is fertilized, it's up to the doe to take it from there.
I do pretty well with the beginning (mating) and the end (kindling) but what happens in between is really a mystery to me. Any ideas?
Doe is a New Zealand - a year and three months old - fourth litter - had 8, 6, 8, and then 9 this time.
Three stillborn but normal size this litter. She had two stillborn in Dec. All other litters and kits fine.
I had another litter that had two little kits like this. Different doe. Litter of 10 and all are doing fine.
I wouldn't be giving this much thought, but I've never seen anything like this before and now it's the second time it's happened in the past month. I checked the record and turns out that the sire is the same for both litters.
Buck is NZ and will be 4 years old in a couple of weeks. Never seen anything like this in his previous litters. He's sired more than 16 litters since Dec of 2013 (records only go back to end of 2013 - lost em all in a computer crash - go back up your data right now). Averaged 8 kits a litter. My first thoughts were to look at the buck but then I get to thinking that once the egg is fertilized, it's up to the doe to take it from there.
I do pretty well with the beginning (mating) and the end (kindling) but what happens in between is really a mystery to me. Any ideas?
