Getting Friendly With Your Rabbit’s Poop

litter box

A litter box works best when filled with fresh grass hay for your bunny to graze on. It encourages good litter box habits and gives busy bunnies something to do.

I thought I would start the new year by getting into a subject that all but a true bunny lover will find strange, your rabbit’s poop. People who don’t know much about rabbits may at first feel like us bunny lovers are obsessed with this topic. This is because when you truly are aware of your bunny’s health and well-being, your first and most obvious clue that something is amiss are his fecal droppings.

Rabbits are well-designed eating and food processing machines. They have evolved to where they have extremely efficient digestive systems, otherwise how could they live with such verve and energy on a diet of just grass (which is most of a healthy rabbit’s diet). As grazers, they need to be constantly eating. It can actually be fatal if their insides stop processing their food for even a day, which is a condition known as gastrointestinal stasis or GI stasis for short.

Cecotropes (cecal pellets)

Cecotropes (cecal pellets)

Cecotropes

Cecotropes (Cecal pellets)

Knowing how your rabbit’s insides work are very important to keeping your pet bunny healthy. It is critical to understand that they are fermenters and that their food is digesting in their intestines by bacteria located there. This is why rabbits can often die when given the wrong antibiotic, because all the important good bacteria in their gut are killed. This is why you should never give any kind of antibiotic (or medicine) from another pet to your rabbit, without your vets express approval, but I digress.

Adding anything different or new to your rabbits fermentation system can cause an upset, until their body adapts to processing it. Us humans get a similar condition when we get Montezuma’s Revenge. Things like sugars and starches, which are not a natural part of a rabbit’s diet can cause this problem. I saw this when after not having been given fruit for many months, I gave some to my buns. They all got sick the next day. If they are getting sugars every day, then they do not get this reaction, but then that leads to other issues and problems, such as fatty liver disease and being overweight.

The best barometer of your bunny’s intestinal fortitude, so to speak, is their poop. It should be consistent and any daily variation with it is very telling. I recommend that you become very familiar with your rabbit’s little droppings daily. Every good bunny lover does this.

You want to see lots of firm but not rock hard round droppings each day in your rabbit’s litter box. They should easily smash between two fingers when fresh. It is a good idea to clean your rabbit’s box each day, because it gives you a chance to see how he is feeling by inspecting his poop. If you clean his box and there are not any in there, you now have a big red flag that should not be ignored. Rabbits are eating and pooping all the time, except for when they are sleeping. If you were to discover this, I would watch him for a couple hours to see if he goes, but if I offer him a treat or some green salad and he is not interested, it means that you have a sick bunny. Steps must be taken immediately or you possibly risk a very bad outcome. When it comes to GI stasis, time is of the essence.

If you are not cleaning your rabbit’s litter box every day, then it becomes a lot more difficult to know if he is using it or not. It is hard to tell if the piles of poop in the box are from today or yesterday or the day before, if it is not cleaned daily. Besides that, rabbits are very clean pets and tend to avoid a dirty box, not to mention that they eat more hay if you give it to them fresh in a clean box each day. Most people who have house rabbits put their rabbit’s hay into their litter box to encourage it’s use and to promote more grazing on the fresh hay.

One of the most important things you can do if you love your rabbit, is to learn to recognize when they are ill and take immediate steps to help them survive. Rabbits tend to have a very low survival rates for a lot of very common issues, simply because their owners are not paying enough attention to how their pet is feeling on a daily basis. When you think your rabbit is sick, almost 99 percent of the time HE IS.

You should familiarize yourself with what healthy good poop looks like and the difference between that and their cecotropes. Rabbits eat all of their food twice and the first time through their system, it comes out as cecotropes (or cecal pellets). They eat these and if your rabbit is healthy, you should very rarely find these, if ever. Finding cecotropes laying around or in his box are a sign that he may be getting too many treats or too much nutrition. This causes your rabbit to not feel the need to eat his cecotropes. Therefore,
finding cecal pellets from your rabbit on a regular basis should also be a red flag warning for you. I recommend taking appropriate action right away, should you begin to find these in your bunny’s area.

The most common reason for finding cecotropes is fruit, too many treats or too much green salad, or too many pellets. I would reduce the amount of these things that your rabbit receives until the problem goes away. I would start with the pellets and fruit first, since they are the highest calorie items. Rabbits do not ever need either one of those things and a very small amount goes a very long way, especially if your rabbit is of the smaller variety. A teaspoon or two is all that most bunnies need of pellets and I never give mine fruit, as I explained earlier.

It is possible to give your rabbit too much salad. He should only get an amount no more than twice the size of his head daily. That is the most he should have and he can certainly have less. Treats are also usually highly caloric and many store bought rabbit treats should never be given.

Never give your rabbit yogurt treats or anything with dairy, seeds, nuts, corn, beans, peas, legumes or popcorn. They are bad for your rabbit. Many of the rabbit treats sold in stores have one or more of these items and so beware. Just because a pet store sells them, does not mean that they are good or ok for your bunny. I would say that half of the items I see in our local pet stores should not even be sold to rabbit owners. I suggest that you give healthy green treats and compressed timothy (not alfalfa) hay cubes to your bunny. You can find some relatively healthy rabbit treats online, but avoid those that the main ingredients are flours and sugars, such as molassas or honey.

Timothy Hay Cubes

TImothy Hay Cubes are a good healthy treat for your bunny. Do not confuse them with Alfalfa Cubes, which are not the same.

One problem that you can see by looking at your rabbit’s poop is something called Mega-Colon. It is a deformation of your rabbit’s colon that causes his poop to become misshapen and egg-shaped. I have a rabbit who has this issue and her poop is sometimes small and sometimes very large, but very rarely round. This condition allows for a rabbit to easily get a condition called bloat, which is similar to colic in a horse. Bloat can be quickly fatal for a bunny. It puts intense pressure on their heart and lungs if it occurs high up in their intestines which can stop their heart or breathing. I have heard of
this happening in as little as 8 hours.

Bloat often appears to novices as GI Stasis, but can be more serious and more quickly. Your rabbit will appear to be in discomfort and will stop eating and pooping. He may keep shifting his position in an effort to relieve the gas that is building up in his abdomen. He may show signs of pain which is clicking his teeth loudly or sitting up hunched over. These are all signs that he is feeling discomfort.

To check for bloat, squeeze your rabbit behind his ribs in his belly area, gently. It should be squishy and soft, not hard and blown up like a balloon. You should do this when your rabbit is feeling fine, to acquaint yourself with how it should feel, normally. I check my Mega-Colon rabbit’s gut, every day to make sure that she is not experiencing any gas buildup, because I know that she is prone to it.

Mega-Colon poop.

Mega-Colon poop. Notice irregular size and egg-shape.

Mega-Colon poop.

Mega-Colon poop. Egg shaped and irregular.

You should not have to normally do this, unless your rabbit is having signs that something is amiss. Lack of poop in his box or signs of discomfort are good reasons to check for bloat. Not wanting his regular daily salad or a bunny treat are also signs that it would be good to check your bunny for gas.

Because they are fermenters, they are producing gas all the time and so a blockage or GI Stasis can be the reason for their bloat. It is not something to mess with and it requires an immediate visit to the vet. Do not wait, because hours can be life or death in a severe case.

Hopefully, you will already have a relationship with a rabbit specialist vet for your rabbit. When your bunny is dreadfully sick, is not a time to be out searching for the proper vet for your bunny. It is a waste of precious time. If you need help locating a rabbit specialist, visit the House Rabbit Society website (www.rabbit.org) and go to their recommended veterinarians list for your area.

The final thing I want to mention is the “string of pearls” that we often find from our buns. This is a sure sign that your rabbit is ingesting a lot of his (or his partner’s) fur and this issue will usually go away if you groom your rabbit by combing him. Rabbits cannot throw up fur balls, like a cat can. In fact, they cannot vomit at all and so once they have swallowed fur while taking one of their many daily baths, it must pass all the way through their system.

"String Of Pearls"

“String Of Pearls”

Generally, their system was designed for this, but they can get blockages if they swallow too much. This is especially true if they have low motility in their gut, which is slower than average movement or speed at which things move through. Low motility in a rabbit’s gut makes them more prone to fur blockage. It is best to regularly groom your rabbit and if you are finding these “string of pearls” in their litter box, then it is a sure sign that you need to “step up your grooming game”.

Every good bunny parent spends a lot of time examining and appraising their rabbit’s poop. It is part of doing it right. To the uninitiated, it may appear as if we are all a bit crazy for being into our bunny scat, but it is only because we truly love our buns and we care.

If you want to stay on top of what’s going on inside your rabbit, you too will want to learn about his poop. When you see that there is a lack of it or is has chanced in any way, you will want to find out why. Do not hesitate to call your vet and keep some of it for a sample. I have even gone as far as to email pictures of my bunny’s poop to her doctor. A rabbit’s poop tells a story, if you are savvy enough to understand what it is saying.

Happy New Year For Rabbits?

This year is rapidly drawing to a close and I felt that I needed to close it with this tome from my heart.

This was a busy year for me filled with the publishing of my new book, The Bunny Lover’s Complete Guide To House Rabbits and lots of rescue work with several local rabbit organizations. I am a busy volunteer for both the San Diego Humane Society and drop in monthly to the Escondido Humane Society to work solely with the rabbits. The San Diego House Rabbit Society is my first love and commitment and they garner most of my attention and time. I take my job as rabbit educator very seriously and am happy to say that my wife and I are driving forces in their efforts to change the way the public thinks about pet rabbits.

As always in life, this year has been a huge challenge. Several of my bunny friends have seen their lives take new uncharted paths and they were not alone, since we too have been challenged in ways that we never dreamed of in the past 12 months. The economy has put a crimp into many people’s lifestyles and so I know that we were not alone in feeling the crunch, financially.

I knew that we would never get rich off my new book, but it’s sales and reach have far outpaced my wildest dreams. That is a good thing, because one thing that I have noticed in these tough economic times is that many family pets have suffered from it all.

Pets who have been with families for years are being dropped off at the shelters because the people just cannot care for them any longer. I have been touched by this phenomenon over and over again, since these troubled times started. It breaks my heart to think that a once loved animal is now fighting for his life in a shelter, where he is afraid and exposed to all kinds of sad things. Often some of these animals go from a good life in a warm friendly home to a small cage or enclosure where they rarely get out or get pets. This has to be extremely unsettling for a pet who cannot understand why these things are happening to him.

I often wonder, what they think caused this to happen to them. I worry that they feel that they did something bad, so bad that they were abandoned and left behind. Who knows what goes on inside their little minds, but I am certain that they simply have no understanding of why they are suddenly there.

Putting my heart and soul into helping forgotten and left behind animals has changed my life and made my little problems in life seem small and inconsequential. It has also helped me through many tough times and count my true blessings over and over. It has been an escape for me many times this past year. I know I have helped change some lives for several of my friends and the bunnies that I work with. That alone, has made the struggle worthwhile.

There were so many brights spots this past year. Big orders from other rabbit rescue people for my book, because they felt it was the best educational tool available to teach newbies about having a pet bunny. It validated all the hard work that my editor Rani and I did to create it.

Meanwhile, Rani fell very ill and went into the hospital with failing kidneys and heart. She has since had kidney and heart surgery and is expecting to do several more. My thoughts and love go out to her, because she was my inspiration and support during the trying times of writing and publishing my book. It would never have been half as good as it is, without her guidance and knowledge.

Several of my bunny friends lost their jobs, place to live and even their health this past year. None of these things is ever fun, but they have all remained up and full of hope for better things to come. Their spirit has charged me up to expect great and good things this coming new year. I am putting my efforts and energy into moving our mission forward in the coming months. My biggest hope is that things will get a little better for pet bunnies everywhere, as a result of all of the good-hearted people out there who are working to change the way the public looks at their pets. Being the optimist that I am, I believe that we ARE making a difference.

What will my next project be? I have so many ideas and thoughts, that even I do not know for sure. I know that my plate is full and that I have a lot to do, but I am definitely going on with my fight to effect change, however small or seemingly meaningless. So in the vein of seeing the cup half full, I believe that it WILL be a better year for rabbits, if not just because so many people out there are working to hard to make it happen.

I learned this year that one of the greatest people I have ever known, passed away a couple years ago. His name was Robert Sturner. He taught me many things and changed my life forever. One of my favorite things that he showed me was that whatever you consistently and constantly dwell upon in your life, will become a reality. I truly believe this and live my life according to this important message. Dreams can become reality and create huge change, if you believe enough and do what it takes to make it happen.

Change will happen and that is a given. What direction changes take are determined by the dreamers who dared to think about things that many people told them were crazy or impossible. New ideas and ways of thinking are being fostered and dispersed every day and with the advent of the internet and international media, faster than ever before.

Someday, I dream of a world where pets do not suffer and experience only love from their owners. Pets have enriched my life beyond words. I cannot imagine a life without their blessings and love, which is second only to family and friends. Many people in the world have no family or good friends and so the love that they share with pets is the only goodness in their lives. More people need to experience this and they will when they discover how the unconditional love of a pet is life changing and beautiful.

Some of my friends lost pets this year. I shared in their tears and sorrow, as I truly know the depths of sadness and despair that can result from such a loss. It is like losing a close family member. Just the thought brings back the heart wrenching sadness that I felt when losing my last pet. The only thing that allowed me to mend was the love given to me by my new pets that we rescued, since. I feel blessed that I have so many cool loving bunnies to share what is left of my life with.

Now that this year is drawing to a close, I put forth that we CAN change the direction of everything and part of doing this is changing the way that we think and act. Those are the things that we personally can control. We cannot control the thoughts and actions of others, but we do affect them with ours. We can be the example for what is good. We can be the torch that shines into the darkness. Through our light, we can make it better.

Let’s light the world!

The Bunny Guy

What To Do BEFORE You Get A Rabbit

I am sorry to say that most people get their first rabbit either one of two ways… They either get one on an “impulse” where they see a cute bunny that five minutes before they did not know that they wanted… OR they find a discarded bunny whom someone else had gotten impulsively and when it did not work out, they set him “free” somewhere.

If you are not one of these two types of people, you will not need to read this article. Kudos to you for being a loving responsible pet owner. IF you fit into one of these two categories, please read this article BEFORE it is too late.

The first thing a responsible rabbit owner does before they get their first rabbit is study a little bit about them. You will never learn the things you need to know about having a pet rabbit by the “seat of your pants”. Almost nothing that you learned growing up with dogs and cats is applicable and caring for rabbits is not intuitive. A smart person will take some time to learn a little bit about lagomorphs before they decide to adopt one, to see exactly what they are getting into.

I cannot tell you how many people do not do this and it is a formula for failure, especially if you are considering having the rabbit live indoors with you and your family (which is a must!). One of the first things you will learn, if you do your homework, is that your rabbit’s area will need to be “bunny-proofed”. This means that you will need to remove, block or cover anything that your rabbit can chew on in the area you plan to let him live. Not only must you bunny-proof his living area, but anyplace that he will run and get his exercise.

All toxic and dangerous items will need to be found and removed, such as houseplants (most are poisonous to rabbits and they will eat them) and places cleaned with household cleaners. There is a complete art to “bunny-proofing” and I will not do this whole article about the subject. Part of becoming a “bunny parent” is to learn how to do it and perfect it in your home. It is a trial and error thing for people who are new to rabbits, because your rabbit will find every flaw or weakness in your system. It will happen, so be prepared for it when you first start out with a new bun.

Notice I said ADOPT your first rabbit. There is really never a good reason to go out and buy a pet rabbit. Not when there are literally thousands of rabbits who will be euthanized this year because no one wants them any longer. Almost every breed of rabbit is available to be adopted and if the one you want is not, then your local rescue, humane society or house rabbit society will help you in finding a homeless rabbit that is suitable for you.

You will also need to learn how to feed your rabbit and rabbit pellets are not the answer. Pellets were designed for farmers to get rabbits fat quickly, so they could be sold for food. They are not a good food for pets whom you want to live 10-12 years and if you feed them exclusively to your pet, he will most likely only live half of that time.

Most of us do the only things we know, when we get our first rabbit. The way that most people first learned about rabbits was seeing them in a backyard hutch eating only pellets, so it is understandable that people do the same thing when they get their first rabbit. I did.

Nothing could be farther from what pet rabbits really need and you are basically sentencing your pet to a lonely frustrated existence. His health will eventually deteriorate and he will almost always die a premature death under these conditions.

Even if you are bunny smart and decide to keep your rabbit inside, one thing that almost everyone fails to do is to locate your future rabbit’s veterinarian before getting one. If your new bunny is not already spayed or neutered, you will want to have this done immediately. Rabbits who are not spayed/neutered are not very good pets. It is smart to check around and have chosen a vet prior to bringing home your rabbit.

Rabbits who suddenly find themselves in a new environment will typically become stressed. Stress in rabbits can bring on a whole host of health problems and it is not uncommon for a healthy bunny to suddenly display symptoms of being sick after getting a new home. He may also have parasites, such as fleas or lice and it is usually a good idea to have your new bunny checked out by a rabbit specialist ASAP after bringing him home.

Some areas are lucky to have a large selection of rabbit specialists to chose from. Other areas it may be a long drive to reach one. You should know this before you get your pet and be aware that you should not take your pet bunny to a regular dog or cat vet. If you are having trouble finding the right kind of vet, contact your local chapter of the House Rabbit Society or rabbit rescue and they will guide you to the proper vets in your area.

Do not get a rabbit because your six year old daughter wants one. Getting a pet rabbit for your children is never a good idea. First off, the one who is ultimately going to be responsible for feeding, cleaning up after and paying the vet bills is you. No six year old is capable of these things, in reality. You are deluding yourself if you think that your child will always act responsibly with a fragile pet rabbit at that age. I think that most children need to be seven or eight years old before they simply understand how fragile a bunny is. The bottom line is that rabbits are not a good “kid’s pet”, contrary to the popular myth.

Another facet of bunnies for kids, is that when your eight year old gets a rabbit, he is going to live until he/she is at least eighteen years old. Somewhere along the way, their interests will dramatically change (cars, dating, sports, etc.) and so just like adopting a pet dog, you must plan for your new pet, looking ten plus years down the road. I tell parents that their eight year old will probably be married with children before a new pet bunny passes away. This puts it into proper perspective for most.

There is a lot to learn about rabbits, if you are new to having them. There are whole books about the subject, such as my new book “The Bunny Lover’s Complete Guide To House Rabbits”. Many people find failure when they first get a rabbit, but there are many ways to avoid it. Most important is doing your homework and finding out whether a rabbit is really for you and your family BEFORE you bring one home. Unfortunately, this is most often not the case, hence the thousands of stray and feral rabbits hopping around (how many of us get our first rabbits).

I will end by saying THERE IS NEVER AN EXCUSE TO ABANDON A PET RABBIT. If you decide that a rabbit is not for you, you must relinquish him at a shelter or rescue. Do not set a defenseless prey animal, such as a bunny free to experience a horrible death at the hands of some predator. Please, do the right thing and let him find a new home with someone who truly wants him.

The Bunny Guy

Why People Over-Feed Their Pet Rabbits

It suddenly dawned on me the other day why many people over-feed their rabbits, while I was talking to a couple who had just rescued a stray bunny who was nibbling the grass on their front lawn. They were lovingly telling me about how they had gone online and learned a little about rabbits and discovered that they should live indoors.

The nice man had gone out and bought a rabbit hutch at the local pet store, but because he had read that wire bottom cages were bad for rabbits, he converted it by covering the floor with a nice wood. He also cut off the legs and made it so the rabbit could hop in and out of the hutch when he wanted. The couple had learned a little about bunny-proofing inside their house and were learning the “hard way” as the went along about spots and places that they had missed, when their new bunny went out for play time runs.

It was quite obvious to me that these people had totally and completely fallen in love with this rabbit. They were eager to tell me all about him and asked me all kinds of questions, as they hungrily learned as much as they could from talking to me.

After we had spoken a while, we learned that their rabbit was already very over-weight and suffering from being over-fed. It was then, that I had the revelation about why so many people make this deadly mistake with their bunnies, especially people uneducated about them.

When we first get rabbits, we quickly learn that our bunny likes to interact and will easily approach you if you have some kind of food or treat for them. We all love it when our rabbit goes through his silly begging motions, which are usually quite cute and highly effective. When we are just learning about pet rabbits, this is sometimes the only interaction that we are able to have with our furry pets. Some of us get a Pavlovian response and will continue pass out the treats in order to interact more and get the approval from our otherwise aloof or distant bunny. This can become a habit and the toll that this takes is directly proportional to the caloric content of the treats that you bestow.

Of course, the more sweet or caloric the treat, the more your rabbit will beg and dance and mine even hop up into my lap to say, “Please, please, please”. It is hard not to give in to a bunny who has jumped into your lap and is giving your kisses to try and pry another treat out of you. Other rabbits will do their own brand of seduction to get that next treat, but I now realize how universal this behavior is.

The problem arises when you fall into the habit of using highly caloric food to get close and interact with your rabbit, because over time it builds up. I am not going to go into a long speech about how bad it is for your rabbit to be overweight, because I have written a lot about the subject. Let’s just say that an overweight rabbit will generally live less than half as long as a rabbit who is not. This means that instead of living ten or twelve years, an obese bunny can usually only expect to live about five years… maybe six if he is lucky.

Add to the equation that rabbits prefer sweet treats to ones that are not. People who are not rabbit savvy, do not know how bad that it can be for their pet. This is a formula for disaster. Rabbit vets see thousands of rabbits each year who are overweight and in the throes of some horrible kind of GI stasis, fatty liver disease and other problems that it causes.

Of course, it does not help that many of these treats that are so bad for your bunny are sold in pet stores and online at bunny websites. Virtually all rabbits will scarf down as many pieces of dried fruit, yogurt drops or treat cookies as you will give them and still do a dance for more. If you do not know any better, you might be inclined to even give them another and then another, when they woo you into it. If you do this every day for several years, your rabbit will eventually have problems from it.

Another big mistake that is frequently made is we over-feed our bunnies their green salad. I often see people giving their little five pound rabbit a half pound of salad each day. This is three or four times the correct amount to feed a bunny, each day. The amount of salad that I suggest you feed your rabbit should be no bigger than twice the size of his head, daily. This will account for different sizes of rabbits, since smaller rabbits should eat less than larger ones. So if you are giving your rabbit this mondo green salad every day, that too can lead to rabbit obesity over the years and dramatically shorten their life or cause many trips to the vet.

Probably the worst mistake people make is in giving their rabbits too many rabbit pellets. Most adult rabbits do not need them. They were actually designed for farmers to get a bunny fat very quickly, so you could eat him, not for a long healthy life as a pet. Many rabbit lovers never give them to their bunnies. If you do, I recommend 1/8-1/4 cup of timothy (not alfalfa) pellets a day. Even less is OK. I think that vets tend to tell people to give too many pellets. I have been told to let them have unlimited pellets by a vet before.

Pellets are the densest most nutritious food that a rabbit usually eats and so it can have a dramatic effect on their weight with just a little more or less each day. When rabbits become seniors and they have trouble keeping weight on, pellets are often used to help keep them from getting too skinny, but for most healthy adult bunnies, they must be given very judiciously, if at all.

In conclusion, I think people need to learn other ways to get close and interact with their pet rabbits other than just feeding them all the time. I know how easy it is to fall into this :”treat trap”, as I call it in my new book, The Bunny Lover’s Complete Guide To House Rabbits. I have been there myself, before.

Get down on the floor and interact with your bunny. Just being down on his level and in his space will eventually turn into interaction time between you. “Play” with your bun using simple toys. Some bunnies will nudge a ball back to you, if you gently roll it towards them. Rattles and small toss toys, like toilet paper tubes are fun to hand to your rabbit. He will sometimes take them from your hand and toss them.

These “fun” rabbit games are how you get close and enrich your rabbits life. I have had a bunny who like to chase the end of a shoe lace. She saw my cat doing it and learned to do it, too. She would grab the end and pull it with her teeth, just like my kitty would do, if I tossed it to her.

You will find if you spend close to an hour each day interacting with your rabbit, that your bond will become greater and he will be a lot more interested in you. I can virtually promise that you will both be happier, as a result. He will look forward to this time and approach you for pets and closeness.

Of course, you can reward your bunny with very small treats regularly, but look for the healthiest ones you can find. Get things that most closely resemble what their natural food would be. By this I mean fresh sprigs of cilantro or parley, instead of fruit or cookies. Apple sticks or a small handful of oat hay. Compressed hay cubes are good healthy treats of timothy hay that most rabbits adore. Get the ones without the pieces of fruit and seeds in them.

Never buy those gourmet pellets at the pet store. They have all kinds of things in them that rabbits were never meant to have, such as dried peas and corn, nuts and seeds and lots of other bad stuff. Many rabbits will pick out all the junk and not even eat the pellets. This is bad. I wish this stuff was not even sold in pet stores. Once again, people think that if they pay more money for this “deluxe” food, that they are loving their rabbit more. Little do they know that they are actually loving their rabbit to death.

If you are in the “treat trap”, get out now before it is too late. You can reverse obesity, but once it hits a certain point, there is no way to go back. Don’t wait until it is too late and you are sitting in the vet office crying about it like I have done before.

The Bunny Guy

Are We There Yet?

I often ask myself if we will see any real difference for pet rabbits in my lifetime. While we have come a long way from all rabbits living in horrible backyard hutches, there are still a significant number who still do. In my estimation from talking to the public during my educational efforts, between 80 and 90 percent still do.

We have had some change since 40 years ago, when all rabbits lived in hutches or cages, to a point where a small percentage now live indoors as pets. There is a trend for more young families to try a pet rabbit as a family pet. This is a problem because taking care of a rabbit is not intuitive. Unless someone teaches you how to correctly do it, most people will do almost everything wrong and have little success at basics, such as litter box training or preventing rabbits from chewing on stuff (they are prolific chewers).

If you were raised with dogs or cats and your only exposure to pet bunnies were the ones that your neighbor kept in a hutch in their backyard, then it is hard to know that they are supposed to eat hay, not big hoppers of rabbit pellet food. It is also not commonly known that pet rabbits need to see a rabbit specialist vets, not your regular dog or cat veterinarian. I recently had a friend who took her sick pet bunny to her dog and cat vet for a common rabbit ailment. He had her put the little guy to sleep for a problem that most of the time can be treated and cured by a rabbit savvy vet. You do not want to have your vet looking up how to treat your bunny on the internet, when it is a matter of life or death (which is what this vet did).

Probably the biggest reason I have become a rabbit educator is that housing, feeding and caring for a pet bunny needs to become common knowledge, just like how to feed, walk and pet a dog or cat. You cannot learn the proper ways to do things by the “seat of your pants”. I have met people who have had pet bunnies for decades who did not know basic things about them, such as that they eat all of their food twice. Knowing these things about your pet rabbit is important to understanding how to provide optimal care, especially when it comes to feeding and socializing with your “buddies”.

Another common misconception that has been slow to change is that people think rabbits do not need to be spayed or neutered. Actually, nothing could be farther from the truth. In order to have a successful relationship with a “house rabbit”, it is essential that they are spay/neutered, ASAP. I would never consider having a pet rabbit who was not, because of the many bad behaviors and problems that usually result. More than four out of five female rabbits who are not spayed will end up getting cancer or tumors by the time they are four years old. Yet, I find that at least 80 percent of female pet rabbits are not spayed, and never will be (or live to be).

How do we get the public to become aware that rabbits are not disposable pets and more than a cheap critter that you buy at a swap meet to put in a small cheap cage in your back yard or garage? I think most people would not do that to a dog or cat (although, I know there are people who do, because I have met them). The number of people who do know how to properly care for a pet rabbit has been slowly growing, due to efforts to educate the public and get the word out, but we have decades of work left to do.

The more people we get talking about this, the closer it brings us to that critical mass where it becomes common knowledge. I hope that if you agree with me, that you will take some of your precious time to support your local shelter or rabbit rescue in their educational efforts. The more we put it out there, the more it will richochet and reach more of the public.

Become an advocate for rabbits!

The Bunny Guy

The Difference Between Pet Rabbits & Farm Rabbits

This is a heated question among people who love rabbits as pets and those who raise them for profit. It becomes a very charged issue that radically divides the two kinds of people who keep bunnies.

I do not think anyone would argue that the bunnies who are farmed and those who are kept as pets are the same exact creature. One simply had the misfortune of being born as fodder for humans and the other was born into a world where he/she was thought of as a pet.

It amazes me the total dichotomy between the two. I think that regardless of which side of the fence you are sitting, you have to admit that it is perfectly OK for people to keep domestic rabbits as pets. Most people do not realize the smart and interactive pet that a bunny is, when kept indoors with the family. A half million rabbit lovers cannot all be crazy.

Rabbits are clearly the third most popular pet nationwide, after dogs and cats (as evidence they are also the third most euthanized animal in shelters). While their percentage of the pet market remains small, it is growing fast.

The problem arises when as in California, where pet rabbits are still classified as livestock, just as the bunnies raised for meat on a farm. Certainly, our society affords life without abuse or torture to all animals and most of all animals kept as pets. I think most people would agree that to cause an animal to suffer needlessly, whether you were going to eat it or not, is not something we want to condone as a society.

We have made it known through our modern laws exactly what animal abuse is. Unfortunately, most of these statues applies mostly to dogs. They may not be tied to a tree or kept inside a too small cage or crate all day. Why is it OK to put a bunny inside a tiny cage 24/7? Is it just because he is still considered livestock? Does that make it OK, especially in light of the fact that bunnies were literally born to run and hop? How could a rabbit not be frustrated and unhappy unable to do the one thing that he was meant to do?

As our country becomes more and more urban, the number of rabbits living on a farm is dwindling. Where as virtually all rabbits raised 50 or 100 years ago were meant to be eaten, now a very large percentage of them are pets from birth. The trend is for the number of lagomorph pets to increase and the number on farms is going down. It is time for a shift in the public attitude.

Since rabbits are still considered “livestock” in our state, it does not have the same requirement that they be spayed/neutered before being adopted out of a Humane Society or shelter, like dogs or cats do. This is ludicrous. Thankfully our local chapter of the House Rabbit Society insures that every rabbit being adopted at every shelter is done. This is not always the case in other areas.

Our leaders need to establish a clear line between farm livestock and our beloved pets. Humane treatment for rabbits is currently laughed at by many parts of the public. That needs to change.

My personal opinion,
The Bunny Guy

Have You Sentenced Your Rabbit Girl To An Early Death?

In my experience chatting with the public during educational event, I have found that fully 80% of pet rabbits out there are not spayed or neutered. Beyond the fact that spayed/neutered buns make much better pets, for female rabbits to stay unspayed, it is a virtual death sentence.

87% or almost 9 out of 10 unspayed female rabbits will get cancer or tumors in their breasts or uterus by the time they are 4 years old. So this means that if you do not spay your girl bunny, she is very very likely to become very sick and die, long before her prime.

Most rabbits who are properly cared for will live 8-10 years, with some of the smaller breeds living a 10-12 years on average. If you care at all about your pet, why would you be willing to allow her to become painfully ill and suffer such a horrible early death? Especially, when it is not necessary.

I know that when people buy $10 or $20 rabbits at a pet store or elsewhere, they often are shocked when they learn that it will be $200-400 (our local prices) to get them spayed/neutered. From what I have seen out there, the expense usually means that most bunnies end up not having it done.

Even worse, in our area rabbits are still classified as livestock. This means that unlike a dog or cat who must be spayed or neutered before they are adopted from a shelter, by law, rabbits do not have to be fixed before they are adopted.

Some shelters realize the importance of spay/neutering in order to have a successful adoption. Who wants a male bunny who is going to spray all over the place or a female who will eventually become sick. These shelters and rescues make sure every bunny that they adopt has it done.

Our local House Rabbit Society Chapter here in San Diego provides spay and neuters for bunnies at a half dozen shelters in the county. They raise and spend tens of thousands of dollars each year to insure that every rabbit being adopted has the surgery.

This is a huge undertaking, but critical for the rabbits. Their behaviors are usually a lot better after spay/neuter, which makes the likelyhood of success a lot higher for the adoption. Litter box training is a breeze after bunnies are fixed and it tones down male aggressiveness, just as in other species.

Yet, in light of all the benefits of having your pet rabbit spayed/neutered, most of them are not. We must change the way the public looks at having their pet bunnies fixed, because spay/neuter is part of responsible pet ownership for ALL animals.

Have you sentenced your female pet rabbit to an early death? Have her spayed NOW, before it is too late.

The Importance Of Selecting The Right Vet For Your Rabbit

You may have noticed that I have not updated my blog in a few weeks, due to the fact that I have been suffering from a serious medical condition the past few months.

While I have managed to keep up all my HRS and shelter volunteering obligations, I have been simply worn out after that and have not had the energy and time to do any writing for my site. Now that I am feeling much better, I think that this important topic needs to be discussed.

Last week when I went for my usual day at the shelter, I noticed right away that my favorite bunny who was awaiting spay surgery was not in her abode. I knew instantly that something was not right and went about trying to find out what had happened to her.

I was told that she had passed away during her spay surgery. I did not ask them the gruesome details as to what had happened, but it brought to mind for me the importance of having a very experienced and rabbit saavy vet for your pet bunny.

Rabbits are extremely fragile critters whom are nothing like dogs and cats. To be able to successfully work with them medically, you need lots of knowledge and even more important, experience with their many health issues.

Even for surgeries as routine as spay and neuter, you want only the best veterinarians working on your pet. When it comes to anesthesia, bunnies have the unfortunate tendency to not do well with it. It takes years of experience, to learn exactly how to anesthestize a rabbit without any complications.

Also, common rabbit issues such as stasis, head tilt or infections take special knowledge and experience not gained from treating dogs and cats. You can only become a good rabbit vet by actually working on lots of rabbits, not reading info off the internet or seeing three or four bunnies a year.

Last month a new friend adopted a rabbit from the shelter I work at. She was one of the happiest most friendly buns we have had in a while and this person bonded her with her little Netherland Dwarf boy. She brought them both to the beach in early July and it was then that I mentioned to her that she needed to locate a better vet than the one she had for her two buns. I made this comment in light of the fact that I had lost a couple of buns at the exact vet that she was currently using and I felt it was due to the fact that they were mainly dog and cat vets. They were simply not good at diagnosing or treating rabbits.

Ironically, a week later her newly adopted girl developed a case of head tilt. The poor bunny was rolling from being off-balance. To this inexperienced rabbit owner, she was having a seizure.

When she rushed her rabbit into the vet that I had tried to talk her out of using, the vet told her that her rabbit was doomed to a life of suffering and pressured her to have the bunny put to sleep.

Not knowing that the bunny was not having seizures, she made the tough decision to save her girl from suffering needlessly and had her put down. Little did she know that most head tilts are caused by ear infections or possibly E. Cunniculi, both which can often be cured with proper medication and care.

I was quite angry with the vet for not referring her and her rabbit to a more saavy and knowledgeable vet. This girl thought that she was doing the right thing, especially in light of the vet’s insistence that she follow his advice.

It was a couple weeks before I decided to tell this girl that her bunny could have possibly been saved and that I felt she had been too hasty in putting her to sleep. I knew it would be devastating news for her to digest, but sometimes the best lessons in life come after a significant emotional event, as psychologists call it.

You can easily see in hindsight what the importance of having of having the proper veterinarian in this situation, but in reality it applies to virtually all vet visits because as my first story illustrates, even routine procedures such as a spay and neuter can have a deadly outcome if an inexperienced or unknowledgeable vet is utilized.

I know we are lucky that here in San Diego we have about a dozen very good rabbit specialists. In many areas, you may have to travel hundreds of miles to reach one, but do not underestimate the importance of locating and becoming familiar with an expert.

Many people in many areas of the USA have the mentality that rabbits are disposable pets and because they can be had for $20 or less are easily replaced if one passes away. For this reason, in many areas the vets will rarely see bunnies brought in, because the people who own them would not consider spending $500-600 to medically care for a rabbit that they bought for just $20. If the rabbit has a serious illness, the owners do not spend money to treat it and opt to simply purchase another new bunny. I have been told this first hand by vets who live in other parts of the country.

I recommend that everyone use the resources provided by the National House Rabbit Society website and your local HRS chapter or rabbit rescue. An important task of the HRS and any rabbit rescue is to communicate to the public who the best vets are for treating their sick bunnies. This knowledge is hard to come by and usually must be learned through trial and error. When your bunny is sick or dying, it is not the time to start interviewing or trying out a new veterinarian for your pet.

All experienced rabbit lovers know that it is critical to develop a relationship with a rabbit specialist vet while your rabbit IS HEALTHY… NOT WHEN HE BECOMES ILL. I will say this again, if you want the best chance of your rabbit surviving a serious illness or injury, you must have an experienced rabbit vet waiting in the wings to see and help your bunny. Frantically searching for a vet for your rabbit while he is suffering and hours make a difference, is not the way to do it and it drastically reduces the chances of your rabbit surviving his problem.

It is highly recommended to have a rabbit specialist see your bunny when he is healthy and not sick, so that a blood panel can be run to provide a baseline from which your vet can more efficiently and quickly diagnose future problems.

The reason for this is that a rabbit’s blood test values can vary widely from rabbit to rabbit. In order to not have your vet wasting precious time trying to diagnose a problem, it helps a lot to already know what the normal values for the tests are, for your particular rabbit. Yes, it costs a couple hundred dollars to run these tests on a healthy rabbit, but it can be the difference between life and death when your bunny is sick.

I am not going to say that either one of the bunnies I wrote about would have survived or not, had a better vet been used, but I do know that GOOD rabbit vets have a much lower mortality rate when working with sick rabbits. When it comes to treating rabbits, experience is everything.

I have learned this lesson the hard way and I try and coach every bunny lover that I know of the consequences of not having the best possible vet for their buns.

Nothing is more heart wrenching, than to lose a bunny with whom you were very close and bonded with. Nothing replaces the kisses and nose bonks that we get from a beloved rabbit buddy. Naturally, we all want our “special friends” to be with us on this earth, as long as possible.

I have personally made these same awful mistakes and so this is why I so adamant that every bunny owner should have a good relationship with a rabbit specialist vet in their area.

Having problems locating such a vet? A simple phone call or email to a local rabbit rescue or your local HRS chapter should provide you with a short list of all the vets whom can help you in your area. Please do not wait until your rabbit is desperately ill to start your search, because at that time it is probably too late.

Stephan
The Bunny Guy

Gimmee Shelter

I had a person come up to me the other day and ask me what their friends should do with a rabbit that is living inside a cage in their garage. My answer was easy, “Take him to the local shelter and relinquish him so that he can get a nice new home with someone who cares about him”.

Their response was, “Isn’t there a petting zoo around somewhere”?

This implied that it would be better to dump the bunny at a zoo or even set him free, but anything would be better than taking the rabbit to the shelter. Really?

I work at a couple of local shelters and it is true that they sometimes euthanize rabbits there. Thankfully, the days of putting bunnies to sleep because there is no room for them in the shelter are not as common as they used to be. Still, rabbits occasionally do get put down for illness or behavior issues because shelters do not have the resources to spend on their medical care and there are still some antiquated rules about animals that bite, but this happens for less than one percent of the buns that are admitted to the shelter.

What do you think the odds of dying are for a rabbit that is released into the wild? My guess would be that it is less than 50-50 that the animal survives a year. Isn’t that a more sure of a death sentence than the one in a hundred chance of a bad outcome at the shelter?

I know that shelters have gotten a bad rap with the public because they admittedly do euthanize some of the animals that come to them, but the public is more to blame for that than the shelters are, in my opinion. Why do people continue to purchase pets from the malls and local pet stores instead of giving homes to animals in the shelters and those living with rescue groups? I personally think that most people do not give consideration to the fact that when they do this, they are now part of the problem.

When a pet is purchased instead of being adopted, that is one more critter who will languish in a cage at the shelter instead of going to a new home. That is also, one more animal that will now be bred by a breeder to replace the animal in the pet store that the person just bought. It continues the cycle of breeding more unnecessary pets.

The shelters are not places to be feared. They are bastions of hope for thousands of animals who are in need of some caring people to give them the forever home that they crave. The public should not shun their local shelters. They should be supporting them by adopting from them, but also taking animals there to find new homes when necessary.

Better to end up in the shelter where there is at least a chance of a new life with some new people who will give better care and more love to an animal, than to allow the little guy to be neglected and abandoned. When this goes on long enough, his condition becomes so bad that when he finally does end up at the shelter, that there is not other recourse than to end his life.

Many people simply set the animal free, so that someone else will find him and end up with the responsibility of taking him to the shelter. That is pretty sad. How can people be so heartless?

I think folks justify it in their minds by demonizing the shelter and rationalizing that setting their pet free or locking him away in a cage someplace out of sight, that it is actually better than being in the shelter. Nothing could be farther from the truth.

The ultimate betrayal is preventing your pet from being able to finally get a new home where the people will have more time and love to give to him. You can rationalize running out on the commitment that was made when bringing the animal home in the first place, but then why not just let the pet move on and go somewhere where he is truly wanted?

Shelters are not the enemy and while no animal wants to end up there, for most it is a chance at a new life and a new beginning. Embrace your local shelter and even donate and volunteer there. See what is actually going on by becoming involved. I do not think there is a shelter in this country that does not need fresh new volunteers to help them in their quest to find new homes for their charges.

 

The Bunny Guy

Don’t Freak Out, It’s Normal

I get people calling me all the time in a panic because their rabbit just left a big puddle of bright orange or red pee. They want to know what kind of awful disease that their bunny must have in order for him to eliminate in such vivid colors.

My answer is always the same: red or orange pee does not really mean anything and that your rabbit can occassionally pee those colors. It does not mean that there is anything wrong.

More importantly, you will want to watch your rabbit’s urine for signs of bladder sludge. Rabbit’s urine is very high in calcium, which does not dissolve well in solution. It can precipitate out very easily and it is quite common for enough calcium precipitate to be left in their bladders, which causes a serious problem called bladder sludge.

If your bunny’s urine appears gritty or thick in texture, this is a real concern. A rabbit’s bladder has the unique disadvantage of having it’s entrance and exit being near the top. This allows calcium to settle out and form a sludge that gets trapped at the bottom of their bladder. It can even form bladder stones, which an HRS friend’s rabbit is at the vet this very minute getting surgery to try and remove. They are painful and can cause other issues such as stasis or lack of appetite due to the stress and pain.

If you see crystals or grit in your bunny’s pee, it means that he needs to see his vet before the condition becomes chronic. Bladder sludge and stones are a very difficult situation for which treatment is not always effective. Sometimes surgery is necessary to correct the condition and other times the vet can express or remove it through other therapies.

The bottom line is do not wait until your rabbit is in agony to deal with the situation. Don’t worry about the technicolor urine if he makes it, but rather always be aware of the texture of his pee. That is the key to noticing the most common issue that rabbits experience with their bladders.

Bladder sludge is a common and serious problem that is much easier to fix if caught early. Please don’t make the mistake of ignoring the early signs. A good bunny parent stays in tune with their bunny and notices little things like this.

Rabbits are very good at hiding their illnesses and so you must be proactive when caring for them by checking their water and food intake daily. Observe their litter box to insure there are poops present every day and be on the lookout for any indication that sludge may be present.