feeding baby cottontails

from looking at them, and pictures online, i estimated they were about 2.5 weeks old.

basically, for reference, i pretty strictly followed this website for all the feeding info: http://rabbit.org/faq-orphaned-baby-bunnies/

we headed to petco, got some powdered KMR, then headed to walmart to pick up the acidophilus. we ground up the acidophilus pill into a powder, but i think you can buy them in capsules and just break open the capsule. 

let me also say that everything i read said how fragile baby bunnies are. they apparently can die like *THAT*, so i was uber paranoid with my care. i didn't want to screw anything up! we have a scale in our kitchen for measuring food, so i used that to measure all the bunnies before each feeding.

i followed the directions on the can for mixing the KMR with warm water, and added a pinch of the acidophilus powder to the liquid KMR mixture. i then used a pipette to feed the KMR to the babies. i started off with just two feedings per day, as advised by the above website, but they weren't really gaining very much, just sort of stable or moving up very, very little (and we're talking like 1 gram here), so i upped it to 3 feedings per day and that really helped out a ton. at each feeding, i started out with 6oz. of KMR per bunny, per feeding, but then after like 5 days, i moved it up to 9oz. per bunny/feeding. i started off slow with the feedings because almost everything i read said the #1 cause of death is overfeeding. they can die easily because of bloat.

basically the key to all things baby bunnies is TAKE. IT. SLOW. they are so fragile, and 90% of the time the babies will die. so yeah, i was freaked out because i didn't want to kill them! they can die just even from getting too scared! 

so i kept weighing them and feeding them the KMR mixture for about a week or two, then decided they were old enough to start on pellets.

now with the pellets, i didn't want to just go to the pet store and pick up a bag of rabbit food. i wanted to make sure it was healthy and nutritious for them, while keeping all the crap/junk out of it. once again, i did my research, and found this food to be great:

manna pro select series pro formula feed for rabbits. we got it from our local tractor supply company, and it came in 25lb. and 50lb. bags. the best part? high quality feed for only $9 for a 25lb. bag! and $16 for the 50lb. bag. they took to it right away, so i was thrilled. i just put a weighted bowl into their cage and filled it up with these pellets. here is the description with ingredients and all that so if you don't have a tractor supply company near you, you can find a feed with similar ingredients:

Manna Pro® Select Series™ PRO Formula Rabbit Food is a complete feed for all classes of rabbits. A well-known and trusted brand among rabbit breeders. Contains 16% protein.

Ingredients:
Dehydrated alfalfa meal, wheat middlings, soybean hulls, soybean meal, feeding oatmeal, cane molasses, vegetable oil, brewers dried yeast, saccharomyces cerevisiae fermentation solubles, dl-methionine, calcium carbonate, monocalcium phosphate, dicalcium phosphate, salt, ferrous carbonate, ferrous sulfate, copper sulfate, manganous oxide, manganese sulfate, zinc oxide, zinc sulfate, cobalt carbonate, calcium iodate, sodium selenite, vitamin A supplement, vitamin D3 supplement, vitamin E supplement, thiamine mononitrate, riboflavin supplement, niacin supplement, choline chloride, calcium pantothenate, pyridoxine hydrochloride, folic acid, biotin, vitamin B12 supplement.

Guaranteed Analysis:
Crude Protein (min.) 16.00 %, Crude Fat (min.) 2.50 %, Crude Fiber (min.) 16.00 %, Crude Fiber (max.) 21.00 %, Calcium (min.) 0.75 %, Calcium (max.) 1.25 %, Phosphorus (min.) 0.50 %, Salt (min.) 0.25 %, Salt (max.) 0.75 %, Vitamin A (min.) 3,000 IU/lb.

you want to have the protein be at least at 16%, and since rabbit breeders and people who put their rabbits into shows fed their bunnies this food, i figured it was good/safe for me! plus, the price was unbeatable. 

i also wanted to make sure they could drink from a water bottle since it is a foreign object to them. after showing them a few times, they caught on, and that was that! they were now on pellets and a water bottle. MUCH easier on me! haha...i weighed them two more times after this change and their weight was no longer ever a worry. they were gaining weight like champs :) 

the next post is about deciding to keep or release back into the wild.

to keep, or not to keep?