What is Wrong with Her? -Help-

[The_Dutchess]

My blue Silver fox doe has 9 3 week old kits. And despite being free fed and eating like a horse, when I feel her spine it is spiky, and she is quite thin. She is just sickly looking, not her normal self. I think the kits are taking a toll on her, though they aren't nursing much anymore. But for 3 days now, she has started sneezing repeatedly, especially when stressed. The insides of all four of her paws are matted, but I think it might be from pee, because the kits peed on a piece of cardboard I had in the cage and the doe and kits all laid one it, but I'm not sure... I have been checking her nose repeatedly, and I can't find much, just usually a tiny bit of clear snot way in her nostrils. Some may know that I had a close call with pasteurella; a couple of our rabbits were taken to a 4-H meeting and handled after a rabbit infected with pasteurella. So we waited out the incubation period and none got it. We made sure that the rabbits were properly quarantined, fed last, and that anyone who fed or handled the rabbits used hand sanitizer. The doe and kits should not have been exposed to pasteurella. So do you think this is pasteurella or do you think it is just allergies mixed with exhaustion from the kits? If pictures are need of her nose, paws, etc. I can get you pictures.

 

[arachyd]

Pee would not mat her paws it would wet or stain them. You won't find a lot of snot because she's wiping it on her paws.

 

[The_Dutchess]

I do NOT want the babies getting sick...should I separate them? What do I do?

 

[OneAcreFarm]

I do NOT want the babies getting sick...should I separate them? What do I do?

Unfortunately, if she is sick, the babies are already exposed. If you cull the doe, you will need to keep the kits in isolation, as they can start showing symptoms as they grow.

 

[Miss M]

We just dealt with a similar situation yesterday.

Galadriel noticed some snot on the nose of one of our "accidental" does, as we were filling water bottles. She was still nursing 4-week-old kits. We finished the bottles up quickly, and then dispatched and butchered her immediately. Thankfully, there was barely any spikiness to her paws at all, so I think we caught it really early.

Fortunately, the kits were already raiding the J-feeder. Bunny-Wan Kenobi got some oats and mixed them with a little blackstrap molasses, and put that out there for them, and they attacked it eagerly.

For 3-week-olds, if you cull the doe, you can soak oatmeal in goat's milk (can be bought canned next to the evaporated and condensed milk, or in cartons some places with the milk.

:clover:

 

[The_Dutchess]

Now all of the sudden she is completely fine except for the occasional clear snot. I am thinking maybe it was allergies? Or what is the rabbit version of bronchitis like? I don't think it was pasteurella.

 

[ek.blair]

It is possible that it was just an air pollutant that irritated her respiratory tract, and I will keep my fingers crossed for you that that is all that it was. I would keep a SUPER close eye on her all the same though.

 

[Miss M]

Now all of the sudden she is completely fine except for the occasional clear snot. I am thinking maybe it was allergies? Or what is the rabbit version of bronchitis like? I don't think it was pasteurella.

Keep your guard up... something in the back of my brain is telling me that I've read that sometimes the snot will disappear when it goes into pneumonia. :hmm:

But it is possible it was allergies. After we dispatched the doe, my son pulled the hay off of the top of the cage so he could put it in a feeder on the front of the cage, where the kits could reach it (it had been up there for a few days, because the feeder had fallen off into the chicken stuff and needed cleaning). When he pulled it off, he was enveloped in this cloud of dust. He asked me if I was sure I wanted the kits to have that hay, and he shook it slightly when I looked. I was horrified. So the doe may have been reacting to the mold in the hay, rather than having Pasteurella.

It's all in what you are willing to take a chance with.