Care of rabbits

For profitable rabbit farming, reproduction plays a vital role. Female rabbit is ready to accept male at about 6 month of age whereas male starts mating from 7 month onwards.

• For successful mating, doe should be put to the buck's cage and watch carefully for successful mating. In successful mating, doe emits a sound and buck falls on either side of the doe. If female does not allow the male, repeat the same procedure after 4 days. Sometimes some does require assisted mating.
• Right time of mating is either early morning or evening of a day.
• Check the pregnancy 14-15 days after mating by palpating the abdomen. If not pregnant, go for re breeding.
• Their pregnancy period is around 30 days.
• Pregnant does should be shifted to the kindling cage at 25th day of pregnancy.
• Pregnant doe generally starts making nest by plucking her own hair one or two days before kindling. If she does not pluck hair, give some fine quality straw in the cage.
• A doe generally gives birth to 6-7 kids. Kids are devoid of any hair and eyes are closed.
• Watch carefully immediately after birth and check the condition of kids. Do not touch the kids until some emergency comes and use the gloves in such a case.
• Doe gives milk once or twice a day. So, keep all the kids together for proper feeding.
• Remove dead or defective kids from the cage.
• Sometimes does kills her own kids or does not give milk especially after first kindling. If that Particular doe repeats the same habit at the next kindling, it is advisable to cull that doe.
• Give adequate amount of balanced ration along with plenty of clean drinking water for the production of sufficient milk.
• Eyes of kids generally open at the age of 10 days.
• Hair start growing from two weeks of age.
• At three weeks of age, kids will also start taking feed along with mother's milk.
• Best time to wean kids is at 42 days.
• Breeding buck and doe should be kept in individual cages.
• Rebreeding of doe should be performed immediately after weaning.
• One adult doe can give 4-5 kindlings a year depending on the space availability and scientific management practices.
• For efficient breeding of rabbits, the male to female ratio should be1:5.
• A mature buck can successfully mate 4-6 does a week.
• Buck should not be overfed to avoid overweight and deceased libido.
• Keep the productive and reproductive data of buck and doe.