The Greatest Gift

You may recall that February marks the 9th birthday of little Gavin and we were thinking of planning something special for him to celebrate. Well now, it seems that the Great Bunny God reads this blog on occasion, as an angel appeared (having lost her surviving teenage rabbit) and, after Gavin and Dakota conducted themselves wonderfully at their "interview", they went off to their new home as house rabbits yesterday.

We couldn't be more pleased for them and wish them the best of luck for the rest of their pampered lives!

The Big Number 9

It's our dear Gavin's 9th birthday next month. I know what he'd really like as a present, especially after being here for many years, is a new home- in his old age he's getting quite soppy and enjoys head rubs and fuss from any passing volunteer, especially one on a Monday that he has wrapped around his paw. Unfortunately what he's probably going to be getting is a lot more head rubs. We'll have to think of something special, eh?

Bales of Goodness

Hay is a very important part of any rabbits diet - it should be around 80 percent of their daily intake of food. To put it another way, they should be eating a (loose) bundle of hay about the size of themselves every day. This is because they are by nature grazing animals with constantly growing teeth that need to be ground down and digestive systems that expect a constant movement of fibrous matter.

If your rabbits are NOT eating this much hay, it could be that you are overfeeding them on vegetables or pellets. You can try cutting back on either or both gradually to see if they start to eat more hay.

Of course, while some rabbits will hold out to try and con more of their favourite foods out of you, others just naturally seem to enjoy hay as a delicious part of their diets...

"Hmm...OK, this is good..."

"...uh huh, yes...."

"Well this looks very promising, thanks. And I'll have the same again this afternoon?"

OMG EARS!

"Happy now?"

Yes Gavin, yes I am. :-)

Handy

"Hey, you there! Show me your hand!"

"Hmm...seems clean enough. OK, get to work."

"Oh yeah, that's it. Now, keep going until I doze off, then you can go clean my house."

Ears Gavin

My attempts to take a decent picture of Gavin continue. However hard I try, I *still* can't get him to put his ears up when the camera is pointed at him. That said, if I look back at older pictures of him his ears are always down in those too so maybe he just has a thing about cameras!

"Camera? What are you talking about? I was just making it easier for you to stroke my head properly!!"

Gavin and Dakota

This is a couple we were deeply joyful to see work out. Dakota, former partner of our dear Rocket, and Gavin, who came back to us after losing his partner Stacey. Not managed to get a decent new picture of them yet though - he is so sweet, he keeps distracting me wanting head strokes!

"Oh, you're back? OK, I'll take another five minutes, but after that I'm really gonna have to give Dakota a go at grooming my head."

Tunnel Challenge

"You want to see something funny? Wait 'til Gavin and Stacey are both in the pipe. Then give me their breakfast. Oh wait, did I say 'funny'? I meant 'eaten'."

Gavin and Stacey

"Am I sniffing the air searching for food, peering towards the horizon looking for predators or just posing for a photograph?"

"Oh, did you think I was going to tell you? Aren't you funny."