dying bunnies

Question
Hi,

I have a litter of rabbits that are about 2 month old. They are eating well and look healthy until I woke up and found one dead.  It showed no signs of injury and had seem healthy the day before.  The next day I found another one dying, it was limp and was holding its head back, it has some discharge from the nose and was gasping for air.  It died very soon after I found it.  This morning I found another baby doing the same thing.  Very congested nasal passage, gasping for air, holding its head back and died very soon after.... All babies seemed perfectly healthy just hours before... any suggestions.

Answer
Dear Carrie,

Baby rabbits--especially if they have been weaned before 8 weeks of age--are extremely susceptible to respiratory infections (which is what this sounds like) and also to gastrointestinal (GI) infections.  Their mother's milk provides antibodies that protect them and help their own immune systems develop, and if they don't get a full eight weeks of mother's milk, they will not be as healthy as those who do.

For upper respiratory infections, the only remedy is antibiotics from an experienced rabbit vet, whom you can find here:

www.rabbit.org/vets

Please also read:

www.bio.miami.edu/hare/sneezing.html

Some vets will not prescribe fluoroquinolone antibiotics (e.g., Baytril, cipro) for a baby because some studies have shown that these drugs can adversely affect cartilage development--in *dogs*.  This has not been demonstrated in rabbits, and we have used this class of drugs safely with babies many times.  I mention this because many vets might err on the side of conservative antibiotics and prescribe a sulfa (e.g., septra, albon, etc.), and most of these are totally useless against a respiratory infection, whereas the fluoroquinolones often work well.

I hope you can save the remaining babies, and that they will be healthy from now on.

Good luck,

Dana