Sore hocks?

What do you do for a rabbit with sore hocks?

I think Anna might be starting on them.

It depends how bad they are? Are they bleeding? Broken skin? or just red inflammed skin? Or just pink callouses with no fur?

It is always wise with sore hocks to remove as many contributory factors as possible, these are:
Being overweight,
Being on the wrong surface - that encourages friction and pressure sores
Nails that are long
Not enough exercise
Bun sitting on wet or soiled litter or self-soiling
Mobility issues - arthritis, spinal problems etc.

If you can control these they should help a great deal towards overall treatment, which will be dependent on how bad the hocks are at this point. Prevention is better than cure with hocks as once the condition sets in it is difficult to treat.

Just bald patches at the moment, but it looks like they're starting to irritate and I don't want them to break.

Luci is absolutely fine though.

Anna is overweight - and on a diet to remedy this, but that's something that can't be mended overnight. Nails are clipped, and she's active and moving quite happily.

She's mostly sitting on the hay in the back room at the moment, and not squatting on the dirty litter at all.

If they are just bald and not broken then I would not put anything on them at all. My vet always explained to me that putting creams/lotions on before it is necessary to do so can aggravate the problem as not only will they likely squash the surrounding fur which is there to protect the skin and is acting as a friction/pressure cushion, but it will also make the skin soft and more likely to fracture once weight is applied - i.e. bunny standing on them.

Seriously sore hocks may require the use of certain creams but generally if this is the case it is advisable to bandage the foot as well to protect the hock from both infection from the environment and to replace the cushioning effect of the fur.

If the hocks are at this stage I would look to address all the risk factors I listed above and just make sure that bun has somewhere padded and soft to rest up as this is when the hocks are mostly in contact with the ground. For outdoor buns this is deep soft hay, and for indoor buns that don't have hay as a normal substrate I would recommend soft fleece bedding or veterinary bedding thickly piled and folded to create the most cushioning that you can. When we cared for a foster bun with severe sore hocks he found the most relief by sitting on veterinary bedding and his hocks eventually began to heal remarkably quickly alongside appropriate oral medication to reduce the pain and inflammation.

Our vet recommended we use witchhazel to toughen the skin before they got too sore. It has really help with Mini. I've noticed Mischa is also developing patches so I need to do his as well. You have to be careful they don't lick it though. Unfortunately mine like to sleep on the carpet not the vetbed so not much I can do about that bit! I put more vetbed where they sleep and they just move further round to sleep on the carpet again. :roll: I did read somewhere that vetbed in itself CAN be abrasive too so to put something like a sheet on top. I keep meaning to do this see if they prefer it like that.

I agree with the above comments. I have found a smooth surface (not carpet) helps along with a soft deep bed

Schuette said:

I did read somewhere that vetbed in itself CAN be abrasive

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I think this is very much personal experience, and what might work for one bun may not work for another. We let our sore hock bun choose where to sit and he chose uncovered vet bed, in my experience it is not abrasive at all, quite the opposite in fact, but we can only report our own experiences here. I do sometimes use it inside a pillow case for my normal footed buns.
In human medicine a similar product is used for bed sores in some hospitals - the material is designed to counteract the effects of friction and pressure sores.

That's why I bolded the 'can'

I guess it also depends very much on the type of vetbed itself. Tis trial and error in some ways.