Spaying aftercare advice?

Ok, so my Bunny Smokey is all booked in to get spayed on Tuesday, so, of course, I have fallen into the role of over anxious mum. She is my first rabbit, so I have no idea where to start when she gets home, I assume I will hear loads from the vet, but I was wondering if any one had any tips that worked for making their rabbits as comfortable as possible after they get home?
I am just praying that the surgery goes ok (I deffinatly was not this worried about my dogs getting neutered, but they were family pets I suppose, and Smokey is soaly mine) and I really want to give her the perfect recovery situations!
Help would be massively appreciated by us both!

Your Vet should make sure that your Doe has started to eat and that she has poo'd and wee'd before she is discharged. She should also be prescribed 'take home' analgesia for you to administer daily for about 5 days.

She will need to be bedded on clean towels or sheets and hay needs to be up in a rack to minimise any sticking to her wound. Hopefully the Vet will close the wound using internal suturing so there wont be any bits of suturing material for her to nibble at.

Water is best offered from a bowl initially as Rabbits tend to be more keen to drink from a bowl than a bottle, especially after a GA.

You can feed her her normal diet, her appetite may be reduced for a couple of days but there should be some input and output.

She will need to be confined to her hutch/cage for a few days and prevented from jumping up onto anything. If she has a 2 tier hutch you would need to close off the ramp for a few days too.

The wound will need checking twice a day, it should be dry and clean and not inflamed or hot to touch. There should not be any lumps or bumps appearing around it.

If she is an outdoor Rabbit then it is usually advisable to keep them indoors for the first 24 hours after a GA. However, given the very hot humid weather at the moment you may need to weigh up the pros and cons of having her indoors in an unfamiliar place or having her in her usual environment. If she were to feel cold to touch I would keep her in. But if she felt to be a normal temperature and she was happier outdoors I would put her there, given that it is certainly going to remain very warm overnight all of next week.

I hope all goes well for her

All of what Jack's Jane said. Pippa went in with her husbun Dipsy, and was absolutely fine, no problems whatsoever. Is your vet doing a pre-op health check? Mine does even though he sees my 'special needs' bunnies regularly. Pippa had her pre-op at 10.00, was spayed about lunchtime, but then he never discharges them until after 6, and as Jane said, when she had ticked the four boxes, ED double P, as he says (eaten, drank, peed, pooed)

He did say doe's often don't eat as soon as the boys, but as long as she was nibbling at something, that was ok. Might be an idea to take in some herby stuff. I took parsley as that is Pip's absolute favourite. The hardest part of the spay for me, was keeping her in her pen, as the next day she was back to her usual 'loony tunes' self. But she is manic and probably has half a dozen binky's before 9am every day!!! so she really needed to be kept contained so to speak.

She had metacam for 5 days, and day 5 was her post-op. Internal dissolvable sutures, and glued on top to prevent nibbling the wound site, and she had a t-shirt on so she couldn't get to the area anyway. Injection wise whilst still asleep was, long-acting pain relief, anti-biotics and gut stimulant to keep everything moving until she was eating as per usual.

With regards pain relief I treat my buns how I would patients, in that it is better to give pain relief before it is actually needed, to keep bun comfortable and happy, so you are in effect keeping the pain relief topped up. She didn't have any on day 6, but obviously didn't need it, but I would definitely make sure you have got some to hand just in case.

Try not to worry, your bunny will be absolutely fine and enjoy being pampered afterwards no doubt.

Housing worries

I'm slightly worried about keeping her indoors for a couple of reasons, 1) our house (very irritatingly) gets really hot in this weather, and its cooler, but still warm, outside, 2) my mum would not be thrilled, even if I had her in my room. 3) she has never been inside, and I don't want to stress her out, and want to keep things familiar. 4) I don't have a indoor cage and don't want to spend £60+ on a cage I am going to use once.
However, I am also worried about keeping her outside, as 1) I don't want her to be too cold 2) I don't want anything to spook her, 3) I'm worried about flies being attracted to the wound 4) even with disinfectant, I would worry about the wood having germs hidden in it.

Another worry, is about bedding, particularly outside, would shredded paper be ok for bedding and litter? I feel, as it would be dust free, there would be less irritation. I would also have an old (but freshly washed) towl down as bedding and play too if she is up for it. If I put the towl in a card bored box with a pop hole in it as a bed, would that be ok? Even if she chews it a bit, as she will chew it.

DarceyH said:

I'm slightly worried about keeping her indoors for a couple of reasons, 1) our house (very irritatingly) gets really hot in this weather, and its cooler, but still warm, outside, 2) my mum would not be thrilled, even if I had her in my room. 3) she has never been inside, and I don't want to stress her out, and want to keep things familiar. 4) I don't have a indoor cage and don't want to spend £60+ on a cage I am going to use once.
However, I am also worried about keeping her outside, as 1) I don't want her to be too cold 2) I don't want anything to spook her, 3) I'm worried about flies being attracted to the wound 4) even with disinfectant, I would worry about the wood having germs hidden in it.

Another worry, is about bedding, particularly outside, would shredded paper be ok for bedding and litter? I feel, as it would be dust free, there would be less irritation. I would also have an old (but freshly washed) towl down as bedding and play too if she is up for it. If I put the towl in a card bored box with a pop hole in it as a bed, would that be ok? Even if she chews it a bit, as she will chew it.

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Shredded paper as bedding will be fine. If she is a cardboard chewer I'd not put a cardboard box in just incase she ingests a significant amount whilst her GI tract may already be sluggish from the GA.

If you decide to leave her in familiar surroundings outside then fly netting all over her hutch/run would be a good idea. An old net curtain would suffice. You can usually pick net curtains up from Charity Shops for a couple of pounds.

Thanks

Jack's-Jane said:

Shredded paper as bedding will be fine. If she is a cardboard chewer I'd not put a cardboard box in just incase she ingests a significant amount whilst her GI tract may already be sluggish from the GA.

If you decide to leave her in familiar surroundings outside then fly netting all over her hutch/run would be a good idea. An old net curtain would suffice. You can usually pick net curtains up from Charity Shops for a couple of pounds.

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Ok, sounds good, I will go and look today for netting. I may just leave her carrier in the hutch (she loves that thing as I also leave it out in the run) its big enough for her so move round in comfortably but not to big that it will take up too much hutch space. With a towel in the bottom that would probably make a good safe spot and sleeping area for her. And then I can just leave her be when she gets home. And she has never chewed that, licked the roof when she has jumped on it in her run, but never chewed it. Well, I better go and check our paper shredder, make sure it's all ok, if not my vet sells bags of recycled paper for pet bedding. That you so much for all your help!