Life in New York, Part I

Hello, there! It’s been a few months since I took a blogging break, and I figured today was a good day to update.  Walter and I are officially New Yorkers, though right now we’re camped out in the ‘burbs at my brother’s house.  This means that, since the house is not exactly rabbit-proofed, Walter has been relegated to the basement.  Of course he hates this.

When I first set up shop in my temporary home, Walter had a prime second floor location. But, as it’s summertime and the house has no air conditioning, the upstairs got way too warm for a rabbit.  So, down to the basement he went.  It’s much cooler, but it’s also darker and Walter hates that no one ever comes by to visit him.

He’s escaped the confines of his cage four times so far.  The first time, he was still upstairs.  I came home and found him hip-hopping around his bedroom, and figured I would just sit with him while he enjoyed a little bit of freedom.  This bedroom, however, has a set of stairs that leads directly to the attic.  I didn’t think much of it because I’ve never seen Walter try to climb stairs, but within a matter of minutes, Walter had hopped up the entire flight and started roaming around the finished attic.  Getting him back downstairs was a definite struggle, but not nearly as much of a challenge as getting him to accept his home within the rabbit jail.

The second time he escaped his jail, I was still in bed upstairs and heard some rustling down in the living room.  Assuming it was my sister-in-law walking around the house, I ignored it and continued sleeping in. (Unemployed people have no reason not to sleep until noon, right?) When I finally dragged myself out of bed and made it downstairs, I found Walter poking his silly rabbit nose out from behind the couch.  When I went to bed the night before, he was secured in the basement!  How did he get up there, and for how long had he been hopping around?!  I let him explore for a little bit and then took him back to the basement.

This was short-lived, however.  When my brother came home from work, I heard him shout up from the basement: “Uh, your rabbit is missing!”  Crap.  Walter had wedged himself under a large and unmovable cabinet.  Double crap.  I had to use a skinny flagpole to thwack him out of his hiding spot.  Neither of us were pleased.

The final time, I was not home, but my brother found him lurking around the basement, and I’m not entirely sure how he was able to get Walter back into his playpen/cage set-up.  After this time, I found some shoelaces and tied the playpen a lot more securely to the cage, and Walter hasn’t been able to escape since.

After these escape attempts and after having been kept in this rabbit jail for three weeks, I decided Walter needed some serious time to stretch his legs. I brought him out to the patio, which is enclosed save for a small entrance, which I blocked off with the playpen.  Walter loved it! He spent the next few hours running, jumping, eating leaves, and relaxing in the big concrete space.  At some point, I decided he should go out onto the lawn. This was a mistake.

After being startled by the neighbor’s dog, Walter darted from one end of the playpen to the other, breaking through the enclosure seam and out onto the open lawn.  Realizing that he now was a free rabbit, he froze.  I think he knew he didn’t want to run away anymore than I wanted to try to chase down a renegade rabbit.  In an unusual moment, Walter let me pick him up and place him back onto the patio, as I promised never to make him go out and enjoy nature ever again.

I guess I do have an urban bunny!

Bunny Blogger Break?

Hello bunny bloggers! As you can tell, the frequency of my blogging has really tapered off lately.  I will definitely be posting much less often now for a few reasons.  First, I just started grad school and as you can imagine, it's totally overwhelming on its own. Add a full-time job and an active social life, and it turns out that I just don't have enough hours in the week to blog!

Second, it seems like Walter and I have really hit our stride.  We've got our routine down pat, and aside from the occasional rabbit revenge for my lack of attention, Walter and I are getting along just fine.  He seems happy and comfortable in our digs here, though I've been trying to prepare him for another move this summer.  

That's right.  Another move.  My bunny and I are moving to the Big Apple! (Sidenote: I hate when people call it the Big Apple.)  More details to follow, but let's just hope I don't have too much trouble finding a nice studio apartment on the Upper East Side that is rabbit-friendly.

Walter has his annual check-up with the veterinarian this weekend and we'll get an update on his e. cuniculi, so I'm looking forward to that. He'll also get a long overdue nail trim, which my scratched-up skin will appreciate.  I can't seem to trim his nail myself! This rabbit has a mind of his own; he's definitely not going to stay still long enough for me to clip his nails.

Welp, that's about all the time I can spend blogging today - I have a rabbit staring me down:

Give me cheek rubs!

Why did you stop paying attention to me?!

PLAY WITH ME!

Gotta go!

Weekend Update

Walter had quite a weekend! There were guests at my apartment all weekend long, and I’m not sure Walter knew what to make of it. On Friday evening, my friend Stephanie was in town. I didn’t get home from work until just before Stephanie arrived, so I had barely two minutes to spend paying attention to the rabbit.  Steph and I went out for the night, leaving Walter to run free around the apartment. By the time we got home in the early hours of Saturday, my stubborn rabbit was not pleased to be sent straight into his cage without so much as a forehead scratch.

On Saturday morning, Stephanie left and I frantically ran around the apartment, cleaning up as much as I possibly could before my mother arrived. (To my mother, who is likely to be reading this: I’m sorry it was not very clean.) Walter, as I mentioned in an earlier post, usually loves chore day.  But this day, he was still holding a grudge from being snubbed the night before.  He spent most of the day sulking in his box fort until my mom arrived.

Now, Walter is not usually quick to approach strangers.  He keeps an eye on them from his box fort (or, formerly, under the couch) until much time has passed and feels like it’s safe to show himself.  For some reason, this was not the case with my mom.  As soon as she got there, he greeted her with curiosity and pleas for pets.  He started following her around the house. He even showed off some of his funnier hops and running moves!

Still, sadly for the bunny, we had places to go and people to see, so we didn’t have much time to spend on playtime.  Leaving Walter to his own devices, we set out for dinner and some local theater, and didn’t come back for several hours.  When we got home, it was clear that Walter needed some attention.  While my mom set to inflating the air mattress, I spent a handful of minutes scratching Walter’s forehead and rubbing his cheeks.  He seemed pretty content.  Even more so, he seemed really curious about the air mattress.

And that’s when I got the brilliant idea to let Walter stay out of the cage all night long.  I figured I would sleep on the air mattress, and if Walter still needed some cuddle time, he could hang out with me while I was sleeping.  But, as usual, with a rabbit, nothing is ever as easy as it seems.

Walter began our sleepover by running laps all over the apartment.  Then, under cover of darkness, sneaking through his box fort, hopping on and off the air mattress, making tunnels out of my sheets and blankets, until finally settling in for the night and catching some Zzz’s.

He then woke me up in the same manner, only this time he never stopped for a restful nap.  Instead, he turned my body into part of his obstacle course.  Talk about a wake-up call!

Over the course of the morning, it became clear to me and my mother that Walter had been given too much freedom in the past 24 hours.  After a few frustrating hours of deterring Walter from chewing or digging at everything in sight, I finally decided it was time for him to have a time-out in his cage. We locked him up and then once again left the house for food and theater.  Walter had calmed down dramatically by the time we got back, and he was allowed apartment freedom again.  Once out of his cage, Walter set to running laps and spending a lot of time hopping all over the air mattress.  I’m not sure if he loved the bounciness of the mattress, the fact that it afforded him a better view of the apartment, or just the newness of the mattress’s existence, but he had a grand ol’ time hopping on, off, and on top of it.

Seeing that the rabbit was behaving well outside the cage, my mom and I left for dinner and to run some errands.  We were on a mission to get me a new vacuum cleaner. Being a person with allergies who now lives in an apartment with wall-to-wall carpeting, I needed something to help get rid of all the rabbit hair and hay particles all over my apartment.  Lucky for me, my mom picked out the Dyson DC28 Animal Vacuum Cleaner.  It’s beautiful! If it does what it claims, I should be able to vacuum my apartment so well that no one will even know that I own a pet rabbit.  (Thanks, Mom!)

After all of our outings, my mom and I were pretty beat on Sunday night.  But Walter was just getting started.  He hadn’t really seen me in days, and he looked pretty lonely.  So, my mom and I sat on the ground to play with the rabbit, and he immediately came over to me, nudging for some pets.  Two seconds later, he melted onto the ground, eyes closed, and teeth grinding.  I suggested that he get up and get some pets from my mother (a rare treat – ask any of our dogs!), and she replied, “I think he’s got exactly what he wants already.”

And she was right, for two minutes, until Walter got bored and started running laps all over the apartment again.

Getting a Second Rabbit

Over the past few days, I've been debating getting a second rabbit. I feel like I haven't been at home as much lately, and so I've been feeling badly that I'm not spending as much time with Walter as he's used to. When I come home at the end of the day, it's pretty clear that Walter's been lonely. I feel guilty about leaving him alone all day long, especially now that's he's calmed down so much and has become more of a snuggle bun.

I easily see the benefits to having a second bun: someone for Walter to play with and keep company. (Not to mention the fact that I found a heart-meltingly cute rabbit up for adoption online.) But what are the downsides?

Money, for one. The cost of food, veterinarian services, toys, etc would obviously double. Training a second rabbit to not chew my walls or dig my carpeting could be another nightmare. Cleaning up after two rabbits instead of just one would be more of a headache. And then there's the space factor: right now I have one large cage that wouldn't be big enough for two bunnies. Where would I house them?

Then I worry about whether or not Walter would do well with another rabbit in the house. Does he want to be Top Bun, or would he love having a new friend around? I don't know anything about bonding rabbits. If I got a second rabbit, he'd need to be around a year old. I don't think I could deal with the attitude and training issues of a bunny.

Do you have multiple rabbits? What are the benefits and drawbacks to owning more than one? Do the pros really outweigh the cons? And what's the hardest part about introducing a new bunny into the house?

Freedom!

Long ago, I dreamed of the day when I would be able to trust Walter enough to leave him out of his cage while I was at work. As I got to know my bunny better, I quickly realized this dream would probably never be realized. However, Walter's behavior over the past few weeks has been impressive, to say the least, so I have begun to test his out-of-cage freedoms.

It started off small - a half hour here and there while I ran to the store, maybe once a week. Then, last Sunday, I left him out of the cage while I went to a very long brunch. I came home to find Walter napping in his box fort. The apartment looked unchanged and undamaged. Hooray!

By no means am I ready to let Walter have the run of the apartment while I'm at work all day, but I will definitely start giving him some more out-of-cage-while-I'm-not-home time.

Quick poll:

Rabbit Rosetta Stone

I can't believe it.  Walter has learned English.  The first few times it happened, I thought it was a fluke.  But last night, I realized he had actually learned one very, very important English phrase: "Get in your cage."

For a handful of nights now, just as bedtime approaches, I stand over Walter and cheerfully announce, "Get in your cage!"  Then I'd give the rabbit a little nudge on his rear, encouraging him towards his habitat.  He'd shake his head, run around the dining table, and then - with me following closely behind, giving him gentle nudges along the way - finally stand in front of his cage.  One more nudge, and in he went.

That alone is huge progress.  It used to be that I'd have to chase Walter all over the apartment to get him even close to his cage at bedtime.  I'd have to pick him up for as long as he'd allow and then redirect his course so that he headed into the cage.

But last night, Walter was lying on the ottoman, melting into a puddle of bunny love while I gave him forehead scratches.  His eyes were closed, he was grinding his teeth: he was completely calm.  Then, I said to him nonchalantly, "It's almost time for you to get in your cage for bedtime."

At the mention of get in your cage,Walter jolted upright.  He looked at me incredulously.  Say it ain't so!  I said it one more time: "Walter, get in your cage." He hopped off the ottoman, gave me some angry head shakes for good measure, and without me following behind him, hopped into the cage for the night.

It's a rabbit miracle!

Holiday Home Away from Home

Much to Walter’s chagrin, he’ll be in the kennel for the next week or so for the holidays.  I, of course, procrastinated in making Walter’s kennel reservation and by the time I got around to calling, our usual kennel was booked full.  Normally, Walter stays at a kennel closer to home, even though it’s not Walter’s usual doctor.  This time, I ended up making a reservation for him at our veterinarian’s office.

When I called to secure a spot for Walter for the week, I asked what I needed to bring with me, aside from the obvious (medication, the rabbit himself).  The receptionist indicated I should plan to bring food, bedding, everything.  This shocked me!  At our usual kennel, all of this is provided – and for roughly the same price. 

Am I expecting too much?  What is standard practice here?  What do you usually bring with you when putting your rabbit in the kennel?

[On a separate note, this will likely be my last post for 2010. I hope you all have a wonderful holiday and a very happy new year! See you in 2011!]

Rabbit vs. Robot

As it turns out, Walter hates my computer.  I think he thinks it’s my new pet rabbit that I love more than him, or something.  Over the past few days, I’ve been spending much of my evenings on the computer (job hunting: a tedious, yet necessary task) and Walter has made it perfectly clear that he resents my time dedicated to this small, glowing machine.

He starts showing his discontent by hopping up on the ottoman and staring at me.  No, really.  Staring.  I can practically see a scowl on his rabbit face.  Sometimes I’ll ignore him, but sometimes I’ll put my laptop to the side and give him some forehead scratches.  Whenever I show him affection and attention, he melts into a puddle of bunny love on the ottoman.  The minute I turn my attention back to the internet, the scowling begins again.

It then progresses into a heavy display of “look at me!”  This ranges from Walter chewing on things he knows are off-limits to Walter putting on his best show of jumps and antics for my entertainment.  Both methods work: his bad behavior means I have to get off the couch to discipline him (fifteen seconds of attention!), and his binkying means I watch him and laugh at his silliness (fifteen more seconds of attention!).  These are only temporary measures, though, as I inevitably must return to my work on the computer.

Then comes the final plea for attention.  Walter hops on the couch and climbs into my lap into the small space between my body and the laptop. And he’ll just lie there for however long I let him. He gives me sweet little rabbit licks while I’m petting him, and begins nudging me and biting me when I stop, even for a second.  Sometimes he’ll bite the computer, just to show it who’s boss.

Do your rabbits ever go to great lengths to get your attention? What do they usually do?

Angry Rabbit

It has come to my attention that Walter hates when I sleep in on the weekends.  During the week, I wake up pretty early for work, and give the rabbit his breakfast by 7:30 AM.  On the weekends, Walter’s typical breakfast time isn’t until 10 AM or so.  Just like his mama, he gets grumpy when he’s hungry.

He also gets spiteful!  Despite hearing Walter jump back and forth in his cage all morning, I slept in on Saturday.  When I finally got out of bed, around 10:30 in the morning, I promptly let Walter out of the cage and fixed him his meal.  But the rabbit was already mad and punished me by acting absolutely crazy.

For starters, he began chewing on a doorframe that hasn’t interested him in weeks.  Then, he maniacally dug at the bathmats on the bathroom floor.  With great fury, he picked up an empty box and tossed it all over the bathroom.  I tolerated all this, simply picking up the bathmats and placing it out of his reach and turning him around when he started chewing the walls.  But then I hit my final straw: Walter started biting my foot.  Nonstop.

I was standing at the bathroom sink, drying my hair, and Walter crept slowly towards me.  At first, he tugged on my sweatpants.  I stopped what I was doing to give him a few forehead scratches and then returned to my task.  He started eating my sweatpants again.  I ignored him.  And then I felt the sharp pain of rabbit teeth on the top of my foot.  Ouch! I yelled at him to stop and moved him to the other side of the bathroom, but this just made him come back to bite me again.  Double ouch!

This went on for a few minutes, until I got so frustrated with him that I had to lock him back up in his cage.

Later in the day, he started huffing at me.  He’d already been fed.  I’d given him attention.  But still, he huffed.  So I finally huffed back.  He echoed my huff, and we went back and forth for a couple seconds until I got bored of acting like a bunny and went back to reading my book.

What does your rabbit do when he’s mad at you?

Testing Out My Vet's Suggestions

Over the weekend, I tested out my veterinarian’s suggestions for incorporating pineapple juice into Walter’s medication routine.  I started with the add-juice-into-the-syringe approach, but what I failed to realize ahead of time was that this would mean that there would be more liquid to squirt into Walter’s tiny rabbit mouth.  I have enough trouble getting him to take just one milliliter of medicine; adding four more was torturous!

Needless to say, this method failed for me.  Next, I tried to put out a small dish of plain pineapple juice, in the hopes that Walter would slurp it down, and the next time I could place out a small dish of pineapple juice laced with meds.  Walter snubbed the juice entirely.

So, back to the basics, which now entails using some serious brute strength to hold Walter in place and force the medicine down his throat. Walter repaid me by tearing his entire box fort to shreds on Saturday.

I’m about a third of the way through Walter’s medication period. Only two more months to go, and I can’t wait for this to be over!

Weevils!

It was a warm summer day and Paul and I had been running errands all afternoon.  One of those errands was to pick up a bag of pellets for the rabbit.  This was back when we were still feeding him the addictive Healthy Select Rabbit Diet.  Once we got home, I put the bag of food away and didn’t give it a second thought until dinnertime.

When it came time to feed Walter, I opened up his new bag of yummy goodness and started to pour out his mealtime serving.  The food looked a little different: all the pellets were sticking together in loosely formed clumps.  It looked like maybe the dried berries in the bag melted from being the warm car all day, and formed this strange cobwebbed food mixture when they dried back up.

I showed it to Paul and asked if he thought it was still okay to give to Walter.  “I’m sure it’s fine,” he said.  For several days, we fed Walter the pellets from this bag of food.  We were probably halfway through the bag when grossness struck.

One evening, I took the bag out to prepare Walter’s dinner, and left the bag opened while I walked into the other room to grab something.  When I came back to finish the task of giving my rabbit his dinner, I noticed a few small, skinny, neon greenish yellow colored worm-looking things crawling out of the bag.  I shrieked.  Paul came running.  Before Paul even made it across our apartment to the kitchen, I noticed several more of these wormy creatures crawling all over the counters.

We set to squashing these unidentified mini-monsters.  I threw the bag of Walter’s food away.  We started finding them all over the apartment – in Walter’s food bowl, crawling on the walls, climbing windows, everywhere.  “What are these?!” I asked.

The answer?  Weevils.

Weevils are common household pests, and can actually be very often found in pet food.  They eat their way through the bag of grains, lay eggs within the grain itself (in our case, the grain was the pellet), and when the eggs hatch, the larvae eat their way out of the grain.  It’s pretty gross.  What’s even grosser is how quickly they reproduce.  A weevil infestation is a quick one.

After the evening of smushing green wormy-things that were weevil larvae, we started finding teeny tiny brown moths flying all over our apartment.  Fortunately for us, these bugs were stupid and easy to smash, since they never flew away in time.  Unfortunately for us, there were so many of them.

So, how do you get rid of a weevil infestation?  You start doing what Paul and I called “Weevil Huntin’.”

First, either throw out all your grainy food or freeze it for four days.  This includes cereal, rice, and pasta.  For better odds, get rid of (or freeze!) everything you have.  If you do freeze your food, make sure it stays in the freezer for at least four days. This is the amount of time it will take for any weevil eggs that have been laid to die.

Then, set to cleaning.  Paul and I found the weevils’ main hiding place in our hallway closet, so we attacked that the hardest.  Using a bleach-mixture, we sprayed and scrubbed every surface we could find.  This sounds like a grueling task, and it is, but it was worth it to be rid of the weevils.  Clean the insides of cabinets, clean tiny crevices where you think a weevil might lurk.  Clean like this for a few days in a row.  Again, tiresome.  Again, worth it.  We had to go through this process twice, since our first food-freezing and cleaning efforts weren’t quite enough.  But after the second time, we were completely weevil free, and glad of it.

As it turns out, that “cobwebby” look to Walter’s food was a sure sign of weevils.  After I saw that, I should’ve tossed the food out immediately.  When weevils eat through the grains, they leave a sticky residue behind, causing all the other food to sort of clump together and form a food “cobweb.”

So, lesson learned.  It’s important to store your pet’s food in well-sealed containers.  I like the Rubbermaid Flex & Seal Cereal Containers.  They’re air-tight, easy to grip, and easy to pour.  And they hold just a little more than one bag’s-worth of rabbit pellets.

It’s also important to check out the food you’re purchasing, preferably before you purchase it.  I check out Walter’s pellets thoroughly, at home at least.  Because weevils are brown, it’s hard to see them amidst all the pellets in the bag.  But, I’ll do a check when I pour Walter’s serving into his food dish, and I keep my eye out for any signs of cobwebbing.

And, I try not to think about how many weevils Walter might have consumed.  Ick.

Lessons in Giving a Rabbit His Medicine

Paul and I attempted to give Walter his medicine last night, very unsuccessfully.  After watching the video provided by a commenter in my last post, I felt confident in my ability to use a blanket to wrap Walter in a “bunny burrito” long enough to squirt the medicine in his mouth.  But this proved easier said than done.  We just couldn’t get him to stay in the bunny burrito.  Just as I thought we’d wrapped him up securely enough, he’d wriggle out and dart to one of his hard-to-reach hiding spots.  I was able to give him maybe one-tenth of the required dose through the course of the night.  After spending about an hour chasing Walter around the apartment, probably scaring the bejeesus out of him, I gave up.  By bedtime, Walter was terrified of us; he wouldn’t even come over for a peace offering of basil.

I went to bed frustrated, but woke up with a new plan.  The video showed the rabbit handler sitting on a stool – a place that is out of the rabbit’s element.  I needed to recreate the same situation for Walter.  Trying to pin Walter down on the carpet was fruitless; he would always have an escape route.  So, what could I use that would block off all his exits?  My answer: the dining room table.

I had seen Walter hop up onto the table from the dining chairs enough to know that it was a scary jump down from the table for him.  Too scary for him to attempt it, in fact.  I asked Paul to lay a towel on the tabletop and lift Walter on the table. (To Paul’s credit, he is a much firmer rabbit handler; picking the bunny up still scares me, and I’m sure Walter can pick up on this.)  Once on the table, I wrapped Walter into his bunny burrito and gave him a few forehead scratches while Paul got the medicine ready.  To my surprise, Walter calmly let me insert the syringe into his mouth, behind his teeth, and squirt a little bit of the liquid towards the inside of his cheek.  This was a huge improvement from the night before, when Walter would shake his head and violently run away at the first touch of the syringe on his mouth.

After the first squirt, I let Walter take a short break to lick his lips.  I placed the syringe back in his mouth and repeated the process.  Two more small squirts later and Walter had taken his entire dose of medicine! Paul and I praised the bunny for his good behavior and then gave him a small bit of carrot as a reward.

I’m still nervous that we’ll encounter another medicine-taking struggle for tomorrow’s dose, but I’m confident in the tabletop bunny burrito, and proud of both myself and Walter (and Paul!) for figuring out how to get through the first round.

A big thank you to those who have left comments or tweeted at me with tips and tricks to make giving my rabbit his medicine a lot easier.  I appreciate all your help!

Rabbit Meets Dog: An Update

So Walter and I have been dog-sitting for a few days now, and I wish it was going better.  Friday morning, I arrived at my friend’s house to set the rabbit up in his temporary home.  I chose their guest bedroom, since it was close to where I’d be sleeping, and therefore easier for me to check in on him or spend time with him.  When I returned in the evening, my friend was still home and we decided to introduce Roxy and Walter.  This was a mistake.

Roxy, anxious about another animal in her home, had been crying and pacing in front of the door to the guest bedroom all day.  We opened the door slowly, holding onto Roxy’s collar in anticipation of an attack.  At first she just stared the rabbit down.  But then suddenly, she darted out of our grasp and towards Walter’s playpen, effectively nose-bumping with him rather hard.  We got a better grip on her, and after two more nose-bump incidents, decided that the introduction needed to be over.  I expected Walter to be startled – and maybe he was hiding his fear – but he just went about his business, hopping in the playpen.

But having to listen to the dog whine and sniff outside his door all day must’ve been terrifying to Walter.  Add to that the anger of having been caged up all day, and Walter turned into a menace.  Much later that evening, I found Walter’s playpen area a complete disaster – his travel crate had been completely overturned, his hay had been knocked everywhere, and the blanket covering the floor had been torn through in his attempts to dig his way out.

After a sleepless night of listening to Roxy cry nonstop (no exaggeration – she cried from midnight until 8 in the morning), it was time to move Walter somewhere less available to the dog.  I didn’t want to have to do this, but Walter had been banished to the unfinished basement.  I felt terribly about this.  But, with Paul’s help, Walter got situated in his second room for the weekend.  Again, he was angry, but at least Roxy couldn’t get to him this time.

Walter spent about twenty-four hours in the unfinished basement until I came to check on him yesterday afternoon and found that he had somehow escaped his playpen! I have no idea how he did it.  He didn’t break through the seam of the enclosure, he didn’t somehow sneak underneath the gate.  He must’ve hopped the fence! That’s a big jump for a little bunny.  I have no idea how long he was free for before I found him.  There are any number of ways for him to get hurt in that part of the basement.  It was time to move him again.

The only other option at this point was the finished part of the basement.  I didn’t want to do this – the basement is brand new, and between the potential for Walter to dig, chew, or urinate on the carpet, I didn’t want to risk ruining my friend’s brand new basement.  So I put him in the bathroom.  I think this is the most ideal place for Walter.  The floors and baseboards are all tile, and using the playpen, I blocked the wood vanity and the wood door frames, so there is nothing for him to chew.  He gets almost free range of the whole bathroom, so he has a little bit of room to run around.  And I know he loves the coolness of bathroom floor tiles.

He’s still not super happy, but as long as we can get through the next few days, I promise I’ll make it up to him with lots of out-of-cage time in our bunny-proofed home.

Rabbit Meets Dog

Walter and I are dog-sitting for a friend for the next few days.  My rabbit’s exposure to dogs is limited to Buster, my family dog, who is thirteen years old, arthritic, and scared of everything.  They’ve only met twice.  The first time, Buster shook with fear while Walter hopped around him, sniffing and trying to make friends.  This ended badly – Buster got sick and threw up out of anxiety.

Buster (left) and Rocky, our family dogs (RIP Rocky)

Buster wasn’t always scared of small animals.  He used to chase squirrels, rabbits, and even attempted to chase deer in our yard.  I guess with old age, he began to fear the critters that could outrun him.  While I do feel badly that my dog was terrified of a little Walter rabbit, I was grateful that Walter’s first meeting with a dog was such a gentle, unaggressive one.

Not to say that Roxy, my friend’s dog, is aggressive or anything.  She’s a really sweet, affectionate puppy.  But she’s also incredibly curious and still has that keen hunter’s instinct.  I fear that her curiosity will lead to an injured bunny, even if it was just an accident.

Roxy, in a quiet moment

So, Walter will be kept in a separate room from the dog and me for most of the weekend.  I feel terrible about locking him away for so much time, but I don’t trust that he’ll be able to safely roam free with the dog around.  They had their first meeting today.  After setting up Walter’s temporary playpen/cage, Roxy snuck into the room and whimpered while staring the rabbit down, checking him out.  Walter, to my surprise, didn’t hide from the dog but instead ignored her completely.  He went about his routine, investigating the playpen, chomping on some hay, and looking for ways to escape the confines.

I am dog-sitting until Wednesday.  I have a feeling it will be a long five days…  Wish me (and Walter!) luck.

Ready, Aim, Fire!

My rabbit peed on my friend on Saturday night.

A friend from high school was in town for the Rally to Restore Sanity and/or Fear.  She came over on Saturday evening to catch up and just hang out.  Walter had been, for the most part, on pretty good behavior almost the entire day.

But something about my friend set off a series of bad bunny behaviors.  First, Walter started leaving droppings around the house on the carpet.  We’ve been living in the apartment for three weeks now, and this is the first time he’s done that.

Then, after telling my friend how well-behaved Walter had been lately, I decided to let him up on the couch for a few minutes.  This was a terrible decision.  I knew from the very moment Walter hopped up that something was not quite right.  He stood in the center of the couch, between my friend and me, and hopped in a few small circles.  Then he stopped, facing me.  The next thing I know, my friend shouts, “Oh no, WALTER!” And that’s when I see the urine stain spreading quickly on the side of her jeans and all over my couch cushion.

What was that all about?!  He hasn’t done that since he was a bitty baby bunny, and even then it was just one time.

I locked Walter up in his cage and he was grounded for the rest of the night.  The next day, he was right back to normal.  No attempts to hop on the couch, no accidents, nothing.  What is going on with my Walter boy?

Rabbit Separation Anxiety?

It’s been a recurring observation in my last few posts – Walter’s been more snuggly lately.  And while I’m loving this side of my rabbit, I’m wondering if maybe he’s going a bit too far.  Last night, I got home from work at a reasonable time and let Walter out of the cage.  From that point on, Walter was beside me for almost the entire night.  If I went into the kitchen, he followed.  If I sat on the couch, he sat by my feet.

I sat on the floor with him for a little while, since I am trying to discourage him from hopping onto the couch.  Walter used this opportunity to squeeze himself between my back and the couch that I was leaning on.  If I moved, Walter gave me a disgruntled look.  Finally, he moved next to me instead of lying behind me and I gave him some forehead scratches while I read my book.  If I stopped for even a split second, the rabbit let me know he was mad.

What happened to my independent bunny?

I didn’t really think anything of it until later.  I got up to use the restroom and shut the door behind me.  Walter, suddenly aware that I was no longer with him in the living room, darted to the bathroom door.  I could see the shadow of his floppy ears underneath the doorway and then heard his frantic scratches to be let into the room with me. I’ve been keeping Walter out of the bathroom because he keeps chewing the door frames and my bathmats, so I thought his scratches were simply because he wanted to play in the bathroom.  When I went to exit the bathroom, I left the door open long enough to allow the rabbit to sneak inside the room, but he didn’t take the opportunity given.  Instead, he followed me right back to our spot on the floor in the living room.

It reminded me of a parent who brings her child to daycare or school: the child kicks and cries for his mommy, not able to bear the thought of being apart.  So, is this rabbit-style separation anxiety?  Or is this a one-time rabbit behavior?  Walter’s gone through some changes recently; we moved to a new apartment and he's now down by one "parent."  I’m not trying to go all psychology on my rabbit relationship, but I know rabbits are sensitive animals.  Is it a stretch to think that Walter’s snuggliness and over-attentiveness is related to making sure there aren’t any more changes coming soon?

Okay, even as I typed that last sentence, I realized it sounded silly.  That seems a bit intense for a little bunny.  Maybe he’s just grown out of his crazy baby phase and is settling into an adult personality of being a calm, affectionate pet.

In other news, Walter’s racing and jumping around the apartment has hit new levels of hilarity.  I will try to take some videos this weekend and post them here.  Happy Halloweekend, everyone!

What are You Doing Here?

I get very suspicious when the rabbit is freely roaming the apartment if I can’t hear him.  Most of the time, this means he’s found a fun place to nap.  But sometimes, it means he’s getting into trouble.  When he’s in this quiet mode, I have to go on a pretty intense hunt around the apartment, and I usually end up finding him in the last place I would expect.  Here is a list of all the weird places that I’ve found him spending time being unusually quiet:

• Lying behind a large, decorative mirror
• Trapped inside an empty moving box (he tried to jump on it, but it was open on the top)
• Sitting in a decorative bowl in the bedroom
• Underneath various tables, probably chewing the wooden legs
• Romping through a folded up mattress pad
• Sitting in a puddle of water from a cup he knocked over
• Sniffing behind the refrigerator
• Squished underneath the lower kitchen cabinets, between a large moving box and the wall, taking a nap
• Sitting on top of a pile of towels in an unpacked moving box
• On top of the dining room table
• Inside the closet where I keep his food, bedding, and litter
• Stuck between the couch back and the couch cushions
• Burrowing between both couch cushions

 It’s only been ten days! I can’t imagine where else I’ll find this wacky rabbit in the apartment.

How I Met Walter

I did not set out hoping for a pet rabbit.  Originally I wanted a dog.  My boyfriend, who would be housing the dog, was completely against this idea.  In an attempt to find a compromise, I suggested the only other pet I could think of that I would enjoy: a bunny.  Paul relented and agreed.

After doing some light internet searching, I was bombarded with advice to adopt a rabbit from a shelter rather than purchase one from a breeder.  I had the best intentions of doing this.  I spent weeks scouring websites of local shelters, but never came across a rabbit that I fell for.  As the weeks passed, I began incorporating local breeders into my search.

I wasn’t sure what I was looking for.  I knew I wanted a Holland Lop, and I knew I wanted a male rabbit that I would name Walter (I give credit to Paul for the name suggestion). Then, while on Wikipedia, reading information about owning a house rabbit, I came across this picture:

Picture courtesy of Wikipedia (via Orlandkurtenbach)

“That’s the rabbit I want!” I said to Paul.  “You can’t have the Wikipedia bunny,” he replied.  I tried using my pouty face, but that didn’t make the Wikipedia rabbit appear.  So, with my dreams crushed, I continued my search.  I found lots of rabbits that looked friendly and sweet, and even some that made me stop and consider ownership.  I learned that I liked orange and white rabbits – mostly because my family has an orange and white dog.  I liked rabbits whose ears stuck out kind of funny, not just straight down towards the ground; I wanted a rabbit with some character.

And then I came across the website for KNT Trails.  I saw an announcement about a litter that had been born just a few weeks earlier, and clicked the link to view pictures of the bunnies.  And then I saw him: my real-life Wikipedia rabbit.

My very first introduction to Walter's cuteness.

I showed the picture to Paul and, in my sweetest voice, asked if we could go visit the bunny.  Paul obliged.

We drove out to Owings, MD sometime in March and Terry, the owner of the rabbitry, had arranged for all the bunnies to be set in a playpen outside where they were free to hop around in the grass. As we walked up to the corral of bunnies, I saw a familiar orange and gray face nibbling at the grass.  “That’s him!” I said to Paul.  “He’s definitely a Walter.”

Walter was so little! He was about the size of my palm.  He gave me a few licks with his scratchy tongue (I should have cherished those licks, because as he's gotten older, they've become few and far between).  At that point, I was hooked.  Paul, who wanted no part of the bunny corral, gave me a skeptical look.  “Pleeeeeeease?” I asked.  Paul shrugged and said okay.  I set Walter, officially named so, back on the ground and told him I’d see him in about a month.  When I came back a month later, he had grown so much!  After a quick squirm, he settled into his travel carrier and left the countryside for the big city.

How did you choose your perfect pet rabbit?  Did you adopt or purchase from a breeder?  What advice do you have for people looking to find their new house rabbit?

Walter Surveys the Apartment

It’s official: Walter loves the new apartment.  I let the rabbit explore for a few hours yesterday, and I don’t think I’ve ever seen him jump, binky, or run so much in one three-hour span as he did last night.

He helped me identify one particular trouble spot during his adventures, though.  The space between the refrigerator and the wall was just large enough for a rabbit to squeeze his way behind the appliance.  After a few frantic minutes of trying to first figure out where the bunny went, and then trying to lure him out from behind the fridge before he got hurt, I had to slightly move the fridge to prevent future sneak-ins.

Other than the refrigerator misstep, Walter behaved really well in the new apartment.  He spent some time darting from one end of the unit to the other, turning the path of unpacked boxes into an obstacle course.  He searched for a new hideout spot, since my couch sits lower to the ground than the couch at Paul’s apartment and Walter can no longer fit underneath.  He, of course, dug at the doors to both the bedroom and the bathroom, pleading to be allowed to enter.  And he sought out all miscellaneous wires and cords left around the apartment in an attempt to satisfy his urge to chew.

This brings me to a really exciting realization:  Walter learned the word “no.”  Whenever the rabbit hopped over to any exposed cord that hadn’t yet been bunny-proofed, I sternly told him no.  Walter would stop immediately and hop away.  I was one proud mama!

But, with any progress comes a few drawbacks.  Walter also learned that I can’t see what he’s doing when my back is turned.  As I was unpacking my kitchen, I saw that he hopped up onto my ottoman to reach the wires coming from my cable box.  I told him no and he hopped off with his best look of innocence.  The minute I turned back to my unpacking, the rabbit hopped back up onto the ottoman.  After four repeat instances of this, I finally had to lock the mischievous rabbit in his playpen.

I’m glad to see that Walter is handling this housing transition so well, but more than that, I’m glad to notice the changes in the rabbit’s behavior and maturity.  He’s one step closer to my ultimate goal of never needing to lock him in his cage at all.  But he’s still got a long way to go.

Don't Dig the Carpet!

Walter moved into our new apartment yesterday.  He was not pleased about the change.

We did most of the moving on Monday, but were too tired by the end of the day to finish the job, including Walter and his cage.  When I returned to Paul's apartment after work yesterday, I let the rabbit out of his cage so that he could hop around while I finished packing.  He loved hopping in, around, and on the empty moving boxes.  But, unfortunately, packing also meant taking down Walter’s cage and putting all his toys in boxes.  The rabbit went from happy to slightly confused to completely terrified in a matter of seconds.

He hid under the couch for as long as we would let him, and luring him into his travel carrier was more difficult than usual.  Paul and I had to resort to serious cornering tactics and then basically just shoved the rabbit into the crate: not my preferred method of getting Walter in there.

Once we got to the new place, though, Walter settled in pretty quickly.  I set up his cage and put the playpen around it so that the rabbit couldn’t discover any unpacked wires or wood items strewn about.  The apartment, as I mentioned in an earlier post, has one major downfall:  carpeting.

It took Walter maybe an hour to discover the joys of digging at the carpet, even within the confines of his playpen.  I am starting to worry that the combination of the rabbit and the carpet will become disastrous and expensive.  What recommendations do you have to deter a rabbit from chewing or digging at carpeting?