Woes of first time moms

[ollitos]

Two of our first time moms had litters on the wire. One was fine because there was enough fur pulled. The other, we lost 4 of the 7 because they were chilled.

These two does are also not feeding their kits. A third wasn't feed hers either and the entire litter of 9 was dead this morning. For these two, I took a chair out to the pasture, put kits in a thick towel, then pulled the doe out of the pen. I basically had her sit on my lap over the open towel. I pulled the sides of the towel up so the kits would stay warm and not fall off my lap. Both does tolerated this very well and all the kits had fat, fat bellies when I was done.

I'm really hoping this will jump start these does and they'll do it on their own from now on. Has anyone had to do this? Has it helped? Has the doe started feeding the kits on their own? Or am I screwed at this point?

 

[3mina]

You'll know either way tomorrow when you check those nests

 

[AnnClaire]

Good luck!!! Sometimes they need a little jump start for things to "click" ... hope they get it!

 

[SarahMelisse]

With one doe I had it work well and with another doe I had to hand feed the kits for the first four days. I suspect her milk hadn't come in yet, but if I didn't supplement those first four days... all nine kits would have surely died.

 

[Amy]

I had to do that with both of my does litters, especially one of them.
We did the flipping method, boy was that a lot of work usually taking 2 sets of hands, those babies wriggle get latched and wriggle, unlatch, etc. I think I'll try your method next time.
These were my first litters, so still learning a lot as I go-maybe they would've been fine without my help, but they seemed unfed.?