desperate first time

Question
Hello... I thought I had 2 bucks, to my surprise i woke to find a 6 babies in the cage, one dead. I quickly removed the remaining 5 and since bought kitten replacement milk for them. However, I have read that the mothers milk is the best, so my daughter and i decided that i would hold momma bunny and she would place the kits one by one on the momma to feed. My worry is that I am not sure if the momma is producing milk.. they were born yesterday morning, they seem ok but im not sure if there is some way of checking to see if momma is producing milk or not. I do not want to overfeed them or starve them.. How can i be sure? please help me.. Ive never had to nurse kits and i really do not want them to die.


Answer
Mother's milk is indeed the best for the babies.

This site has some good info for surprise litters of babies:
http://www.bio.miami.edu/hare/surpriselitter.html

Basically, you want to let mama spend time with the babies.  You probably won't see her nurse, rabbits only do that once or twice a day.  That site also tells you what to look for in the babies to determine if they are not getting enough of what they need.

And obviously, keep daddy away from mama until he's neutered.  Rabbits can get pregnant again right after giving birth.

This site has info on what to feed the rabbits as they grow older: http://www.rabbit.org/faq/sections/diet.html

This site also has more information on what to do for babies: http://www.rabbit.org/care/babies.html

Read up on this and let mama take care of matters herself.  Rabbits do things differently then cats and dogs.  Provide a safe, quiet, low stress environment for mama to take care of her young.  And make sure to give mama plenty of good quality food.

Good luck with your babies.