It can be extremely difficult to determine the sex of a young rabbit. Although the explanation and diagram below will help you, it is best to have a knowledgeable person reveal you how to sex rabbits of various ages.
Sexing Rabbits: Male or Female?
To determine the sex of a rabbit:
- Hold the bunny on his/her back on your lap with the hind legs facing far from you. With a larger bunny, you might want to hold the bunny with his/her hind legs facing towards you. Placing a bunny on his/her back will put the rabbit into a state nearly like a hypnotic trance. Bunnies still feel pain while in this position, and should not be held by doing this for a prolonged period of time.
- When first learning how to sex a rabbit, it will be helpful if another individual gently restrains the head of the bunny while you use both hands to part the fur and apply gentle pressure on each side of the vent, which is the area consisting of the rectum and the genital areas. (The anus is essentially the opening of the intestines to the outdoors from which droppings are gotten rid of. The genital areas are the external parts of the reproductive tract.) As soon as you have more experience, you can limit the bunny’s head with one hand, and apply the mild pressure with the other.
- While using pressure to the vent area, you will see the anus, the opening closest to the tail.
- The opening farthest from the tail is the genitals.
Males: In male bunnies, the penis will appear as a tubular protrusion. It is round in diameter, really light pink in young males, and has a rounded pointer with a little round opening at its center. In the majority of bucks (male rabbits) older than 10 weeks, you will also see the testicles on each side and somewhat cranial to the penis. They will seem like little mounds under the skin, and in older males, are not covered with fur. Bucks can withdraw the testicles into the abdomen, so even if you can not feel the testicles, the bunny might still be a male.
Women: When the mild pressure is applied to the vent area of a doe (female rabbit), you will see a pink protrusion, but the protrusion is inclined, more oval, and has a slit versus a little round opening.
Other sexual differences in older rabbits
As bunnies age, more physical distinctions between the sexes will become apparent. Bucks have blockier heads and are smaller sized than does of the exact same breed. A lot of adult does of medium or large breeds will have a dewlap, which is the big fold of skin under their chins. Does have nipples, whereas bucks do not. However, the nipples might be hard to discover on a doe that has not had a litter. So, just like the testicles in the males, even if you can not discover the nipples on a bunny, the bunny could still be a doe.
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