Question : My does (rabbits) are moving newborn kits out of wire cages. Why?
OK, so here is my situation. One day, I go out to our rabbitry (we raise mostly New Zealands, we have four does and one buck), and there’s a 3-4 day old kit on the ground. We keep the rabbits in hanging wire cages, 1″x2″ mesh, with 1/2″x1″ floors. The doors are quite secure, and there’s no sign that a person was in the barn (after all, who would be so careless as to drop a kit, but careful enough to wire the doors shut and replace the water bottles??) One doe (Future) delivered 3-4 days ago, the other (Granny) delivered maybe 2 days ago. He was alive, but cool, so I warmed him up and replaced him. I also found three more kits, two alive (they were also warmed and replaced) and one dead. What’s up??? This has never happened before!! The doe who delivered 3-4 days ago is a top-notch dam (two of the live kits were from her), so I’m surprised. The next day, two more of Future’s kits were outside the cage, on the floor. Also, another one of our does (Past) delivered, and while she is improving, she doesn’t have the best track record as a dam. This time was an enormous step back for her. She had two kits on the wire (one was still alive, so I surried it out to another doe), several in the box, and had made no nest. I surried out all her kits. When she finally did make a nest, several hours later, I gave her back three of her kits (the other dams were over-loaded anyway, so I don’t really think I hurt their chances of survival at all). That was yester-day. About when I did that, we found a dead kit (one of Past’s) outside the cages. Don’t know how it got there. We figured maybe an animal was pestering them and causing them to be anxious, so we slept the dog in the barn last night (he doesn’t bother any of the commercial rabbits). To-day there was one (of Future’s) kits on the floor late this morning, which I replaced. Head counts were otherwise good all around and I didn’t see any dead kits, though I didn’t mess with Past, since she is still pretty worked up. I did, however, see movement in her nest box. :) The style of cages have been in use for some time and we’ve never had problems with security. I looked these over quite well and see no damage; they are fairly new. My biggest concern is what on earth is causing her to do this? Is she really squeezing the kits out through the wire? I don’t see any injuries on them. Is there anything I can do?? Has this happened to anyone else out there? Please, please, if you are familiar with this, if this has happened to you, tell me everything you know about it! I can’t find anything online. At this point, we’re thinking the best we can do is keep our eyes peeled and wait it out. Any advice or suggestions would be MOST welcome!! Thank you so much for taking the time to read all of this. :) Our fourth doe was due three days ago, and we have seen nothing so far. I’m not sure if she didn’t conceive (we did set her under a sun lamp to promote ovulation after breeding), or if she is just retaining due to stress.
moving kits

Best answer:

Answer by cricket
have you checked to make sure the kits can’t go threw the cage on their own. when a doe get out of the nest box after feeding them some of the kits still can be nursing and is dragged out of the nest box with the doe. you can put a lip that hangs to the inside of the nest box the kit will be knock off the doe and droped back into the nest.you can take small gage wire and wire it to the bottom of the out side of the cage this will keep the kits from going threw the cage.