Pregnant Rabbits
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Because this is a wiki dedicated to general pet rabbit care, we believe all pet rabbits should be spayed and neutered and not given the opportunity to make more babies. With the amount of rabbits available for adoption in local shelters and rabbit rescues, we do not encourage the casual breeding of rabbits without obtaining the healthiest of stock available from reputable breeders as well as a responsible plan for the babies that does not encourage dumping intact unwanted rabbits in the streets or in the shelters. See Breeding for more details.
However, in the event of an accidental pregnancy because you placed two intact rabbits together of the opposite sex out of ignorance or on accident, we will provide the following helpful information to deal with the situation.
Contents |
Detecting a Pregnancy
Fetal palpation is possible from 10-14 days.[1][2] Pregnancies can be detected radiologically at 11 days.[1]
The links below contain more information about how to detect a rabbit pregnancy.
- Pet Rabbits, How to Care for Pregnant and Baby Rabbits
The following pages are from rabbit breeding sites. Please do not take this referral as condoning rabbit breeding for the common house rabbit owner. We provide these links purely for information.
- Raising-Rabbits.com, 5 Clues to the Pregnant Rabbit
- Rabbit Breeding for Beginners, Gestation and Birth > Telling if She's Pregnant
- ARBA, Charlcie Gill, The Art of Palpation
Discovering a Pregnancy
If you have discovered that one of your intact female rabbits has become pregnant, please consider giving the bun an emergency spay to terminate the pregnancy. A pregnancy detected after 2.5 weeks is probably too far along for an emergency spay without harming the mother,[3] but talk to your local rabbit-savvy veterinarian to get a professional opinion. There are enough unwanted pet rabbits in shelters all over the world, and there is no need to bring more into life without the firm knowledge there will be loving permanent homes for every single one of them until the end of their natural lifespan.
Taking Care of a Pregnant Rabbit and Her Litter
See the following links for more information. Also check out Baby Domestic Rabbits.
- Dana Krempels, Ph.D., Surprise Litter of Babies! What to do now?
- House Rabbit Society, Sandi Koi, Domestic Baby Bunnies and Their Mom
- ArticleSnatch.com, Josey Ramosse, Tips For The Care Of Pregnant Rabbits And Their Litter
- House Rabbit Society of Singapore, Jinny Tan, Pregnancy & Rabbits
- MediRabbit, Offspring feeding time
Further Reading
- The Merck Manual for Pet Health, Breeding and Reproduction of Rabbits
See Also
References
- ↑ 1.0 1.1 Frances Harcourt-Brown, Textbook of Rabbit Medicine, 2002.
- ↑ Emma Keeble, Anna Meredith, et al., Rabbit Medicine & Surgery, 2006.
- ↑ Rabbits United, Abortion in rabbits
