If You Find A Nest Of Baby Bunnies, This Is Exactly What You Should Do

Apr 15, 2019

Spring is the favorite season of many people for a plethora of reasons. Not only is the weather starting to warm up, but it’s also seen as the time of rebirth as well as regeneration for the parts of nature that surround us. You may even encounter some amazing sights this spring: baby animals! It’s no doubt that seeing these animals born as infants and grow up in the world around you is an amazing process.

But many people will make huge mistakes when they stumble across these baby animals because they are unsure about how to interact with them. To make a long story short, your best bet is to leave the animals alone entirely. 

During the spring season, rescue organizations get overwhelmed with animals.

Not only are many kittens born during these times, but people mistakenly believe that baby birds or bunnies have been abandoned and take it upon themselves to rescue them from out of the wild and send them to an organization that handles animals.

Although these attempts to save the animals come from good intentions, it is often misguided. Although many bunnies may seem like they were abandoned by their mother, more often than not they haven’t been.

In fact, bunnies are often kidnapped from their mothers by humans more than any other species of mammal.

Often, people who are mowing or tending to their lawns will uncover a rabbits nest. The nest is often shallow and easily spotted by humans. Even though it may seem like the baby bunnies have been abandoned, this isn’t usually the case. The mother of the babies usually only returns to the nest around two to three times each day, often right before dawn and right after dusk hits. But how can you tell if the bunnies have been abandoned?

You can actually use a clever string trick to find out. Take a string and lay it across the nest in the pattern of a tic-tac-toe board. You could also make a circle around the nest with some flour. Once you return to the nest a day or so after, you will see if the string or flour are disturbed by the mother coming to visit her babies.

But what happens if you do find bunnies that have actually been abandoned? Make sure that on your way to the rehabilitation center you do not stress the bunny out. They should be kept in dark and quiet circumstances due to their nature to be stressed out prey animals. Any mishandling of the bunny can result in heart failure due to the extreme handling and loud motions that surround them in rescue attempts.

If you do find baby bunnies that have bright, open and aware eyes, they often do not need to be rescued at all and are old enough to survive on their own by the time they hit 4-5 inches in length. These bunnies, although small, have already grown to be independent.

Although it can be tempting to want to rescue animals that seem to be in danger to the human eye, it’s best to often just leave them alone. Nests of baby animals should not be tampered with, and vets and rescue operations are warning people to not attempt to feed any bunnies that you find. Even just one serving of the wrong food, such as milk or lettuce, can kill the baby animal.

Although there are times when human interference is necessary for abandoned animals to survive, they should be handled quietly with love and care using gloves during the process. Did you know all of this information about baby bunnies? Have you ever rescued a wild animal?