Are you rabbit lovers, my friends? If yes, then you might need to know of how the baby rabbits survive their first live. Yes, as one of the most popular pet on earth, there’s a ton of wonderful features that make people love them (apologize, for the hyperbole – but, it’s true!). First thing first, the most striking thing about them are their physical features: their fluffy, soft fur, small size, the iconic teeth and two straight up high ears that everyone adore. These reasons – actually – are the primarily reasons why people want to pet rabbits.
Although there’s so many rabbits keep as pet, there are – still – some of them that prefer to roam the wildlife and nature. Live in their own habitat, play hide and seek under bushes, and sometime decided to take a visit on your garden to taste your delicious plants and vegetables; that’s the main job of wild rabbit. If you – whatsoever – interest to catch and tame wild rabbit and keep him as pet, I would recommend you to read article to learn how to tame wild rabbit: how to care for wild rabbit as a pet.
Furthermore, there are many species available on breeders and animal stores, all you need to do is pick the right one that suit to your lifestyle and environment. Rabbit’s breed examples are Mix Rex rabbit, Pygmy rabbit, Flemish Giant rabbit, Holland Lop, Angora rabbit, and many more. Pay attention to rabbit’s need should be your number one priority. Examples: rabbit need a new habitat once he comes to your house, therefore, it is a must for you to prepare the rabbit cage for him.
Rabbit cage is not the only equipment that rabbit’s need, they also need some friendly rabbit toys to make them happy and busy – especially, because you – absolutely, would not always present for him all the time. So, those toys keep rabbit accompany while he’s left alone in the house. Therefore, it would be better if you pet more than one rabbit just to prevent loneliness. Furthermore, some owners often time was aimed to breed their rabbits.
If you was ever have a though to breed your rabbit, you need to know better how life cycle of rabbit is repeated and most certain thing, know how the baby rabbits survive their first live.
Rabbit Life Cycle
To understand more about how baby rabbit survive, you need to know about the life cycle of rabbit in general. There are four stages of rabbit’s life cycle: juvenile, young adult, middle age, and geriatric. In every stage, rabbits exhibit different treatment and needs. Therefore, as a pet under your supervision, you must recognize his need and know what’s best for him in his particular age. I would explain a little bit about the four stages:
- Juvenile: there are several stages juvenile of rabbit: first month (baby), second month (approximately about six to eight weeks), third month (when rabbit hit the puberty, which is around twelve weeks), four to six months, and the last six to twelve months.
- Young Adult: this is the next stage after the juvenile. A young adult rabbit would start developing a different diet habit and environmental enrichment.
- The Middle Age: when a rabbit reach middle age, the main priority as owner is to continue the annual Calicivirus to keep them safe from any virus and disease. Middle age stage is a fragile stage; make sure you keep supply him with benefit things to maintain his health status.
- Geriatric: is the term and stage for rabbits that reach over six years old. As your rabbit is getting older, you must adjust his environmental based on his physical condition.
The Baby Rabbits
One certain thing, baby rabbits couldn’t be separate from their mother (unless they were orphans). Approximately until hit eight weeks, you are disallowed to remove baby rabbit from the mother. Breastfeed from the mother would help the babies to develop immune systems and digestion. Let me warn you, if you buy a rabbit that still in the stage of milk fed, there’s a high possibility he won’t survive. You better keep it in mind, my dear friends.
The best option of age to buy is eight weeks or over from breeders of stores. If they ever offer you rabbit under eight weeks, for the sake of you and the baby, you must refuse it. Moreover, at some countries, selling rabbits under eight weeks are classified as illegal activities, one of the example is in America. So, the survival of baby rabbits are totally depended on the mothers. All you need to do is provide the best environment for the mother and baby – especially the mother.
To produce a healthy milk, the mother need to supply with rich nutrient of foods. Therefore, you should provide a fresh hays such as timothy hays every day. Provide a comfortable nesting place where the mother could take care of their kittens – and yes, the baby rabbits are commonly called as kittens. Furthermore, kitten survival also depend on the temperature of their surrounds environment. Under seven days, the temperature must be around twenty-seven to thirty degree Celsius.
Your duty would extremely increase if the baby was an orphan. At least, if he has a mother, he would get the warm from mother’s body. But, if he was an orphan, his body temperature was totally depended on you. Place the baby inside the box with hay, or other soft materials such as fleece and cloths, and put the box in quiet place. Furthermore, there are many cases that the mother was refused to feed her kittens.
Due to situation like this, there’s no other option but feed them by yourself. Use toy doll bottles or other small bottle to feed the baby, and the rule is only feed him twice a day. You must be careful, overfeeding baby rabbit would lead to fatal problem – even the death itself. This is how baby rabbit would survive in first live – the power of motherhood. Well, the mother could be the rabbit mom… or you. It’s totally depend on the situation buddy.