I failed... now trying to warm up cold kits.

[FourRingCircus]

Not sure what happened with my dates, but while I was out of town for a couple of days DH was holding down the fort he was surprised with a hutch full of fur. I came home and decided to do a quick walk through and came around the corner to find white fur everywhere... and a nest box in the hutch. Props to DH for realizing that pulled fur = need for a nest box, but unfortunately no cardboard on the wire bottom, nor any extra hay (he was doing bare minimum rounds for me before he went into work. Too little too late though . I was caught so off guard that I thought for sure it was a false pregnancy. I started to walk away, but hesitated and went back to find 4 very cold kits. I am warming them up now, but it's not looking hopeful. 2 even had milk in their bellies . One looks most definitely dead, the other 3 I thought had a chance. I have tried rubbing them some, but I don't want to do it too vigorously. I have never successfully revived cold kits... what am I doing wrong? Or is there a point when they are just too cold to come back?

Also, while I am asking, at what age is there no point in trying? I had a 1.5/2 week old get out of the nest box one night and froze . I tried warming it up, but no luck. The last 2 weeks has showed me that while the nest boxes I was given worked well in the past with warm weather, they are far from good enough for cold weather. Too many getting out too easily. I will be re doing them soon...

 

[alforddm]

Keep cycling towels in the dryer until they are warm to the touch. If they are warm to the touch and still stiff they are gone.

 

[FourRingCircus]

One was much stiffer and looked very different from the others, so I was pretty sure it was gone. The other three were still soft, but now they are stiff and the blood has pooled so they are officially gone

 

[alforddm]

I'm sorry. It happens. Please don't beat yourself up about it.

 

[Marinea]

So sorry.

We had a similar situation last week. We had bred does, and then our postponed house addition work was set to be done. An experienced doe apparently got stressed and had her litter all over the wire. She didn't even clean them all. I managed to save two and fostered them, but lost the doe a day later to a retained kit. Our first lost litter in three years.

It happens, no matter what preparations you make. You didn't fail.

*hugs*

 

[wamplercathy]

I place pine shavings in my boxes, then straw and as long as the doe has them in the box and keeps them covered then there is no issues. The boxes are all wood with wire bottoms.

 

[imajpm]

I've revived stiff dead looking kits. If they don't have blood pooled in the toenails they have come back, blood in the nails and none have ever survived. The last batch I unchilled was in the stretch, squeak, gasp, I am dying stage and all three survived. Those I put in front of a space heater, turning often (lol sounds like I was cooking) for ten minutes then stuffed them down my shirt for another hour, hour and a half. They all made it. There was a fourth but that one had been over groomed so I let it go. Once they were warm and happy, I fixed mom's nest, tucked them in, and she took good care of them after that.

I have warmed kits up to about 10 days old, after that it seems like all chilled kits are doa by the time I find them.

 

[FourRingCircus]

I place pine shavings in my boxes, then straw and as long as the doe has them in the box and keeps them covered then there is no issues. The boxes are all wood with wire bottoms.

This wasn't a normal kindling, unfortunately I was out of town and it was unexpected. DH doesn't do much with the rabbits at all and didn't know she needed more materials other than just her fur. I was thankful he got the nest box in at least... <br /><br /> -- Sat Feb 13, 2016 9:14 pm -- <br /><br />

I've revived stiff dead looking kits. If they don't have blood pooled in the toenails they have come back, blood in the nails and none have ever survived. The last batch I unchilled was in the stretch, squeak, gasp, I am dying stage and all three survived. Those I put in front of a space heater, turning often (lol sounds like I was cooking) for ten minutes then stuffed them down my shirt for another hour, hour and a half. They all made it. There was a fourth but that one had been over groomed so I let it go. Once they were warm and happy, I fixed mom's nest, tucked them in, and she took good care of them after that.

I have warmed kits up to about 10 days old, after that it seems like all chilled kits are doa by the time I find them.

Good to know about the nails - I noticed they were very red and didn't think that was normal so I am guessing they were already gone. A space heater is a great idea - I will have to remember that. I ran our dryer on high for about 10 minutes then wrapped them in a warmed towel and set them in it (obviously not running) but it didn't hold heat long enough. One heating pad wouldn't get hot enough, then the next one got too hot. It was just a recipe for failure all around :down:

 

[Truckinguy]

I've defrosted quite a few kits over the years that were pretty much stiff and they've come back pretty good. The next issue is whether the mother will feed them. She may have decided they were gone and won't take care of them or she rejected them in the first place which was the reason they froze.

Last year I had a litter of five that I called "The Frozen Five". They were so stiff I could pick them up by the head and the body wouldn't move. There is an expression that many rabbit people use "They're not dead until they're warm and dead" so I brought them inside and put them on a heating pad. There was slight movement from a couple of them that was so slow I nearly missed it. About 20 minutes later all were moving very slowly and about an hour later they were wiggly and squeaking. I returned them to the mother in the morning, she jumped right in the nest box and fed them and it was all good from there. About 12 weeks later they boarded the bus to freezer camp.

 

[FourRingCircus]

These ones were still softer, but who knows. Two had definite milk in their bellies so she had already fed them at least once. They were born sometime after 7 that morning, I found them around 4:30 that evening. One was off by itself, and it looked a lot different than the others so it might have been DOA. I found the other 3 together. Maybe someday I will have success - I know in the past for a couple of them I probably didn't give it enough time.

 

[MamaSheepdog]

Sorry you lost them. The blood in the nails is a sure sign they are dead, although I usually try to warm them anyway in the vain hope that they will revive.

I ran our dryer on high for about 10 minutes then wrapped them in a warmed towel and set them in it (obviously not running) but it didn't hold heat long enough.

I use the dryer method as well. You need to put quite a bit of bulky stuff in there (towels, blankets, jeans) to hold the heat. I close the door as well, making sure to tell all family members that there are kits in the dryer so they don't accidentally turn it on. For very cold kits you often have to take them out in their warmed towel and run the dryer to warm things up again, and then wrap them in one of the freshly warmed towels, repeating as necessary.

 

[Rainey]

What worked best for us was the heat lamp we'd gotten for a chick brooder. Chose last time we were raising day old chicks not to use the heat lamp for them. But it worked well for cold kits--warmed them quickly, we could see them instead of having them wrapped and having to unwrap to check, and if it seemed to be too hot could just back the lamp back a bit.
(Anyway we don't have a clothes dryer. Call it our solar dryer--a clothesline in warm weather, wood racks inside in cold )
Different things could work well--just depends what you have.

 

[Deer Heart]

It's alright Heritage, sooner or later you and I will finally hit our sweet spot and have more kits than we know what to do with. (this happened to me on the 8th, 6 little ice cubes. Only I got mine warmed up, alive, chirpy, etc. and returned them to the mother. She dug them out of the nest while I was at work and they froze again, all dead that time.)

 

[WhWRabbitry]

So sorry Heritage!

 

[karenl]

I've successfully revived 5 kits down my bra with a warmed towel man they were cold made me cold just walked round with them all morning in there just gotta watch they can breath so you don't suffocate them. Muma looked like she had walked around cage and just left a trail of them in the middle of a thunderstorm. I thought for sure they were all dead but they all revived its amazing seeing life come back into their lifeless cold none breathing bodies takes ages to revive some don't give up till you see the blood pool in their nails.

 

[Truckinguy]

I use a small heating pad just that measures abut 12x15", put the kits in a small shallow plastic container lined with soft rags, put the heating pad on top and turn it on to medium. The problem is that the heating pad shuts itself off after about an hour so I have to keep an eye on it but it work well.