Rare Heritage Rabbits

Keeping rabbits alive in the summer is one of the most difficult jobs of raising rabbits. I'm in central eastern MO where we are into the triple digits with high double digit humidity. Typical MO summer weather here. Hot and humid! And no relief in sight for several days.

If your nest boxes are removable, take them in the house during the day. Don't worry, the Does will take them back and nurse them when you take them back out. If you have cats and/or dogs in the house, put the nest boxes in one room that you can close off to keep 'curious' house pets out of them. Make sure to label the nest boxes, so you can match them up with the right Doe.

Got a late term Doe who's really stressing in the heat? Take her in the house. I ALWAYS keep three or four cages I can use in the house. It's a pain, but it can save the Doe and litters lives.

Got a fan on the rabbits? Not blowing directly on them, heavens NO! But blowing air AROUND them. Circulating it. That will help to cool them. Don't be chintzy. Use as many fans as necessary to ease your animals. I even have an old box fan I bought at a garage sale for $1.00 with only one speed out on my chickens to help THEM deal with the heat! It helps a GREAT deal to have air moving.

If you can't take your nest boxes in the house, remove as much bedding as you safely can. And check them two or three times a day, or as frequently as you can so that you aren't having to find and remove really 'putrid' messes. Personally, I don't normally breed during June, July or August. And it's not because my Bucks go sterile, I always keep back a couple younger Bucks to deal with THAT problem. It's to keep pregnancy stress off the Does. I carried my daughter in the summer heat and I KNOW how miserable it is! LOL My OB told me that carrying a baby is like carrying a little furnace burning on high inside you! Just imagine being a Doe and having 6-10 little furnaces on high inside you!

As frequently as you can, give the rabbits fresh, COOL water during the day. Not ice cold, but COOL. An ice cube or two in the water bowl won't make the water cold, but it will cool it enough to help give the rabbits some relief from the heat when they drink. Also, by using BOWLS or CROCKS instead of bottles, the rabbits can curl around them to help cool off. I use old pots and pans (when they freeze they don't break) and believe me, my rabbits spend a LOT of time curled up around them. Especially right after I dump them out and refill with cool water. Being home all day, on really hot days I water my rabbits up to 5 or 6 times or MORE a day!

You both work and are gone all day? Get a neighbor that's home to go check on the rabbits at least once or twice during the day. Even if you can't get anyone to check on the rabbits, try to have someone that will call you at work if the power goes off because then your fan(s) will go off and other steps will have to be taken.

No close neighbors? Spend $10 or $20 dollars on a cheap answering machine and call several times during the day yourself. If the answering machine doesn't answer, you can usually bet that your electricity if off. Then you can take steps to implement an alternate plan to help your rabbits. Keep bottles of water out with the rabbits in case your water goes off. If you live in the country and are on a well, if the electric goes out, there goes your well, too. Make sure to have a back-up source of water. Poured into a bucket, even a few 20 ounce soda bottles of water, frozen, will cool that water enough to provide the rabbits relief if you have to water them with that. Just make sure that you periodically change your stored water to keep it fairly fresh. In a pinch, buy bags of ice and put them in a bucket. Let them melt, but don't use the melt water while it's still cold. Let it warm a bit until it's just nice and cool. Even if you are on city water, you can STILL loose it if the power goes out to the water plant. So you need to keep back-up water available as well, and also periodically change it to keep it fairly fresh.

SIGNS OF HEAT STROKE OR HEAT PROSTRATION: Please read and learn these symptoms!

If you go out and find a rabbit laying with it's head thrown back, ears back and panting, that's a rabbit in the first stages of heat stroke. Cool if off. Quickly. Keep a bucket of water at the ambient temperature of the air on hand all the time. Add enough fresh water to COOL it off, not to make it cold. Then dunk the rabbit, making sure it's ears are wet (but not it's muzzle!!). Ears are where rabbits loose excess heat. Not panting. Some people prefer to mist or spray the rabbit. I personally prefer the dunk method because it gets the rabbit wet down to the skin and then the evaporation of the moisture from the skin and coat helps cool the rabbit.
DO NOT USE COLD WATER TO DUNK/MIST/SPRAY A RABBIT IN HEAT STROKE!!! You'll throw it into shock and can very easily kill it while you are trying to save it. This same method can also be used to help save other small livestock such as chickens, etc. if they go into heat stroke. (Larger livestock can be sprayed with a hose until they cool off. FIRST CHECK THE TEMPERATURE OF WATER IN THE HOSE! IF ITS BEEN SITTING IN THE SUN, IT CAN BE ALMOST BOILING HOT!

My vet told me that if you see a mammalian livestock animal with foam on its muzzle, chances are it's in heat stroke. The object is to cool it off as quickly as possible. With sheep, goats, cattle, horses, etc, the best way to do it is with the hose. Cats can be dunked (welders gloves help a great deal when dunking cats as they don't seem to appreciate your efforts to help cool them off), dogs depending on their size, should be dunked or sprayed with the hose.

Say your rabbit is laying sprawled out, head thrown back, ears back, panting with obvious signs of moisture around its nose and mouth and going down onto its chest. This is the next to the last stage of heat stroke. Again, this animal HAS TO BE COOLED IMMEDIATELY or you're going to lose it. By this point, it's only a 50/50 shot of saving it, unfortunately.

Your rabbit has all the above symptoms and is in convulsions. Destroy it. By this point, the rabbit is so over heated that there is quite probably brain damage. That's what usually causes the convulsions. At this stage, nothing can be done to save the rabbit. Just destroy it and put it out of its misery.

Some people use ceramic tiles that have been stored in the freezer and keep switching them out throughout the day to help cool their rabbits. I don't care too much for this method as I don't feel they hold their coldness all that long. I think terracotta tiles, or large pieces of terracotta flower pots, first soaked in water then frozen, hold their cold longer and are more effective, but they can also cost more. I mention tiles as it is an alternative that a lot of people swear by. I've not used a soaker or mister system.

What I do may not work for anyone else, but somebody else's method may be perfect for them. We all love our rabbits, so let's share the information about how to keep them cool and comfortable during the summer heat.

---Thank you to Wanda Twellman of Lazy T Rabbitry for permission to use this article---