I got my second bunny yesterday, an 11 week old French lop I’ve named Zeus, everything seemed fine, he was relaxed and my other rabbit, Freya, was furious [lolz].
This morning I got up and started my usual routine of saying good morning to Freya (touching a finger against her nose in greeting through the bars of her pen) and I went to do the same to Zeus when i noticed a few small puddles of runny poo in his cage (he is in a cage until his pen arrives next week, and it gives him time to adjust to us).
I ran straight to the computer and googled for info and tried to find a way to keep him safe and comfy while I waited for an emergency vets appointment. He has since seen the vets (I’m lucky, my local vetinary surgery ALL the vets they have registered know how to treat rabbits, unsure if it’s a British thing or not).
I gave them all the info, he arrived yesterday, he is 11 weeks old, he had a little bit of greens he stole through the bars of the cage and he found a dried banana slice that Freya had hidden when he was wandering about. that there was runny poo in his cage from overnight, but there were also those soft poos that rabbits eat [sorry, I can’t spell them XD] on the floor too. He had eaten some hay, and he had drunk some water since I woke until we saw the vet.
So that’s the biggest worry because we all know how dangerous runny poos can be. As it’s a bank holiday weekend Zeus is home with me now as I can give him more attention (they would have to have a vet come from home to check up on the pets kept at the clinic where as I am here and can see if anything changes)
I’ve to watch out for the usual, not eating/drinking/weeing/pooing, more runny poos, more lethargic than usual. He has drunk some more water, and eaten some of his pellets. He had fresh hay this morning , but I haven’t seen him eat any of it..
Zeus was checked over, (his bottom is clean, she thought I had cleaned it, but I assume it was Zeus that did), he got an injection to keep his gut moving and he was sent home with a course of antibiotics incase it’s salmonella posoining.
I am really really scared and really really worried. I know he has only been here for just over 24 hours, but I fell in love with him within an hour of him arriving.
Not only this problem, but I noticed that while he is the same size as Freya (5 month old Rex) he was really light. He really hates being handled at all so when I took him out the pet carrier, and had to make sure he didn’t jump off the vets examination table I noticed he felt every thin. His fur is very fluffy so you can’t see it, but you can feel his ribs and the bones along his spine. Oh I can’t believe how hard this is for me to type, I’m actually crying. He is just SO thin and it’s all hidden undereath his fur. He is such a beautiful rabbit otherwise. He obviously hasn’t been handled much if at all because he HATES being touched at all. I mentioned it to the vet and she agrees that he is very thin, so we weighed him, he is only 1.9kg. I was wondering what a healthy weight for an 11 week odl French lop is? I cant seem to find much info to be honest.
So on top of the runny poo stress, I also have one that is probably very underweight, is leery of being handled (bit me at the vets but not hard) and I will be forced to handle him twice a day now to administer his medication.
Advice on THAT would be great. How do I give a bunny medicine? I have a syringe for it, but most advise to put something like banana on the syringe, or apple sauce, or to give a treat afterward. I can’t do that incase it sets off his diarrhoea. The bunny burrito trick hardly works, he kicks HARD (got some nice stripes as a badge of bunny honor now) and when that doesn’t work, he tucks his head down in between his front paws. We managed a does though, and we have to do it again at 10 tonight, and then twice a day for 4 more days.
He looks like he needs a good groom too as his fur looks a bit ‘clumpy’, there are no obvious mats though, but he looks like he has never been groomed. I gave him a handful of rabbit pellets and he has wolfed them all down so I gave him another handful and once I post this I will check to see if he needs more (unlimited pellets for babies right?)
He drinks his water strangely too. Almost as if he didn’t know how a water bottle works, but he is getting more confident with drinking from the bottle now.
So, to sum up, diarrhoea in a baby bunny, what can I do to help him? (other than what Im already doing of course)
Underwieght (?) baby bunny, how do I deal with that safely?
Medicating with a syringe but unable ot use a treat method. Any tips of help on that?