We have a lot of rabbits. Tabitha used to manage a family-owned pet store that sold bunnies. Once the bunnies became three months old, they were too old to sell so the pet store would get rid of them to bring in younger bunnies. The older rabbits would be taken to auction to be used for food or as bait to teach dogs to hunt. Tabitha brought many of these rabbits home.
Keeping Everyone Together
Cosmo, Halley, and Padmé were rescued from the Humane Society. They were surrendered as a bonded trio which means they grew up together and have always been with each other. The Humane Society wanted them to stay together. It’s hard enough to rehome a bonded pair, let alone a trio. It’s been our experience through the rescue that people will adopt a bonded group of animals, decide which one from the group they like best and rehome the others. We adopted the bonded trio to make sure all three rabbits would stay together.
Housing
All of the rabbits have a large yard to play in. Some of the rabbits are housed in small groups and others are housed alone, depending on how well they get along with each other and how well the other rabbits treat them. The rabbits aren’t housed in hutches because we want them to be able to run, jump, play, and dig in the dirt. While living in the city, we had a rabbit named Sneakers. Because of the lack of room to allow for a large enclosure for him to run around in, he had to be housed in a hutch. We didn’t have a choice at the time, but it’s something we won’t ever do again. Since we have a lot more room at our current house we can give the rabbits a lot more room.
A New Yard
Along with building a new pig enclosure, we also built new rabbit enclosures. One of the new rabbit yards is over 1,000 square feet and allows almost all of the rabbits to live together as a colony. I’m so excited about the way the new rabbit yards came out!! Here’s a post (with lots of pictures) I wrote about the new rabbit yards!
Look What The Weather Brought In
We’ve had rabbits since 2002. Up until the winter of 2019 we were very successful at keeping the male rabbits (bucks) and female rabbits (does) separate. One wintry night it snowed…a lot. The snowdrifts got over six-feet high and one of the bucks (Benji) was able to casually hop up and over the drift and into Alice’s yard. About a month later we had ten beautiful bunnies, five girls and five boys. After Benji’s visit with Alice, he was the first of the four adult bucks to be neutered. As soon as the five younger bucks are mature enough for surgery, they’ll be getting neutered too. In the meantime, all of the bucks, even the neutered ones, are in enclosures far away from the girls!
Food
The rabbits are fed grass hay that is supplemented every day with store-bought rabbit pellets. Each rabbit also gets at least 1/2 cup of fresh green vegetables and herbs every evening. We rarely give them carrots and fruit because the sugar content is too high and can upset their delicate digestive system.
Photo Album
