Excellent timing

[ladysown]

so I have this rescue doe here who was potentially preggers as she was in with a buck who apparently didn't work.

Today.. she had five kits.

It was fortuitous in that my son had just decorated his toad house and asked me to come see. I went out to see and I saw her with a mouth of fur and said.. OH NEST BOX needed. I hadn't given her one as she's a somewhat untidy doe and I wasn't convinced she was preggers.

SO... five kits, all nice and snug in a smallish nest box. We'll see how they grow. Which once again points out the fact that bucks that apparently don't work... sometimes do apparently work.

 

[sammysue63]

Awesome catch! Congrats on the kits

 

[LilFish_JWQueen(:]

wowzer lol congrats!

 

[Cattle Cait]

Congrats! What breed is the new mama? (And the buck, if you know)

 

[ladysown]

mama is a mixed mutt of some sort. She's currently NOT eating. Her kits are looking okay though, so I'm going to syringe water into her. She's never been a good eater and now she's substantially decreased the amount drastically. I need the kits to survive for another 8 days. So going to work with her a bit.

 

[Cattle Cait]

Try putting honey in the water and/or molassas in her feed. I like keeping a bag of 4-way (aka sweet feed in some regions) for new rabbits to switch them over onto our feed. It works great!

 

[LilFish_JWQueen(:]

Try this mint conditioner mix..ive gotten from a cage dealer...every rabbit i couldn't get to eat started to eat when i gave them it. Ive never had anything else work as good. Its amazing.

 

[ladysown]

what mint conditioner mix??

 

[SMR]

I thought mint was bad for preg or nursing? It acted as a natural 'dry' up agent. Or do I have this confused?

 

[MaggieJ]

I thought mint was bad for preg or nursing? It acted as a natural 'dry' up agent. Or do I have this confused?

That is certainly the reputation that mint has, SMR, but I've been having doubts about how accurate this idea really is. I fed mint to a doe that I did not know was pregnant without problems this summer. This idea may have arisen because of pennyroyal, a member of the mint family, being used as a birth control/abortion herb by humans.

It is still a good idea to avoid feeding mint in quantity to pregnant or nursing does, at least until we get reliable information. In this case, I would assume that the amount of mint might be very small, just used to entice the rabbits to eat. But as with any new product, you want to know the ingredients before using it.

Edited to add:

See Frosted Rabbits' post below. Pennyroyal is a toxic herb and should never be fed to rabbits.

 

[Frosted Rabbits]

Pennyroyal IS a very toxic herb--It used to be the major 'insecticide' of a flea soap (Sargeant's Skip-Flea-- came in bar form) I used on my dogs many years ago-- I believe it is a neurotoxin-- and it can be used in borders to keeps pests out of gardens and kennels

 

[cindmill13]

Excellent catch!
Congrats! Rabbit are very cutest pet, I have two rabbit one is male and another is female.
:bunnyhop: