Just thinking out loud here

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I work at a pet store, and, as you can imagine, my coworkers love animals as much as I do.  I’ve had instances where I would have plans to go get a neglected bunny someone didn’t want, and several coworkers say they’d gladly take the bunny.  I also know of two separate pet stores in my area that sell bunnies that give bad information on their care, so I’m certain people end up dumping them once they realize how hard the work really is.  A lot of people bring their bunnies to the shelter, but the shelter a) doesn’t provide any information on the buns to adopters, and b) doesn’t care for them well while they’re there.

If I were to hypothetically coordinate getting unwanted buns into the loving hands of my coworkers and finding permanent homes for said buns, does anyone here have any suggestions on how I should reach out to those who wish to surrender their rabbits before they end up on the streets or in the shelter?  Craigslist is my only idea, but I don’t even know how I’d title that.  There are so many phony rabbit rescues out there (rabbit hoarders/flippers) and I don’t want to look like one of them by advertising on Craigslist with, “Will take any unwanted bunnies, no questions asked!”  Who in their right mind would trust an ad like that?

If you have any ideas at all on how to reach out to those about to dump their buns or if you can think of any trustworthy-sounding Craigslist titles (that just sounds sketchy typing it out like that…), please let me know!  No suggestion is dumb here!

[tobyluv]

Do you know if the shelter spays and neuters the rabbits? If so, it seems like it might be best to adopt the rabbits or have your coworkers adopt them from the shelter to find them good homes. I don’t know of any way or place that you could advertise the fact that you will take any unwanted rabbits.  Even if you found a way, you might be inundated with requests and end up with way more rabbits than you could handle.

 Whatever adoption fee the shelter charges for adoption will certainly be less than someone would pay to have the spay/neuter surgery performed by a private vet. People would very likely be more eager to adopt if the rabbit was already spayed and neutered. You and your coworkers could foster the rabbits until they went to a new home, but before you start taking in rabbits, you need to be pretty sure that you can find good homes for them. I volunteer at a rabbit sanctuary and we are asked to take so many rabbits. Many of the people that ask us have already tried to find homes for their rabbits, but had no luck doing so. You need to realize that you and your coworkers might end up with a lot of rabbits yourselves, if you start taking them in and don’t have any luck finding good homes for them. It’s wonderful that you want to help all the discarded rabbits that you can, but you have to be prepared and know what you are getting into.  In the time that you have the rabbits, even if it’s a short time and you have homes lined up, there will be expenses – the every day basic care expenses and there could be unexpected vet expenses.  You also have to be aware that bringing in rabbits into your home could upset your own rabbits.  I’m sorry if I sound so negative.  Believe me, I want to see as many unwanted rabbits saved as possible, but this would be a big undertaking for you and your coworkers, and it’s very likely more than you are prepared for.

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Our shelter does spay and neuter the rabbits which is wonderful, but they’re often there for long periods of time and have no foster programs for rabbits (I volunteer there and I love the staff and what they do, but they have so much on their plate with cats and dogs, rabbits just aren’t what they’re concerned about.) I’m not for sure, but from looking at their rabbit room (a walk-in closet), I’m guessing they’re all out of space for new rabbits and just turn people down.  I have an awesome exotic animal vet that fixes bunnies for a ridiculously low cost just because she knows more bunnies need to be fixed and doesn’t want a higher price to scare people from fixing their buns, so I’d likely just use my own money to pay for that if it needed to be done (so… probably every bunny:/).  As for the taking in too many bunnies… well, I guess I’d have to turn people and their rabbits down at some point or another… That hadn’t even occurred to me.  But I guess just helping a few more bunnies that would have either been released or neglected is my goal here

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No, you don’t sound negative!  You sound realistic and have valid concerns.  I’m mostly relying on my awesome vet to get every bunny a checkup since those are hardly anything, and the fact that this wouldn’t be a large-scale operation, just fostering as many buns as I could with the volunteers I’d have.  I’d definitely be spending a lot of money out of my own pocket, but it certainly seems worth it to me as long as I get to help a few otherwise doomed buns.  The shelter is just always full and slightly neglectful of the rabbits, and nowhere else for hours around us takes in buns.

[tobyluv]

I’m glad that you understand my concerns. If you did get rabbits from the shelter, that would allow them to take more. It would save you money for the spay and neuters. You could control the number you took, only taking what you thought you could find homes for. Unlike advertising, where you likely would be inundated with requests. That is one of the duties I have at the Rabbit Sanctuary. I am in charge of the email account. We give our rabbits a home for life and can only take a small percentage of the hundreds we are asked to take each year. So, I spend a lot of my time telling people that we are full and cannot take their rabbits. It’s very depressing to have to do this, and I worry about all those that we couldn’t take. I offer them advice in the hope that they might keep their rabbit, and tell them of other rescues that might be able to help, but I know that those other rescues stay full and that there is only a slim chance that they can help. If enough people hear about you, you will definitely have to start turning away rabbits, and that will be distressing. It certainly is to me. There are many rabbits in need that I can’t get out of my head and there are nights that I can’t sleep, especially when I get late night emails about a rabbit that someone wants to discard.

It’s very admirable that you want to do this, and there are so many rabbits in need of homes, but it seems like the best way to help and the way that you wouldn’t get overwhelmed and possibly depressed, would be to take a rabbit or rabbits from the shelter as you were able to provide for them, then find them homes. Every rabbit you take from the shelter allows them to take in another one that they may not have had room for, or it may keep them from euthanizing the rabbits that have been there the longest, just so they will have room for new ones.

Good luck in your venture. Any rabbit that you can save and find a good home for will help.

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That makes more sense to do. I can’t even imagine turning down rabbits… I don’t know how you can handle that. Thank you for the thoughts and ideas, it’s given me some stuff to think about.

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