New Rabbit

dwayne

dwayne

AC Members
Jul 12, 2001
548
0
0
52
Boston, MA
Howdy everyone! Remember me? Long time no talk!! I took a break from ALL my internet forums... now I exclusively visit only 2! This one, and a mommy's group one. They put a huge foot down on internet use at work, and my computer at home went kerput... time on hubby's computer was practically non-existent... but Santa came a little early and brought me a new one! Hooray!

On to my post! We are awaiting landlord approval to adopt a bunny rabbit... and I couldn't be more excited! I can't imagine why they wouldn't give us the OK... but you never know, so keep your fingers crossed! I've been perusing petfinder.com and we found a few that we really like - all mini lops either young or mid aged, all fixed-spayed-neutered. (we being me and hubby, it will not be revealed to 3year old son till it's finalized)

Now my question is, do I have what I need for him? I went to Petsmart today becuase I saw a kickass cage/shelter on clearance from $100 marked to $25! We have the bigger one (36x29x21). Then I also got a small crock bowl for pellet food, a nice water bottle, 2 squishy toys (rabbit safe), a cuddle cup, a litter pan, a hay ball, kritter kabob, and a few chewey things including flavored salt licks to go on the kabob.

I have not yet purchased food pellets or hay, becuase if we don't end up getting the rabbit I don't want to risk not being able to return it. I plan to get a bag of rabbit litter (I dont know what it's made of, but it says for rabbits and it is flushable and controls odors... if I don't get that I plan to get Carefresh), a small bag of timothy hay, and a small bag of pellet food (any suggestions on a good variety with the right nutrients?).

Am I missing anything (besides the rabbit, that is)???

Thanks in advance!
 
If you let him roam the house, don't forget to get a Shop Vac...at least until he's potty-trained, anyway. ;)
 
Go ahead and get what all you need for little FooFoo (like my name suggestion? lol) because the PETsMART return policy is pretty flexible, you can return pet food there, even if it's opened. Just save your receipts if you don't want to exchange any of the stuff instead of getting a refund. Anything returned without a receipt that is priced over $5 will be given back to you on a gift card ONLY, but if you have receipts, then you can just get your money back without getting anything else. Try another kind of bedding besides the Carefresh, that stuff is really dusty and sometimes it causes trouble with sneezing and weepy eyes. We had to quit using it in our guinea pig cages in the store for that reason. It's also a lot more expensive than the aspen shavings which will work just fine. Get the little booger some timothy hay or alfalfa too, they love that.

I think it's great you're adopting a bunny and getting it altered too...way to go! :thm:
 
We got the A-OK from the landlords!!! I'm so excited!!! Thanks for the suggestion skyeye... we're definately goign to get timothy hay for him to eat/bedding, but I want to get something different for the little corner litter box... hmmm... maybe just shredded newspaper!!

Slappy, you're so funny! We will, obviously, let him out of his cage for a few hours when we get home from work, but he will by no means have the run of the house with freedom to deposit his pellets wherever he sees fit... eek! Actually the only thing the landlords were concerned with was whether he'd be in a cage or free-roaming!!

Now to go pick out a little guy! Oh, skyeye, they all come with names!! We will keep whatever name they already have, except for one - donnie - he's a baby, and if we get him we'll be renaming him... I have an ex donnie who, well let's just say I don't like the name :p:
 
I've never actually kept a rabbit in the house, but have been told they tend to always "go" in the same place. this was definately true with the rabbits we kept outside when I was young. You will want to get him something to chew on. They like to and need to gnaw. If they don't have something they will find something (Like baseboard)
We always put strips of scrap drywall in the cages. the rabbits would chew the gympsum and leave the wooden frames of the cages alone. if we did not add drywall they would eat the cagesanywhere they could get to the wood.

Hay is food, straw is bedding. Don't use hay for bedding it will cause confusion :p:
As far as rabbit food, we always just used prepared pellets and supplemented with hay. Fresh greens are always a vey welcome treat, and of course the occasional carrot (no joke)
Dave
 
Hi dwayne. We have two Lionhead Rabbits. Both are litter-box trained. Dave is right. Once you see them go, put the litter box in that spot. When they learn to use the box, you can move it and they will go to it. That's how we trained ours. If you get a short-haired rabbit, aspen bedding will work fine. Our rabbits have very long hair so we use aspen pellets. We feed a good pellet and lots of fresh veggies every day. If you feed your rabbit alfalfa be careful; it can give them diarrea. Hay is a must. It gives fiber and keeps their molars from growing spurs. If you let them out watch out for chewing; furniture, phone cords, lamp cords, people...everything. Worse than babies. There are several good websites on rabbit care and feeding. Congrats and enjoy your new bunny.

Mark
 
Hi everyone!!

We adopted Tony one week ago, and he is doing so great! We got him from the mspca, and he is litter box trained, and came with "instructions" on what he likes best... he's SO low maintenance and so much fun. He is a mini lop-holland lop mix... being from a pound they weren't 100% sure exactly what he was; they do know he's ~6 months old, and just about fully grown (estimate him about 3.5lbs). He came from a house with 3 boys, he lived there for a month when the family realized he was the cause of one of the boy's constant runny nose. He is very used to the loud noises associated with kids, so that's great - he is so un-skittish!! The only thing I've seen him freak out about is when our radiators start kicking on - but heck they sometimes startle me out of a sound sleep! He's not very keen on being picked up, but he will sit and stretch his legs behind him if you scratch in just the right spot behind his ears!

He has 2 litter boxes in his house (the smallest litter pans I could find - we use the corner ferret/rabbit one to hold his toys, it was just too small). Within the first hour of him being home he peed in the back part (in the wooden hutch part) so we put the one litter pan back there... I decided I didn't want him hiding back there all the time, since they like to chill out on-in their litter pans, so I got another litter pan for the cage part of his cage. He only pees in the back pan - never anywhere else. He poops 99% of the time in one or the other pan, and then sometimes I'll find stray pellets in the cage (and when he's out playing) - but honestly I don't care much about those, it's the pee that smells.

The litter pans have a layer of carefresh and a thick layer of timothy hay... every day my son drops a handful or two of fresh hay on each pan (and I put in fresh carefresh and all new hay every 3-ish days). He always has hay to eat - either from his box, or in a papertowel tube or other "toy"... he gets salad twice a day - 4 baby carrots and 4 big leaves of lettuce (romaine and green leaf)... he's definately not a fan of the carrot greens. Also when he comes out to play after (our) dinner time, he gets a small handful of pellets (treats!)... I'm going to the produce market today to get some other greens to try...

Question - he doesn't seem to drink much water. We give him fresh (cool) water in the morning and at supper time and you can barely notice how much he drinks... is this normal? He had a crock bowl at the pound, so I know he knows how to drink out of one (versus a water bottle)...

Here are a few pictures - his red-eye is just as bad as my sons!! He actually has huge brown eyes...

EDITED: use this link :D
http://pg.photos.yahoo.com/ph/mommytoray/album?.dir=/c535&.src=ph&.tok=phtt.MEBv7nBeEUR
 
Last edited:
darn, I can't get the pics to work but I wanna see this little guy sooooooooo badc. I remember when I had a bunny, his name was Spike and I had to fight with my mom to keep him. My boyfriend at the time had given him to me as a gift for my birthday. This rabbit was supposed to be a Dwarf and turned out to be the biggest rabbit I had ever seen. Man, did he love me too..... I used to bring him all over the place and he would stick so close to me like a dog. I even brought him to the catskill Mountains and he followed me around all over, he was a great bunny. I used to sit with him on the couch at home and no one else was allowed on the couch though..... did you knew rabbits have a feirce growl? LOL, if someone tried to sit with me, he (I think it was actually a she now that I think about it) would run over to their end of the couch and scratch the dickens out of them, LOL man I miss that big guy!

Mine did like the water bottle over the water bowl but that might just be a preference type thing. You might want to give it a try and let him have his water when he wants it....

Nonetheless, congrats on your bunny, d.... sounds like you and the bunny alike found gems. Good luck with him and get those pics to work :)
 
You must log in or register to reply here.
AquariaCentral.com
Top Bottom