07/02/2026
This isn’t a glamorous part of rabbit keeping, but this is why we ALWAYS check the nest box, EVERY day! (pics nested in comments)
Especially in the first few days, and as eyes begin to open and kits may wander out.
Don’t mind the old timers who tell you to never handle kits or the mom will eat them, if your rabbits are stressed enough to eat a litter for normal handling, they are better off in the freezer. Nobody should be allowing nervous systems like that to reproduce as livestock.
8 out of 9 pregnant does have kindled, and they’ve all been doing great with their litters, but mortality rates in rabbits are naturally very high.
Rabbits are an animal of high fecundity- their reproductive strategy is to produce a very large number of offspring with the hope a few make it to reproductive age. Short gestation periods, rapid maturation, availability for instant re-impregnation, minimal maternal obligations, and large litter size are all adaptations for a life where most of them aren’t going to make it. This lifestyle often prioritizes quantity over quality of offspring, there’s fairly high levels of anomalies, the weak don’t survive and mortality rates are high. Even with domesticated rabbits in carefully controlled farm settings, lots of things can go wrong.
In the nest check yesterday I discovered 2 NZ kits that had died during labor and the doe struggled to pass until the next day. In another nest I found another 2 NZ kits passed, one with an umbilical injury that ruptured, and one displaced to the corner of the nest and died from cold. A Californian kit that was large and healthy at birth was passed away today, it appears to have a severe overbite that prevented latching.
Had I left them in the nest they would have begun to rot, attracting flies and predators, putting the rest of the litter at risk and stressing the does. One mom had already peed on the litter hoping to cover the smell from predators, now that the nest is cleaned she’s caring for her kits normally. This is why I always track how many kits are supposed to be in each nest, and count every day!
