probably a weird question about nursing orphaned 'popples'(?

[dandee]

i had read about having the goat milk on hand in case of orphaned, do you call them popples? I have a bunch of breast milk in the deep freezer properly stored. would that work in a pinch?

Also, in another post, ottersatin mentioned putting Vit E in the eye of a popple for 'nesteye'. In human babies, a shot of breastmilk in the eye will clear up alot of things. just curious if you think that may be used for rabbits as well.

(wierd to picture squirting breastmilk in a bunny's eye, but, hey!)

 

[MaggieJ]

The term popples is a pet name for young rabbit kits, still in the nest box. We call them that because of the popcorn activity when the nest is opened. Pony! coined the phrase over on the Homesteading Today rabbit forum and it migrated here when we started RabbitTalk. While it is not an officially accepted term for kits, we are all rather fond of it.

I don't know if human breast milk would work for rabbit kits. Rabbit milk is incredibly rich by comparison, which is why the kits grow so fast on just one or two small feedings a day.

Never heard of the breast milk for eye infections either... but it sounds like an interesting idea. If you try it, let us know the results.

I can tell I'm going to enjoy having you with us, Dandee... You ask such interesting questions! :rotfl:

 

[Shara]

LOL! this is too funny!I have pondered similar things, but was afraid of being "gross". Now that I know I'm not the only one, I will share the conculsions I came to. Human milk and rabbit milk are very different. human milk is designed with a constantly nursing baby in mind, easy to digest (for us) and high in sugars, with a different type of fat, from what I understand. Rabbits, on the other hand, only nurse a few times a day, and grow at a much faster rate than humans. For this reason I wouldn't choose to feed a kit human milk. However, I think it would make an interesting experiment.

Now, human milk (all raw milk, I believe) has very high levels of antibacterial and anti viral stuff in it. So I think it would be worth a shot using it to clear up eye infections. At the very least, it would clean the baby's eye out, possibly helpingto flush out any irritants.

Now, I am by no means an expert, nor have I tried either of these things, yet, anyway. This is just the conclusion I came to while pondering it at length...<br /><br />__________ Tue Aug 24, 2010 10:13 am __________<br /><br />shoot, and here I was thinking that popples were what you called kits in canada! that teaches me to make assumptions! :rofl: