toffeeandbuttons
New Kit
my lionhead doe gave birth 10 days ago, it was acidental but not her first litter so we knew what to do, bring them inside, seperate from buck, keep warm ect. Four of them are quite big and chunky now, with all their fur and eyes that look almost ready to open. But one of them, aptly named 'moley' still hasnt got all his fur, bless him/her, he has little pink patches and looks more like a little mole than the others who look like proper rabbits now. He is also half the size of the others with a skinny body while the others have bulging tums and is always at the bottom of the pile. This came to our attention a few days ago so following advice from the internet we tried to coax her to feed him by putting him next to her, but everytime he got underneath and latched onto a nip, she hopped off. So i tried to hold her there, which worked for twenty seconds tops before she started kicking and trying to get away, so not wanting her to hurt the baby or stress herself out i had to let her go. Then my mum came up with the idea of holding her on my lap and putting moley underneath her while stroking and reasuring her. But i cant even tell if moley is suckling, he just seems to be lieing under her, and after a while she nips me and gets aggitated and wants to go back in with her other babies. I just tried to turn her on her back and so i could latch moley onto a nip as a last resort, again seen suggested online, but she got really stressed, her ears went back, and she was not happy so i gave up, the last thing i want to do is put her off suckling. Moley seems to get tinier and wrinklier every day while the others are growing like nobodys buisness. Am i being paranoid, should i leave her to it? has anyone had experience with this before and has suggestions? I know every litter has a runt, and as none of them have died, this one is clearly the weakling in the litter but i cant let the poor guy/gal die!