Is it possible that the mom rabbit will eat her babies? The extremely short answer is yes.
The better answer is – the incidence of does eating their young is unusual, and we do not know of any does that just up and eat their babies for no factor.
Why Do Rabbits Eat Their Babies?
Bunnies are prey animals that exist at the bottom of the hierarchy. In the bunny’s perspective, everything out there has a huge set of fangs or a very sharp beak, along with a huge appetite. But that doesn’t mean it simply gives itself up and lays down on the dinner plate. The doe does all she can to personally survive and keep having infants for the good of the species.
If she is in the procedure of kindling or if she has a young litter, and after that gets scared for her life, it is well documented that she might eat her children, ruining any evidence that would draw in predators or minimize her opportunity of survival.
If those kits were even a few days old (in the wild), this doe would likely currently be pregnant with her next litter. She will run away to make it through another day so she can have her next litter and ideally raise much more infants.
Do rabbits eat their young babies? If a new mom bunny is stressed or fearful, she may respond by consuming the litter. Instinct might be informing her that the possibility of her litter making it through would be better in another time or place.
Given an unstressed birth, eating a whole litter is rare, but eating one or two packages is not uncommon. The mother might have found that a person of the sets is hurt, defective or too runty to make it through. In rare cases, a doe might constantly eat her babies, possibly since she struggles with some nutritional shortage. In such cases, it is best not to continue breeding the animal.
After giving birth, a mom rabbit usually licks her newborn packages clean. Then she consumes the placenta and all of the other materials that brought out the litter. This habits prevails amongst little mammals because placental product offers nutrients that the mom requires after giving birth and might promote lactation. Consuming the afterbirth may likewise be a way of getting rid of traces of childbirth, which may attract predators.
Also read: What Should You Do If You Find a Baby Rabbits Nest?
