What made you fall inlove with bunnies?

[allenstacy74]

Hi! I have been thinking a lot about how I became a proud bunny owner and the steps that led up me up to loving those little fur balls and would love to hear your stories!

When I was 16 I was struggling a lot with mental health as an autistic person, I find it hard to keep relationships with people and don’t know how to make friends.. I decided I wanted a pet to keep me company! I decided on getting a bunny (and I know a lot of people are not going to like this but it’s the truth) I fully planned on keeping my bunny in a little hutch in my room as I wasn’t very educated and just based all my knowledge off of poor animal care from -pets at home- etc.. when I brought my bun, Pumpkin, I ended up “accidentally” free roaming him as I just loved his company, he loved to cuddle and sleep by me and play all the time, he was such a beautiful boy with the most wonderful personality. Sadly Pumpkin is no longer with us as i took him for a check up at the vets and found out he had a birth defect which was untreatable and passed away a month or so after I got him, I’m so grateful for everything he taught me on how to love something, I never used to believe those stories of animals knowing when a person is hurting until I met Pumpkin, I truly believe he saw how much pain I was in and he looked probably more than I looked after him.. Thanks to Pumpkin i now have 2 more bunnies who receive the upmost love and care I could possibly give. And I can happily say I am way more educated and cautious of how I care for my buns and they have exceptional lives and it all pays off when they show me love in return!

 

[Catlyn]

I started out in quite a similar way. Pestered dad for a suitable pet... no space for big dog, dad doesn't want a small one; allergic to cats; allergic to hamsters; mum said no rats; birds are noisy; let's settle for a rabbit.
So we went to a local breeder to pick out the one who would be pet in summer and pot by winter. I ended up picking the sweetest, biggest bun there was possibsility to take. My first bunny boy Musti who was a whopping 4.5kg at 4 months of age, one who put up with all of our wrong ways of caring and feeding. Looking back on it, honestly amazes me how his system didn't give up when he would often get almost a whole kilo of non-leafy veg scraps per day. How he could live in a 60*90cm cubicle that didn't fit him. When we got him at the very beginning, he didn't even fit the old cages from like 2006 we had for a few of our past rabbits. These weren't fit for any rabbit. Then i joined this forum, learned a bunch of stuff, and started pursuing a better life for him. Brought him indoors, got him neutered and vaccinated, changed his diet the best i could, got him to freeroam whenever i was around. He loved me like no other. I loved him like no other. He was better than any of my classmates. He got me thru the first year of quarantine. Sadly he started limping and i couldn't get to the good vets fast enough to not let him go. His hayday healthy weight was 5.5kg, but he had dropped below 5 when at the last vet.
We got Storm right that day. I had to actually learn to bond with him and he didn't put up with any of the crap that i had yet to learn to do better. A smaller boy of the same breed, an adult just a bit over 5kg at his last weighting, he's a complete flipcoin personality-feisty, grumpy and get-it-my-way kinda bun. He's the boss and he knows it. Real eye-opener how bun breeds' personalities are nothing but estimates. Hah, gentle giants alright, i got one and then a madhouse wrecker right after. Still love him tho.
Took the next step in bunny parenting and fought for Storm to get a bondmate. Drove 130km to get "her", a lovely, kissy mix the vets assessed to be a boy and whom i named Lümi. He was on the gentle side of buns and i felt extremely blessed to have him. Much like Musti, he was my emotional support. Sadly he didn't live long either, was fine one morning and then died in my arms the same night. We assume it was something wrong with his genetic makeup or a weakened heart from URI that took him. Could've been one or the other, or a mix of both. I'd always known he'd been slightly megacolon-y.
As Storm was looking depressed, we got him another mate, actually a girl this time, from 60km away. She wrecked her carriage, wrecked her cage, wrecked the walls, everything. Including my heart. She sucessfully bonded with Storm and their bond is stable, that's such a sight to see their pair antics. Her fave things are hugging Storm, destroying any flooring i try, and sometimes she falls asleep in my arms. Sometimes.
I love all of them dearly as they give me reasons to actually get up and improve, just to take greater care of them.

 

[allenstacy74]

I started out in quite a similar way. Pestered dad for a suitable pet... no space for big dog, dad doesn't want a small one; allergic to cats; allergic to hamsters; mum said no rats; birds are noisy; let's settle for a rabbit.
So we went to a local breeder to pick out the one who would be pet in summer and pot by winter. I ended up picking the sweetest, biggest bun there was possibsility to take. My first bunny boy Musti who was a whopping 4.5kg at 4 months of age, one who put up with all of our wrong ways of caring and feeding. Looking back on it, honestly amazes me how his system didn't give up when he would often get almost a whole kilo of non-leafy veg scraps per day. How he could live in a 60*90cm cubicle that didn't fit him. When we got him at the very beginning, he didn't even fit the old cages from like 2006 we had for a few of our past rabbits. These weren't fit for any rabbit. Then i joined this forum, learned a bunch of stuff, and started pursuing a better life for him. Brought him indoors, got him neutered and vaccinated, changed his diet the best i could, got him to freeroam whenever i was around. He loved me like no other. I loved him like no other. He was better than any of my classmates. He got me thru the first year of quarantine. Sadly he started limping and i couldn't get to the good vets fast enough to not let him go. His hayday healthy weight was 5.5kg, but he had dropped below 5 when at the last vet.
We got Storm right that day. I had to actually learn to bond with him and he didn't put up with any of the crap that i had yet to learn to do better. A smaller boy of the same breed, an adult just a bit over 5kg at his last weighting, he's a complete flipcoin personality-feisty, grumpy and get-it-my-way kinda bun. He's the boss and he knows it. Real eye-opener how bun breeds' personalities are nothing but estimates. Hah, gentle giants alright, i got one and then a madhouse wrecker right after. Still love him tho.
Took the next step in bunny parenting and fought for Storm to get a bondmate. Drove 130km to get "her", a lovely, kissy mix the vets assessed to be a boy and whom i named Lümi. He was on the gentle side of buns and i felt extremely blessed to have him. Much like Musti, he was my emotional support. Sadly he didn't live long either, was fine one morning and then died in my arms the same night. We assume it was something wrong with his genetic makeup or a weakened heart from URI that took him. Could've been one or the other, or a mix of both. I'd always known he'd been slightly megacolon-y.
As Storm was looking depressed, we got him another mate, actually a girl this time, from 60km away. She wrecked her carriage, wrecked her cage, wrecked the walls, everything. Including my heart. She sucessfully bonded with Storm and their bond is stable, that's such a sight to see their pair antics. Her fave things are hugging Storm, destroying any flooring i try, and sometimes she falls asleep in my arms. Sometimes.
I love all of them dearly as they give me reasons to actually get up and improve, just to take greater care of them.

They sound incredibly similar to the bunnies I have! My big boy, Eugene, who is a mini lop is so energetic and playful but also a pain in my butt! His biggest hobby includes destroying absolutely everything I own haha, whether that be my floor, skirting boards, walls, carpets, curtains, wardrobes, my bed etc etc but I have my sweet little angel, Cora, she is an albino mini lop and she’s a bit younger than Eugene but when I adopted her, she was previously living in a small wire top cage and was no where near litter trained, I’ve never been able to train her but I can deal with sweeping up after her, because she is so sweet and just likes to be with Eugene, they seem like they were just meant for eachother.. although at times she can be a bit grumpy with me, she gets a little frustrated when Eugene gives me love instead of her but she has never been aggressive, she just wants him all to herself!

 

[DelawareRunner]

I had dwarf bunnies when I was kid for about seven years (am 47 now). I didn't know much about caring for them back then. I had two male baby bunnies in 2002, one which was killed by fly strike and the other made it to five years old which is when I said no more outdoor buns--indoor only for now on. I adopted my Lily in 2007 when she was two years old; she was a lionhead mix with beautiful coloring. She lived indoors with us and had a pen for exercise. She also had supervised run time on our back deck. She was a kind hearted, laid back bunny that loved everyone. Not a mean bone in her. She died at age twelve and was with me through some of the most awful times in my life and comforted me when I became an empty nester at age 37. I was so devastated and it took me about three years before I could visit her grave and look at pics of her without crying. I adopted Precious (my avatar), a dwarf mix that was less than a year old in 2017, about a month after Lily passed. She is loveable, sweet, and funny but SO ornery and sassy! Not mean at all, but she knows what she wants and she also likes to give the vet a hard time. I couldn't imagine life without her though.

I always liked rabbits because they can live for a long time, bond with their people, have a lot of personality, and you can leave them alone for a long time unlike a dog. I just find them irresistibly cute as well .