Baby with a broken leg

[S&SFarms]

First litter in a while, something (besides the weird false pregnancy) had to go wrong. Uhg.

It had to have happened in the last 3 hours, I was out there the kit was fine, came back and he's not using one of his hind legs. It seems like it's either the "ankle" or just a break further down the foot.
I've had an older rabbit with a break before, she healed up just fine. My concern is since it's just a 3 week old kit and mom is trying to wean early, is he going to get enough calcium? Should I supplement?
Mom hasn't been outright aggressive, but she's definitely already over any of them trying to nurse throughout the day. I have a feeling her stomping off angry might have been the problem.

 

[KimitsuKouseki]

The younger the faster they heal. Just make sure it's healthy otherwise and you shouldn't have to do anything. If it's look like it's not feeding well just isolate him and give him apple slices. I've lost a doe who had 3 week old kits and I weaned em using apple slices, it's tender so easy to eat and juicy so they get their liquids. Eventually I added an older 5 weeks old baby with em and he taught em to eat hay and drink water. (These are the bunnies in my avatar btw)

 

[alforddm]

At 3 weeks old they should already be eating pellets and drinking water with mom. I've weaned an entire litter at 3.5 weeks due to doe sickness and didn't lose any of them. I just offered pellets and water. I may have offered some old fashioned oatmeal but it's been several years and I don't remember. You can never go wrong with old fashioned oatmeal.

 

[akane]

I put a litter on dishes of oatmeal soaked in goat kid formula at 2weeks with a water bottle and pellets. By 3 weeks they didn't need softened food. The dam was suffering mastitis with no milk coming out. I definitely would not introduce fruit and watery greens if they are not already getting some. You can sometimes get away with higher fiber greens like plantain and dandelion yard forage but you risk major digestive upset relying on fresh foods. Especially combined with weaning that can lead to digestive problems anyway. Sometimes even a litter weaning normally needs to be put on just oatmeal or rolled oats and water for awhile. Rabbit digestive tracts are very slow to adjust the bacteria needed to digest food changes and especially fresh foods or anything with high sugar content. If calcium is a concern though grains as well as fruits are quite low in calcium or even higher in phosphorous that needs to be equal to or half as much as their calcium intake in order to use calcium properly. Softened pellets and using goat or horse milk replacers would be more complete nutrition in cases where it's a concern. Usually they get more than enough calcium from milk and pellets that bones should heal over even quicker while they are still growing. A legume hay like alfalfa is also high in calcium and I've mixed the fallen leaves from alfalfa into softened pellets for rabbits or guinea pigs. Unless they are skinny they are getting enough of either milk or the solid food already in the cage but if you do separate and they don't appear to be eating whole pellets (or hay) well enough just serve a daily dish of pellet mash even if you only use water until they are relying on the dry ones fine.

 

[S&SFarms]

I might just be feeling paranoid again, lol. They are eating pellets / oats and drinking from a water bottle as of two-ish days ago. Most are starting to plump up again, they were a little light for a couple days. The other litters I've had didn't even start weaning until 3 weeks, so I worried.

He was using the foot to scratch his ear this morning, I'm going to take that as a sign it's not too hurt.

 

[alforddm]

I might just be feeling paranoid again, lol. They are eating pellets / oats and drinking from a water bottle as of two-ish days ago. Most are starting to plump up again, they were a little light for a couple days. The other litters I've had didn't even start weaning until 3 weeks, so I worried.

He was using the foot to scratch his ear this morning, I'm going to take that as a sign it's not too hurt.

I had a kit get it's foot hung in floor wire (regular 1/2x1"). I found it pretty fast but the kit started trying to get away from me as I was trying to remove it from the wire and I was sure that leg was broken. The dang kit had twisted that leg completely around it looked nasty when it happened. When I him loose it didn't feel floppy so I took a wait-and-see approach. Within a couple of days he was fine. Not sure if the leg was only sprained or if they just heal really fast. They are tough little buggers.

 

[S&SFarms]

I had a kit get it's foot hung in floor wire (regular 1/2x1"). I found it pretty fast but the kit started trying to get away from me as I was trying to remove it from the wire and I was sure that leg was broken. The dang kit had twisted that leg completely around it looked nasty when it happened. When I him loose it didn't feel floppy so I took a wait-and-see approach. Within a couple of days he was fine. Not sure if the leg was only sprained or if they just heal really fast. They are tough little buggers.

That's good to hear!

He's still hopping around on three legs, but he's gotten a lot faster about it, lol. I do worry he'll just... forget to use the foot even when it does heal, but I cant really do anything about that either. Otherwise seems happy and healthy.

 

[SableSteel]

I had one really mess up her ankle as a baby... healed up almost perfectly fine. It's amazing how resilient baby rabbits can be with injuries like that