Care of baby animals
Care of small baby Animals
Feeding must be done every 2-3 hours around the clock until the baby is one week old. You can then start to gradually decrease the feeding to every to every four hours. At about one and a half to two weeks you can stop all night feedings.
The task of feeding a baby can be accomplished with a baby bottle of appropriate size or an eyedropper.
Animals should not be cradled like a human infant but should be fed in an upright position.
Never overfeed the baby. Don’t keep encouraging the baby to eat more. If the baby eats more than it can digest the excess food will spoil in its stomach with an overgrowth of bacteria, causing bloat and diarrhea. This can kill the baby. It is better to underfeed than to overfeed. Give less at more frequent feedings. Meals spaced too far apart encourage overeating.’
Hiccups in babies is very common and is not a sign of worms as is commonly believed. Most of the time is is the diaphragm, a big muscle that separates the chest cavity from the abdomen, which contracts and relaxes to make us breath. This muscle is controlled by the phrenic nerve and sometimes becomes uncoordinated, causing a muscle spasm which results in hiccups. The parts of a young body are simply getting used to one another and learning to work together.
After feeding, the baby must be stimulated to urinate or defecate. One method is by dipping a cotton ball in warm water and rubbing the baby from the rectum to the genitals until the baby eliminates.
Watery stool is a sign of overfeeding. A stool that is too firm can be softened by feeding more or by the addition of three or four drops of Karo syrup to the bottle of formula. Feces should be the consistency of toothpaste, brown in color but never green, which indicates infection.
Urine should be light yellow and thin. If it is thick and orange the baby is dehydrated and the formula should be thinned or the animal fed more frequently.
Babies cannot regulate their own body temperatures so a heat source such as a heating pad or a heat light must be provided. Be sure not to over heat.
Remember that an infant that has not received any colostrums from it’s mother has not produced any antibodies to ward off illness.
And remember these are babies and required lots and lots of rest.
