Trouble giving birth?

[Cattle Cait]

Pepper is due sometime this week, and the past few days she has been acting awfully strange. She has been licking her lady-parts obsessively, making that weird shake (I don't know how to describe it) like she is having contractions and is acting very uncomfortable. She has skyrocketed downward in condition - her fur is very rough and she is losing flesh very fast. She's quit eating for a couple of days now, she is nibbling on hay but thats about it. I felt her belly and I can feel something fat and heavy between her back legs, but it just looks like fat but if she was fat wouldn't she have fat over her spine and hips too? She won't let me pull her out of the cage, feel farther back to see if maybe she has something wrong with her lady-ness, or flip her over.

Is it possibly a baby is stuck? Can I help her with that at all?

I'll call the vet if necessary, only because it's Pepper.

 

[Frosted Rabbits]

CAll the vet-- sounds a bit like dystocia ( mal-positioned kit-- acts like a 'plug') You can try rubbing the fatty area you feel-so as to turn it a bit-- but f she is real tired, she will not be ale to push very well.

 

[ladysown]

i second that. call the vet in and see what you can get figured for her.

 

[OneAcreFarm]

any update on Pepper?

 

[Cattle Cait]

I'm having trouble finding a vet in the area who will cater to a rabbit...since they fall in that gray area between small animal and livestock I have to find a large animal vet and our usual one retired.

She's still alive and acting a little more Pepper-y, but still not eating.

 

[MaggieJ]

Not eating at all? Is she drinking?

If you can't get her to a vet, there are a couple of things you could try that may or may not help. You could give her a calcium boost. There are preparations for livestock, but I'm not familiar with them. Many people feed a tablet of TUMS antacid. It is calcium based and rabbits seem to enjoy the fruit flavoured ones, especially berry, from what others have said. If that doesn't help, feeding a few heads of lavender may expel anything in her uterus. The kits likely would not survive, but I doubt they'd make it anyway. Please understand that I've never had to use either these measures.

 

[akane]

You must get food down her. A rabbit's digestive tract will suffer damage, possibly permanently leading to death, if it doesn't keep moving with food pretty much constantly. Ideally they shouldn't go more than a few hours without something but they'd probably be fine at around 12-24hrs. If days go by with none or hardly any food though they can die from complications.

 

[Cattle Cait]

She has been nibbling on hay, so she is at least eating SOMETHING. I'll try the Tums and I think we have some dried lavender, does it have to be fresh?

She does seem to be drinking, but the barn kitten has a new habit (sticking his head through the bars on her cage and drinking her water, he's either very brave or incredibly stupid) so it may not be her, but she drinks every time I fill it.

 

[MaggieJ]

I'd try some kitchen oatmeal, dandelions or plantain... almost anything to get her eating more than just hay... although that is something, at least. The lavender does not have to be fresh as in still growing, but if it is dried and older than a year it may not have much of the medicinal ingredient left in it.

 

[Cattle Cait]

Well, we FINALLY found a vet that would care for a rabbit. I took her in today and the vet palpated her. Turns out she had two retained fetuses that died about 3 weeks in or so. Pepper started oozing blood on the exam table (lovely, right?) so they got some fluids in her, gave her a shot of B-12 and some other sort of medicine and sent us home with some antibiotics to prevent infection. Vet told me that hopefully she would abort in the next 24 hours and, sure enough, she aborted on the way home.

Pepper has been moved up to the garage from the barn so we can monitor her for the next few days, but she seems to feel MUCH better now that those babies are out of her.

 

[MaggieJ]

I'm glad you found a vet for her. I know how special Pepper is to you. Hope she makes a full and speedy recovery!

 

[ladysown]

Oh yeah! sounds like she'll be okay then.

 

[OneAcreFarm]

Glad to hear that things got sorted out with Miss Pepper!

 

[currituckbun]

So glad she is doing better. That was a close call.

 

[fuzzy9]

Glad Pepper is on the mend!

 

[Cattle Cait]

Thanks everyone

She has moved back to the barn after her few days in luxury in the garage. Pep is eager to run loose again, I guess she'll be going to the big show in November since she's got no babies! Lucky her!

 

[AvatarFarm]

Glad she's doing better.