Otto's Bladder

 Hi Everybunny! Cookie here! This blog post was supposed to be about my dainty feet, but instead it's about Otto's bladder.

My secretary spent last weekend fussing about Otto, and she insists that I tell you the story because she says its very important that all bunny people know about Otto's bladder. She says it's more important than my dainty feet right now. Seriously, his BLADDER is more important than my FEET?! How dare she! 

Anyway, I'm going to cooperate because our secretary is under a lot of pressure lately and I don't want to risk her losing her mind and forgetting to order my Flower Power Berry Boost treats. I hope you all like bladder stories. I'll try to make it short.

This is Otto. I have to admit that Otto, though dour, is very cute and very sweet. He's also blind and as old as Methuselah. He's had problems with bladder sludge in the past, but we thought it was under control.

What is bladder sludge? According to the Royal Veterinary College (Click here for a link)"Sludgy bladder syndrome occurs when the normal calcium crystals in rabbit urine are retained in the bladder. This can lead to a build up of a gritty sediment which can irritate the lining of the bladder and lead to inflammation." Thank you RVC!! 

If you go to that link there is a nice, short article about bladder sludge, what causes it and how to prevent it. There's also another one Here from Small Pet Select. And here's one from the Rabbit Welfare Association!

Poor Otto wasn't eating last friday night, and our secretary assumed that he had some GI stasis brewing. So she gave him fluids, put him on a hot water bottle, gave him Meloxicam and Enulose and all those other good GI stasis things and he spent the night next to her bed. When she saw him eating parsley at 3 am she assumed he was back to normal...

...and then the next morning she realized he hadn't peed all night! The light finally dawned - Otto's sludge was back, his urethra was probably blocked and all those fluids she gave him could be putting a lot of stress on his already stressed out bladder. 

Luckily our wonderful rabbit-savvy vet was able to see him on a Saturday morning for which we are so grateful. Because this is what she found when she looked at his x rays!

Ouch!! See those big white areas near his rear end? That's all bladder sludge! 

Otto spent the weekend there and had a catheter inserted to drain his bladder and then had sub-cutaneous fluids to help flush the rest of the sludge out. He came home on Monday, as dour but cute as ever, and is now on cranberry supplements, twice weekly sub-q fluids, a diet of low calcium veggies, and a brief course of antibiotics in case of infection. 

So what is the moral of this story? If your bunny is acting poorly, don't assume it's GI stasis! So often rabbit people focus on their bunny's poo, but honestly monitoring their pee is just as important. If you notice your bunny is having lots of crystals in her urine (those articles I linked to have some good photos!), seems to be straining to urinate, isn't producing a good amount of urine, has blood in her urine, or generally seems hunchy and unwell please get her to your rabbit-savvy vet ASAP.

And now, I'm going to go back to my pen and work on the article about my dainty feet. As Mrs. Brighton would say: "BYEEEEEEEE!!!"

Love, 

Cookie

Is It Time You Got Speutered?

Hi there! I'm Señor Spaghetti! I'm one of the sanctuary bunnies here at HFR. Mrs. Brighton's off polishing her tiaras, so I decided to take over her blog for this month and talk to you about your bunny's health. We're going to start with speutering - that's short for spaying and neutering!

You see, I know some of you got yourself a cute little baby bunny at Easter and now that little cutie is starting to act more like a Tasmanian Devil. In fact, this is the time of year that rabbit rescues dread - when the cute little babies become hormonal nut jobs and their people decide to dump them. Please don't dump your bunny - I have the solution: speutering!

Let's talk about this, shall we? Here are a few reasons that spaying or neutering is a good thing to do:

1. Not fond of your Tasmanian Devil? Most of the behaviors that are driving you crazy (lunging, spraying, not using the litter box, mounting your feet, biting, etc, etc, etc) are the result of bunny hormones. What's the answer? Get rid of the hormones! It can take a few weeks, but after speutering the hormones will dissipate and your little fluff ball will be much better behaved.

2. The C-word. Sadly, unspeutered bunnies are very prone to reproductive cancers. Not spaying or neutering is almost like inviting cancer into your bunny's life. Seriously.

3. We're less stinky! That litter box smell? So much better after speutering!

4. No, we won't get fat and lazy! Plus we'll be a whole lot calmer, and can focus on playing with you instead of looking for a mate.

5. Bunnies are very social, and speutering makes it easier for you to have two (or more!) Unspeutered rabbits tend to want to guard their territory and will fight - even if they are siblings. If your bunnies are male and female, they'll reproduce. You may not see this as a problem, but please think about this: rabbits are the third most often euthanized animals at shelters across the country! By letting your bunnies have bunnies, you are contributing to this serious problem.

Please don't think you can just get one of your pair done. Nope. It doesn't work that way. The intact bunny will still act out their hormonal behaviors, and fighting is still a strong possibility. Plus if you get your male neutered and leave your female unspayed, he is still able to father baby bunnies for several months after surgery. You could still wind up with a litter of bouncing baby bunnies!

6. You may think getting your rabbit speutered isn't "natural". Well, no, it isn't - but neither is keeping a rabbit as a pet either. Remember that we've only been domesticated a few hundred years, and we have many of our wild behaviors still. Getting us spayed/neutered is definitely a good way of helping us adjust to this "unnatural" situation.

7. If you do let your rabbits reproduce, things tend to get out of control fast. This is where I need to tell you my story!

This is me and my siblings when we were just three days old:

I know, we're adorable! Don't you want to kiss us?

Our original person got our parents from someone who raised rabbits for meat, and occasionally sold them as pets. He swore to my parents' person that even though my parents were only 6 weeks old he could tell their sex, and they were both girls. Absolutely, positively two girls. 

A couple of months later, one of the two "girls" gave birth to three adorable babies! 

Lesson #1: It's very hard to sex young rabbits. Very, very hard!

Lesson #2: Rabbits can get pregnant as early as three months old!

Our person was wonderful, but didn't know much about bunnies and didn't realize she needed to separate my parents immediately. She didn't figure that out until a couple of days later, but by then it was too late. About a month after the first litter, my mom had eleven more babies!

Lesson #3: Rabbits can get pregnant the day they give birth, and their gestation period is only about 30 days. And bunny litters can be large - lots and lots of babies!

My secretary has seen situations where two bunnies turned into 60 or 70 in less than four months. It's crazy, right?! In my case, my parents were lucky, because our person knew she was in over her head. She got help from my secretary's rescue and we all got speutered before any more babies happened!

The costs of taking care of 14 babies and two parents were over $4000 - money that the rescue had to raise because our person couldn't afford it. Plus, since we were New Zealands, very few people wanted to adopt us, and five years later three of us are still here in sanctuary. My secretary says we were worth it, but still - if you have the chance to get your bunny taken care of, why bring extra bunnies into the world? Especially when there are some real benefits to spay and neuter!

I feel like I'm the poster child for why you should get your bunny speutered! Have I convinced you? I hope so!  I know bunny people have lots of concerns about their rabbit having surgery, so that's why my next posts are going to be on how to find a great rabbit-savvy vet, and aftercare for spay/neuter surgery. 

Want more information on spay and neuter? Here's some great links:

*The wonderful Dana Krempels wrote this piece on spay and neuter.

*The Rabbit Welfare Association has a good article here.

*We love Best Friends Animal Sanctuary! Here's their article.

Until next time!

Señor Spaghetti, 

Huntsville Friends of Rabbits Minister of Health

PLEASE READ! UPDATE ON RHDV2!!

Bunny folks, please read this post!!

As many of you are aware, the RHDV2 virus is now in America. RHDV2 is an extremely serious disease - it has been described as "the ebola of the rabbit world". It is nearly 100% fatal, and spreads rapidly throughout both wild and domestic rabbit populations. You can find out more about it here. There is another good fact sheet here. While for many years this was a disease we didn't have to worry about, we do now. It's here, and it's spreading.

I got a call from our veterinarian today. She's been speaking with rabbit experts at UT Knoxville, as well as doing research about RHDV2. She's asked us to make the Huntsville Friends of Rabbits community aware of some issues with this disease as it affects us in the Southeast right now. 

This week there has been a confirmed case in Arkansas of a domestic indoor rabbit with RHDV2. This rabbit was apparently from a breeder in South Carolina, was sold at a rabbit show in Georgia, and died after being brought into Arkansas. We cannot be sure where or how this rabbit contracted the disease. 

Unfortunately this is the case with many of the cases of RHDV2 in the US now. Dr. Moore told me that her contacts seem to feel that RHDV2 may be spreading at least in part through hay, but this disease has so many vectors that it's difficult to tell. 

As for a vaccine, at the current time we cannot get it in Alabama until there is actually a case here. It's a complicated story, but boils down to the fact that RHDV2 is not considered a domestic disease of rabbits and the vaccine has to be imported from Europe by permission. I talked with our Alabama State Veterinarian today and he promised me he will be speaking with the USDA to see if there's any way of speeding up access to the vaccine. There is apparently an American company working on a vaccine with the USDA, but we don't know how quickly it will be out.

What does this mean for you and your bunnies? The bottom line is that you need to take precautions now, even though there has not been an official case of RHDV2 in Alabama. It''s very possible that it's already here and just hasn't been reported, and it is definitely going to be here soon. It really is only a matter of time. These are some things that our veterinarian feels are necessary until we have a vaccine and this disease is under control:

1. Please do not let your bunny outside.  We all like to bring our rabbits out for a jaunt in the sunshine, but this is not a good idea now. Especially if you have wild rabbits in your yard, please don't bring your pet bunny out to play.

2. Check out where your hay is coming from. Especially if you buy your hay online, make sure it isn't from an area where RHDV2 has been prevalent. This map **can give you an idea of where the disease is. Remember, just because you buy hay from a reputable company it doesn't mean the hay isn't from an affected area and hasn't been exposed to wild bunnies with RHDV2. If you can buy local Alabama hay you *might* be better off (but again, we just don't know). Timothy is hard to find here, but Bermuda and orchard grass are available from our local farmers. Just across the state line in lower TN you can sometimes find Timothy. Your bunnies cannot go any length of time without hay, so this is a hard one. Please just use your best judgement.

3. Please consider taking off your shoes when you come into the house. The virus can be transmitted through dirt on your shoes. Here at the main foster house we always remove our shoes and put on slippers. In the past this has been to cut down transmission of coccidia, fleas and worms from the outside, but now it's for RHDV2 as well.

4. Wash your bunny's veggies thoroughly! Again, look at where the veggies you get in the store are from. California and Mexico produce many of our veggies, and they have had multiple cases of RHDV2. Our vet is doing some research on washing solutions for veggies that would kill this virus and I'll let you all know as soon as I hear from her. In the meantime, it can't hurt to wash, wash, wash!

5. Please consider not getting new bunnies, especially from across state lines! It really upsets me to say this as I know there are so many bunnies that need homes, but even a bunny that looks healthy can have RHDV2. 

6. If you have a "bunny garden", please be especially careful! This disease can be spread through wild bunny populations, and once it's in the soil it's very difficult to eradicate. Wild bunnies are all over, even in the cities. Please wait to harvest at least until we can figure out veggie washing solutions. You also might want to consider raised beds with rabbit proof fencing and new soil, having a special pair of gardening shoes, and washing up thoroughly as soon as you come inside. Quite honestly, we're really falling in love with our indoor Aerogardens these days! 

7. Please report any deceased wild bunnies to Alabama Fish and Wildlife, and ask them to investigate. DO NOT TOUCH THE ANIMAL! You could easily transmit this disease. This fact sheet from Missouri Dept. of Conservation gives a good overview of the issues around RHDV2 and wild bunnies.

Please stay informed about RHDV2, and we'll continue to post every relevant update. We all need to work together to keep our bunnies safe!!

Love, 

Ruth (aka: Mrs. Brighton's secretary!)

**This map was created and is being kept up to date by a close friend of ours. It is based solely on verified reports from State Veterinarians. Please be aware that each pin may represent more than one bunny and in some cases there are dozens.