Life With Charlie!

[Nikki_Shortstuff]

Very adorable. Since he's young and growing you can give him an unlimited amount of pellets and might want to get some alfalfa as it is higher in protein and calcium than hay.

Thanks Nancy for the advice, I've been giving him unlimited pellets now. His appetite sure has grown, he won't stop eating!

he looks so tiny..r u sure of his age?...hes absolutely positively the cutest little thing.......well be needing lots of pics and vids of him growing up ...

and ur dont stop believing vid was cute..hehe

Aw, thank you! And yes, he is about 8 weeks now. He is so small but it's because he is a holland lop, which are the smallest form of the lop rabbit. =) And WHY did you watch that video, no one on the forum was supposed to see that....lol! I look real different now by the way, my hair is longer and it's brown now, I hate old photos and videos of me, ha ha.

Very wise of you to keep 1 happy bunny instead of more unhappy ones!
And I guess you can see: everybody loves baby bunnies!! Charlie is really cute!

Aw, thanks Vivian. I'm glad everybody likes Charlie, he's such a cutie, a menace though always chewing everything and leaving his droppings in random places, ha ha!

I would avoid giving any nuts to your bunny. They are not easily digestable. Fruit treats are good, I give mine unsweetened craisins and banana chips.

Oh I had no clue they were bad for him! I usually just avoided the yogurt covered ones, I've stopped feeding it to him now, thanks for the warning!

 

[Nela]

He is very adorable. I love holland lops :biggrin:

Not sure if anyone already warned you so I am sorry if you have to listen to this again but be careful with treats at this age. He's still very young and just weaned so you will want to introduce things very slowly and gradually. It's also best to avoid too much variety at this age. The best thing about this time is it's easier to identify any food items your bun might have problems with as sometimes some bunnies are more sensitive to a certain food. Fruit are particularly sweet so you'd want to give only tiny pieces to start with and treat them like treats. :rose:

There is a lot of information in the RO Library if you want to peek :biggrin2:There's a handy safe fruit/veggie list somewhere there as well.

Can't wait to see more of Charlie :biggrin2:

 

[Nikki_Shortstuff]

Nela wrote:

He is very adorable. I love holland lops :biggrin:

Not sure if anyone already warned you so I am sorry if you have to listen to this again but be careful with treats at this age. He's still very young and just weaned so you will want to introduce things very slowly and gradually. It's also best to avoid too much variety at this age. The best thing about this time is it's easier to identify any food items your bun might have problems with as sometimes some bunnies are more sensitive to a certain food.  Fruit are particularly sweet so you'd want to give only tiny pieces to start with and treat them like treats. :rose: 

There is a lot of information in the RO Library if you want to peek :biggrin2: There's a handy safe fruit/veggie list somewhere there as well.

Can't wait to see more of Charlie :biggrin2:

Hey, thanks Nela! And don't worry, the most I give him is a raisin a day and that's when I put him in the cage for the night, I want him to want to go in his cage. I check his poop and everything seems fine.

I love this website, so full packed with information! I'm about to post a new blog so you'll see more or Charlie soon!

 

[Nikki_Shortstuff]

So it's been a few days since I updated Charlie's blog. He's been a good bunny, definitely less chewing of the carpet. I don't know if it was because of my clapping and high pitched "no!" every time he did it, or the fact I got him hard blocks to chew on, but either way thank god he isn't chewing on the carpet as much!

Charlie still doesn't like being picked up, which I don't blame him, I heard rabbits generally don't. He loooves being pet though, if you start petting him he will literally plop on the ground and stretch his legs out in total relaxation! The only reason I tried to pick him up was to check his nails, since they seemed a bit sharp, but he totally freaked out and held a grudge on me for an hour, so I'm not doing that again. :shock:

Back to good news, I got him a litter box outside of the cage (cause he kept pooping on me and my boyfriend's dirty clothes pile), and he's already using it! All I did was put some of his droppings in there, some timothy hay, and ever since he's barely pooped outside of that litter box! I'm so proud of him!
:inlove:

His appetite has definitely grown too, he's eating way more than he did when we first got him, guess he's growing! I swear he looks bigger too...

And now, photo time!

I want those feet! He just loooves lazing around our bedroom.

I also took a video of him playing with the tube of a toilet paper roll, he was getting pretty crazy!

[flash=425,344]http://www.youtube.com/v/N7j3N8PnPrU&hl=en&fs=1[/flash]

 

[Nikki_Shortstuff]

Charlie was doing the craziest thing last night and trying to dig into my boyfriend's model cars at a high speed pace. Then as he squeezing into the space between the wall and the cage he started going through it and started digging as if it was a tunnel or something. Ha ha.

 

[Flash Gordon]

great vid!! he was kickin that toiletpaper tubes butt!:boxing

 

[Blaze_Amita]

AAWWW he is adorable! He reminds me of my Holland, Blaze's brother DJ.. Though DJ was oranage, Charlie look more close to Harlequin.

 

[KelzBunz]

Charlie is adorable! I absolutely :heartsLops!

I'm with you, I think you were meant for each other

Look forward to reading and seeing more of your little guy!

~Kelz

 

[Nikki_Shortstuff]

great vid!! he was kickin that toiletpaper tubes butt!:boxing

Ha ha! He ripped that thing to shreds! I gave him a new tube since he destroyed the other one.

AAWWW he is adorable! He reminds me of my Holland, Blaze's brother DJ.. Though DJ was oranage, Charlie look more close to Harlequin.

Thank you! I love orange bunnies, their fur color is so beautiful! =)

Charlie is adorable! I absolutely Lops!

I'm with you, I think you were meant for each other

Look forward to reading and seeing more of your little guy!

~Kelz

Aw, thank you! I'm glad you like him!

 

[Nikki_Shortstuff]

Bad news guys. I might be allergic to Charlie!

I've noticed that ever since I've gotten Charlie my nose has been stuffed up to the point where I have to resort to breathing through my mouth, and my asthma's been flaring up more than usual. In fact, it was so bad today I had to use a nebulizer several times to calm it down. When I told my parents that I got a rabbit, they decided to tell me (and I never knew this) that I'm allergic to rabbits. I was hoping I grew out of the allergy but I guess not. I notice I sometimes wake up with puffy pink eyes.

HOWEVER, I'm gonna try my best to keep Charlie. We've been vacuuming the room, I have a Helpa filter on all the time, washing hands, using eye drops, I've been taking allergy medications and trying to control my asthma. Charlie's not in our room only for today to calm down my asthma. I don't want to lose him, I've grown so attached to him and I'm hoping my body will adapt. We have a cat in the house who I'm allergic to but now he doesn't effect as much as half a year ago when I was first exposed to him. I love Charlie, I'm not letting him go.

:no:

In other news, Charlie has been going CRAZY with the chewing and digging! He's been chewing everything he can find. I got this bitter spray from the pet store to try and stop him, but guess what? I spray it on the carpet, and he starts licking it! He loves it! In fact anything I spray it on, he hops to it and licks it like crazy! And then he chews some more, lol! I got him this wooden chew toy too, he hasn't touched it yet but I'm sure he'll grow into it and start nibbling on that instead.

Some photos of Charlie recently! I swear, he's getting bigger!

Sleepy time! =)

Exploring the big, wide world! (Of our carpet!)

He LOVES sitting on top of his little house. It's his favorite spot!

Cleaning himself. =)

That's all for now. Anyone allergic to their bunnies? I would love to hear your advice! I'd do anything for Charlie! :bunnyheart

 

[Flash Gordon]

i found this info online about rabbits and allergiesmaybe give it a try ..Charlie would appreciate it.
Rabbit-related Allergies? Having allergic reactions to your pet rabbits? True allergies to rabbits are extremely rare. Most often, people are reacting to the rabbit's hay, not the animal itself. Here are some rabbit-specific suggestions:

• Instead of having the hay loose in a pen, litterbox or cage, try containing the hay. We've found that filling empty facial tissue boxes with hay is an excellent solution. It prevents the hay & grass dust from becoming air-borne.
  
• Try to have someone else fill the hay boxes and sweep up the hay. If that is not possible, use a face mask when sweeping up hay or filling hay boxes.
  
• Try changing brands of hay. Some brands of hay are much dustier than others. Also try another kind of hay, such as substituting orchard grass for timothy hay. Red Door recommends hay from Oxbow Hay Company (www.oxbowhay.com).
  
• Use all the suggestions—such as HEPA filters and consulting with your doctor—mentioned above.

Again, most people with allergies are allergic to many different things. You do not have to give up your animals because of allergies.[/b]

 

[tristaw.]

I have heard that true bunny allergies are rare and that it's usually the wood products or hay that are the real problem. have you had an allergy test?

I thought I was allergic to rabbits ( I have asthma too) but it turned out I am not. I am allergic to timothy hay though.. oy.

Good luck with your bun. He is beautifullllll...

 

[tristaw.]

oh. I should have read Lisa's post first, she had it covered already lol

 

[KelzBunz]

What Lisa & Tristana said

Also, my 6 year-old is extremely allergic to cats and so I was worried when she began reacting to our newly adopted bunny (Gus) back in June. She, too, required her inhaler a few times due to related asthma flare-ups. It took but a few weeks for her system to adjust to having him in the house. She's been fine with him since. I don't react to cats the way my daughter does, but it took me a few months before I stopped having to use my inhaler after Gusjoined our family.

So even if it is your lil Charlie causing your symptoms, perhaps you too will adjust, the way you did with your kitty.

 

[Nikki_Shortstuff]

Thanks guys for the advice! I was wondering if it was the bedding so I replaced the pine bedding with recycled paper bedding today called back-to-nature, similar to yesterday's news bedding. Hopefully my asthma will improve, if not I'll try a different type of hay instead of timothy.

 

[KelzBunz]

Hi again Sorry if this has been mentioned already, but do you line Charlie's whole cage with bedding? Or just his litter box? My two have a mat or carpet they can lay on but I only put 'bedding' (I use wood pellets) in their litter boxes, which not only saves money (and makes for easier clean-up when they're trained) but could also reduce the amount of airborne dust that may be causing your symptoms Just a thought! HTH.

~Kelz

 

[Flash Gordon]

my boyfriends daughter had a massive allergic reaction awhile back and we figured out how it happened..she was helping me feed the bunnies and was handling the hay alot ...now when shes here she doesnt touch the hay and has no probs whatsoever now..and i have 9 housebuns with alot of hay in all their cages...so altho some people might be allergic to airborn particls ..she only had a reaction to handling it and touching her face afterwards .so try and wash ur hands after u handle it and see if that helps.

 

[Momto3boys]

Also you can get allergy shots...

My friends daughter gets them, she was getting them every week at first and now she's down to once a mth.

It's been a 2 yr process but her allergies don;t bother her at all now.

 

[tristaw.]

I know here in Canada allergy shots are very expensive. our insurance didn't cover them though this was awhile back so hopefully things have changed. I hope they are covered in the states. I'm not sure how it works there/ I had the vials mailed to me and it ended up costing me about $800 a year, though I guess if you break it down, it's not so bad?

Anyway, it's something to look into. good luck with finding out what's going on. I hope it's something like hay that is the problem.

 

[Nikki_Shortstuff]

That y'all for the great advice you gave me on rabbit allergies! Sadly I cannot afford to get any allergy shots, I don't have insurance and I could never afford it anyways, but maybe one day! For now all I can do is try my best to prevent the problem. Going from pine shavings to recycled newspaper pellets has certainly helped, and I don't get allergies as bad. I also have been eating really healthy to get my immune system up. Apparently if you have a strong immune system you won't get allergies as bad.

@Kelly, that's a great idea, it would certainly save me money! Sadly his cage isn't big enough to fit a small litter box in it, when he gets bigger and I have to get him a bigger cage a will defiantly remember that piece of advice!