Food for abandoned baby rabbit

by Sindhu
(India)

My doe has given birth to 6 babies. We unknowingly removed the babies and kept them in a tiny cardboard box. The doe is not ready to give milk or it is refusing. The babies are abandoned now. We had fed them with milk using a tiny funnel but found 3 of them dead the very next day. now after 3 days we are left with only one baby. What care and what food we should give the baby rabbit?


****Karen Sez****
Since does only feed once a day, I wonder if she was actually feeding the babies but you didn't realize it? Or, what are the chances she herself was hungry and did not have enough milk for the babies? Additionally, not having enough protein in the food is another reason why a doe would abandon her kits, the other being very poor mothering instincts to start with.

For the little singleton kit remaining of the litter hope for survival dwindles, but let's try...

Raw, unpasteurized goat or cow milk is good, but don't get it into the little guy's lungs. When the kit's eyes open, and before feeding solid food, you must feed the kit a cecotrope slurry for three days before starting solids. Mix the doe's cecotrope into a bit of milk. Crush it, mush it, and mix till it is smooth enough to feed. This is a crucial step which adds friendly bacteria into the kit's intestinal tract, without which it will for sure die. There are more directions here: https://www.raising-rabbits.com/feeding-wild-rabbits.html. Plus we highly recommend following the link on that page to Squirrelworld where you'll get guidance from the experts.

Good luck and God bless you,
K

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