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I've finally found a bonded pair of bunnies for adoption that don't look too much like my past two. I'm going to be calling the foster mom tomorrow and was wondering if there is anything specific to bonded pairs that I should ask about. I have a list of general concerns, but I've never dealt with bonded rabbits.
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Sep 23, 2014 03:54
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| # ¿ May 15, 2024 05:13 |
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Trabisnikof posted:Are they male/female I assume? Ask about their behavior between each other and if they need personal spaces or can hang out together all the time. Make sure they're spayed/neutered too I guess. It's a mom and son that have both been fixed, but personal space is a good one. I didn't think of that.
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Sep 23, 2014 04:38
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Well, I got me some rabbits. It's the mom and son pair that I wrote about earlier. They are both fixed, and very friendly. While I was visiting, the boy sat in my lap for a half hour and wouldn't budge except to butt my hand for more petting. They were owned for a year by a well-meaning family who didn't know anything about rabbits at the time they found the mom in a farmers field. In fact, they took her to the vet after finding her and the vet labelled her a boy. They realized she was female a month later when she had babies. All the other babies grew up healthy and were re-homed. Here are the things I know. Both are definitely fixed. Both lived in the house in a smallish cage but were allowed free roam several hours every day. They were fed about a cup and a half of pellets daily as well as romaine lettuce in the morning and hay at all times. They sometimes went outside but never had fleas. They almost never fight and are almost always by each others side. They also used to get baths. The last time they saw the vet was last year "because they've both looked healthy." They are in Debbie's old pen now since it is MUCH larger than the cage they came in. I've already remedied the food issue since that was clearly too many pellets. Neither one eats hay to they extent that they should but I'm hoping this changes over the next few weeks. I'm going to have to put them both on a diet though. I've also noticed that one or both are not eating their cecotropes. I guess it's nothing new and they haven't every really eaten them, but my understanding is that it's not healthy for a rabbit to not be eating them. My other bunnies very rarely left any lying around. I'll be calling tomorrow for a vet check-up and advice on safely dropping some of the weight. This is the only decent picture of them in their old cage. The mom(black) is named Silo, and the boy(brown) is Eeyore. I hate the name Eeyore so that will be changing as soon as I can think of something better. 
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Sep 29, 2014 05:17
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I fed Debbie only 2tbsp of pellets daily so I almost gasped when the lady said what she was feeding. They are larger than my other two rabbits but, yeah, 3/4 cup per rabbit is excessive. I always feed Oxbow, so I promptly put an end to the 40lb feed store bag of food. They don't seem too interested in veggies right now so I'm going to have a tough few months ahead of me. One thing I noticed this morning is that they are stinky rabbits. I've never had issues with smell before unless the litter box was full, so I'm wondering if it's the pellet litter they came with or something else. I just came home for lunch and cleaned out the pan and added different litter pellets so we'll see what happens with that. I got so used to particular rabbit habits over the last 11 years so it feels weird having so many questions/issues to deal with again.
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Sep 29, 2014 18:42
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Errant Gin Monks posted:Stinky rabbits are very shameful. My dumbass buns smelled like sweet sugar and grass. Except when they stepped in a cecal pellet, then they smelled loving awful. I'm 99% sure it's the cecal berries that are left lying around. It's almost as bad as the goo from expressed anal glands. The type of pellet litter the lady gave me was part of the problem too because switching to the wood stove pellets helped quite a bit.
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Oct 1, 2014 05:21
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The new buns are settling in just fine. I haven't had an issue with the cecals since the third day, which is pretty nice because the smell was getting to me. They are slowly accepting the lack of pellets and increased hay, although the boy will not eat any veggies that I have seen. I'm a bit concerned about that, and surprised since he mimics his mom with almost everything else. The vet visit last week was a trip. They checked out healthy, slightly overweight but not enough to be a major concern yet. I had the techs trim up the claws because I was worried about hitting the quicks. Since I hadn't been able to pick them up much, I had no idea how bad the claws were. The front claws on the mom were over an inch on some toes. One had actually begun to curl. It was so gross. I'm not sure how she was actively running around on those without pain. When trimming the boys claws, he jerked his paw and the entire nail on one toe came off leaving just the quick exposed. He was bleeding everywhere. The tech was more traumatized than he was, and we were sent home with medication just in case. I've been watching all week and you'd never know it happened the way he bounces everywhere and digs in the litter boxes. Other than that, they are settling in nicely. They keep finding new way to get out of the enclosure which my old buns never had issues with. I think these two are just extra curious and interested in exploring.  
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Oct 9, 2014 05:15
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Can anyone suggest a suitable hay manger or something in the order of hay wrangling? For my last rabbit I'd just put some in a large dish as well as to one side of one of her litter boxes and she was fine with that. My current two are idiots and can't figure out how to not flip over the dishes and make a huge mess all over the cage floor. I love them, but they hate my free time. I've tried a cardboard box, this thing and dishes. I also can't have anything that hangs on the cage because Eeyore is an acrobat and has climbed out before. Any suggestions are appreciated!
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Nov 10, 2014 02:38
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They chew up the the cardboard and then pull all the hay out.
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Nov 10, 2014 06:11
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Does anyone buy hay from local farmers? I'm nearly out of my normal KMS timothy order and they are set to be out of it until August. I live in a reasonable driving distance from several farms but I can't be sure what their hay is comprised of. Did you ask for a break down of what the majority grass component was or just say "screw it" and feed it to your rabbits anyway?
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Jul 2, 2015 06:48
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I've been buying local hay lately because it's much much cheaper - $5 for a 50lb bale vs $60 for hay shipped from KMS. The farmers are great, but not when it comes to telling me exactly what's in it because most of their hay fields are rented. Today I grabbed a third cut bale and was excited until I got home and I realized it's alfalfa.  Now I have to watch them like a hawk until I can get back to the farm next week for more of the right stuff. Anyone else ever have this happen?
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Oct 22, 2015 22:48
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voodoonoid posted:However, Bunny Hass did what bunnies do best and started digging up parts of the carpet flooring and now my mom is making me get rid of Bunny Hass. What kind of pen or cage is Hass kept in? Is she ruining the floors inside or outside of that cage, or both? Do you think your mom would give Hass another chance if you can try to counteract the behavior? I've seen other people make cheap digging boxes out of under-bed storage containers and sand or some other safe materials to discourage digging at and chewing up carpeted floors. Also, a myriad of toys that Bunny isn't used to to help counteract boredom, if that might be the case. At any rate, I'd hope that your mother might listen to reason and agree to keep the rabbit in a familiar home rather than spending who knows how long in a shelter waiting for another family. But at the end of the day, it is her home and her say I guess 
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Oct 26, 2015 17:07
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I spent 4 hours the other night trimming and zip-tying linoleum to create a new floor for my rabbit pen. It took way too long and isn't as neat looking as coroplast would have been, but it was a LOT cheaper this way. It may look more ghetto-fab than the prior carpeted floor but they hate the vacuum so goddamn much. I had to do something for all of our sanity to make cleaning easier. So far they hate it, but aren't sliding around as much as I feared they would. I have a large grass mat in there now along with the rest of their hides and toys. I do need a hay manger if anyone has ideas on what I can use. I've tried boxes, bins and metal shallow dishes. Nothing works to keep it corralled so far. 
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Nov 5, 2015 01:02
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peach moonshine posted:Rabbit ate yoga mat - is this a cause for concern? Anything I should watch for? How much of it? Since it is Sunday, I would just keep a very close eye on the behavior and frequency of eating/drinking/pooping. If anything is abnormal, get to an e-vet. If you feel everything is normal and the rabbit is "fine" then you can wait until morning, but call your vet asap to get in for an exam. Rabbit health can go south very quickly. I've had rabbits eat plastic, rubber, carpeting, etc and always follow up that behavior with a vet visit. Overkill? Maybe. But a $90 checkup is cheaper than a surgery that may or may not work. Rabbits are sneaky troublemakers, and unfortunately quite fragile.
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Nov 8, 2015 18:33
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Relatively small then, so that's good. My past rabbits have had a tendency to cause a large amount of damage within a minute of turning my back. Even my current two are destructive as hell if I'm not on top of them at every second, but I blame their former family. I'm sure you have a good rapport with your vet so he/she should be able to tell you whether there is anything to be truly concerned about. 
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Nov 9, 2015 06:47
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Not generally, but it could be an escaped/released domestic or the offspring of some.
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Jun 13, 2018 02:00
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| # ¿ May 15, 2024 05:13 |
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Halloween Jack posted:God. Rabbits and birds are cheap to feed, it's the healthcare costs that are literally lethal. I'm still financially recovering from what I spent on my pets over the past miserable, horrible year. My pets are all cheap adoptees that have been costing me a fortune in health care recently. I put $50-100 a month in a savings just to cover unexpected costs. It's not a lot, but between that and Care Credit being accepted by vets it has really paid off over the years. No questioning whether I go grocery shopping or starve so my rabbit can scare me with another ER trip for GI stasis.
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Dec 11, 2022 00:37
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