rai-nbow
New Member
Hello. My name is Rai and I'm nineteen years old and a junior in college. I have two rabbits, Tricksy and Thumper, who are both neutered males and are the best of friends. Tricksy is two and half and Thumper is somewhere in the 4-5 year range. I've had Tricksy since he was a baby and he is a blue-eyed white dwarf. He can be the sweetest thing or really moody. haha~ Although lately he has been wonderful as I'll discuss in a minute.
Thumper I rescued off Craig's List about four weeks ago. The girl said she couldn't care for him lately and wanted to find him a new home. I'd been looking for a new pet for my apartment and jumped on the chance to adopt him as he is an English Angora and already fixed! You don't find breeds like that around North Carolina so I was very interested. The girl brought him to me two days later and... wow, he was a lot worse for wear than I thought. He was/is terribly thin, running a fever, entirely coated in thick, thick matts that took 5 days of 1-2 hour intervals to cut and brush out. He was covered in his own feces that took several quick baths to clean off. (I had to cut matts, wash him, cut matts, wash him. etc) His cage had a wire bottom that was filthy disgusting. I took out the wire and threw it in the dumpster it was that bad. Apparently they never potty trained him. I've potty trained all of the rabbits I've owned without any issue and I don't why some people think it's easier to just let them be on a grate and clean out the bottom container... no offense if that's what you do. I just think it's easier to potty train them.
Anyway, I was extremely upset about the condition of this poor thing because he is THE sweetest rabbit I have ever had the pleasure to meet. The hours and hours I spent grooming him... he sat there on my lap or next to me while I snipped inches of matts of his belly, feet and face. I went to wipe the flea dirt off his ears and the fur turned blood red and I had to cut off all his lovely ear fringing. It was horrible and I felt so bad...
And here's the worse thing.. about 4 days after I had him, I was clipping around his jaw and noticed a ping pong ball sized swelling... I immediately googled and my heart sank when I realized it probably was indeed a tooth abscess. So the next morning I called four different vets that I had looked up the night before that delt with exotics trying to find somebody who I felt was knoweledgable enough in this area. The third vet office recommended me to an exotic vet an hour and a half away. So I called them up and strangely they were cheaper (for a check up) than all the offices I had spoken to prior and they have a rabbit specialist. SO. I decided to make an appointment for that afternoon. Sooo, my mum and I arrived a couple hours later with Tricksy and Thumper in toe. Tricksy is in perfect health. whoot~ whoot~ And Thumper is severely underweight and needs his abscess lanced off. ...so much for a free rabbit, huh? It's okay though. I'm glad he came to me where I can take care of him. So he has been on penicillin injections for the past two weeks and I need to schedule a surgery appointment.
On a good note, Thumper has been doing GREAT!! He is eating like crazy (his face allows him to be able to chew now x.x) and gaining weight steadily, he's happy!! He's binkied around the room whereas before he just lied down from not feeling well. He and Tricksy get along beautifully!!! I'll post more about that in another thread probably. But let's just say it was pretty much love at first sight. Which was CRAZY because Tricksy is extremely territorial and grumpy sometimes. I read up a lot before deciding to get Thumper to be sure I was introducing them properly. It went so well and right now they're lying on the floor together. :hearts
So anywhooo. That was a LONG introduction. But I hope you enjoyed it or at least got through it all without falling asleep.... I look forward to chatting with everyone and meeting everyone's bunnies!! :biggrin:
Thumper I rescued off Craig's List about four weeks ago. The girl said she couldn't care for him lately and wanted to find him a new home. I'd been looking for a new pet for my apartment and jumped on the chance to adopt him as he is an English Angora and already fixed! You don't find breeds like that around North Carolina so I was very interested. The girl brought him to me two days later and... wow, he was a lot worse for wear than I thought. He was/is terribly thin, running a fever, entirely coated in thick, thick matts that took 5 days of 1-2 hour intervals to cut and brush out. He was covered in his own feces that took several quick baths to clean off. (I had to cut matts, wash him, cut matts, wash him. etc) His cage had a wire bottom that was filthy disgusting. I took out the wire and threw it in the dumpster it was that bad. Apparently they never potty trained him. I've potty trained all of the rabbits I've owned without any issue and I don't why some people think it's easier to just let them be on a grate and clean out the bottom container... no offense if that's what you do. I just think it's easier to potty train them.
Anyway, I was extremely upset about the condition of this poor thing because he is THE sweetest rabbit I have ever had the pleasure to meet. The hours and hours I spent grooming him... he sat there on my lap or next to me while I snipped inches of matts of his belly, feet and face. I went to wipe the flea dirt off his ears and the fur turned blood red and I had to cut off all his lovely ear fringing. It was horrible and I felt so bad...
And here's the worse thing.. about 4 days after I had him, I was clipping around his jaw and noticed a ping pong ball sized swelling... I immediately googled and my heart sank when I realized it probably was indeed a tooth abscess. So the next morning I called four different vets that I had looked up the night before that delt with exotics trying to find somebody who I felt was knoweledgable enough in this area. The third vet office recommended me to an exotic vet an hour and a half away. So I called them up and strangely they were cheaper (for a check up) than all the offices I had spoken to prior and they have a rabbit specialist. SO. I decided to make an appointment for that afternoon. Sooo, my mum and I arrived a couple hours later with Tricksy and Thumper in toe. Tricksy is in perfect health. whoot~ whoot~ And Thumper is severely underweight and needs his abscess lanced off. ...so much for a free rabbit, huh? It's okay though. I'm glad he came to me where I can take care of him. So he has been on penicillin injections for the past two weeks and I need to schedule a surgery appointment.
On a good note, Thumper has been doing GREAT!! He is eating like crazy (his face allows him to be able to chew now x.x) and gaining weight steadily, he's happy!! He's binkied around the room whereas before he just lied down from not feeling well. He and Tricksy get along beautifully!!! I'll post more about that in another thread probably. But let's just say it was pretty much love at first sight. Which was CRAZY because Tricksy is extremely territorial and grumpy sometimes. I read up a lot before deciding to get Thumper to be sure I was introducing them properly. It went so well and right now they're lying on the floor together. :hearts
So anywhooo. That was a LONG introduction. But I hope you enjoyed it or at least got through it all without falling asleep.... I look forward to chatting with everyone and meeting everyone's bunnies!! :biggrin:
