Gerald Proverbs
& Robert Quintyne
MANAGEMENT TIPS
Profits from your rabbits depend largely upon your abilities as
a good manager and businessman.
Success requires that you practice sound management. This
means spending as much time as you can with your rabbits
and observing their behaviour. Changes in their normal
behaviour pattern are indicators that all is not right. The first
principle for success is to keep up-to-date records.
RECORDS
The only index for determining if your rabbits are producing
profitably is by keeping accurate production records. If hutch
record cards are not available it is easy to make up cards with
the following information.
By keeping these cards up-to-date you will be able to trace
which individuals or families are doing the best as far as
health, faster growth, and better developed carcasses go.
As a guide, it is a general rule of thumb that the average doe
should produce 110 lbs. (50 kg.) of live rabbits per year. This
means that does would need to produce four litters of seven
young each per year and the fryers would have to average just
over three and a half pounds (1.6 kg.) when marketed at eight
weeks of age.
In North America the average commercial rabbit producer
produces 160 lbs. (73 kg.) live rabbits per doe from five litters
per year. The average size litter numbers eight animals at
market weight.
KINDLING TIME (BIRTH TIME)
The normal gestation (pregnancy) period for a doe is 31 days
from the date of mating. A nest box filled with a suitable
nesting material should be placed in the does hutch on the
27th day after mating. A word of warning avoid disturbing
the doe as much as possible just before and after kindling,
since too much attention at this time may discourage the doe
from settling down with her litter.
This is especially true with first litter does.
The day after the litter has been born you should check to see
if they are alive, but unnecessary handling should be avoided.
Does that destroy or desert their young should be butchered. If
they show poor mothering with the first litter they will repeat
their performance with all subsequent litters.
LITIER SIZE
The litter will vary from six to ten young; in rare cases litters
have numbered up to 18.
The doe is equipped to satisfactorily nurse a litter of eight
young to a proper weaning weight. The weaning weight for
the breed is the standard that every doe should be made to
measure up to. Avoid unnecessary losses by keeping does
which produce small litters.
 Does with large litters should have the numbers reduced
to eight by the time the litter is three days old. If there is
another doe who has kindled a small litter on the same day,
two or three days before, or the day after the doe with the
large litter, she can be made to accept the excess young from
large litters.
Usually a doe can be fooled into thinking the adopted
babies are her own if some of her nesting material is rubbed
on the young that are given to her. Some does are more
sensitive than others, therefore you will have to out-smart
them by rubbing a little "Vick's" on their noses to prevent
them from smelling the foreign odor of the adopted young.
CARE OF LITTERS
On the day after kindling inspect the litter. Quietly
place your hand in the nest box and remove any deformed,
undersized, or dead young. If you are quiet and careful in
making the inspection the doe will not object too much. If
she is irritable and nervous, place some tempting feed, such
as a carrot or greens, in the hutch immediately before the
inspection to distract her attention.
Baby rabbits are born without hair and their eyes remain
closed until about 10 or 11 days after birth. Sometime
between three and four weeks of age they will leave the nest
box. Their future lies in the care you give them and the
nursing doe. If young rabbits come out of the nest before
three weeks, they may not be getting enough mother's milk
or the nest box may be too warm.
Should the litter emerge before three weeks make
sure that they have plenty of water and young green
forage so that they can get a good start.
Many commercial breeders weight their litters at three
weeks and use this figure as an index for a doe's milking
capacity. Weighing the litter again at eight weeks is
necessary to keep your records up-to-date.
WEANING THE LITTER
Good mothers nurse their litters for six to eight weeks.
The young develop more rapidly if they are in the
hutch with their mothers until they are eight weeks of
age. By that time, milk production will have decreased
and the young will be accustomed to consuming other
feed. It is a good management practice to rebreed the
doe as soon as the litter is weaned. Separate the sexes at
weaning.
Some breeders and most large commercial operators
get an extra litter from their does by breeding the nursing
doe when her Utter is 35 days old and allowing the
young to stay with the doe for the full eight weeks. In
this system a doe produces five litters per year.
SEPARATION OF YOUNG
Separate the sexes at weaning. Replacement bucks should
be placed in individual hutches when they are four months
old to prevent fighting. On the other hand does may be kept
in lots of 10 or 12 in rearing pens until 18 days before they
are bred. Sometimes it may become necessary to separate the
does at an earlier date because of fighting.
PROPER HANDLING
Rabbits should be handled as little as possible. Yet it is a
good practice to occasionally pet or touch young
replacement breeders. Such a practice helps to accustom
them to being handled. Rabbits should never be lifted by the
ears or legs because handling in this manner invariably leads
to injury.