At my wits end with our rabbit and his cleaning problems

Hi all,

Our rabbit has a sort of disformed back leg. He's not able to move it as much as normal and its an odd shape. It has been like this since birth (Weve only had him for 2/3 months) The rescue we got him from told us that because of his foot, he is unable to properly clean himself and also has trouble eating his cecotropes, so his bum can get quite messy.
He's a fairly friendly rabbit, likes to be petted and interacted with. He comes running over when you enter the room and such. However, he will not under any circumstances let you pick him up. Theres inly been a couple of times where I have actually managed to pick him up with my bare hands and even then he just squirms to get free. Usually I have to throw a towel over him and wrap him in it whilst I clean his bum. Or he will go into his pet carrier and I take him upstairs which seems to "spook" him enough that he usually lets you pick him up by hand and do what you need too.

Unfortunately he is now getting wise to these techniques and its becoming harder and harder to get your hands on him. What has got me worked up today is that when I went home for my lunch I immediately noticed that he had a lot of poop's on his backside. Not dairrhoea, but cecotropes that he had just sat in and they had then stuck to his butt. I could not for the life of me get him to cooperate so I could remove them. We both were getting quite warm, which didnt help, and I started to get frustrated.

What am I supposed to do when I cant get a towel over him (It was too hot for that today and I wouldnt have been able to catch him anyway) and he wont hop into his carrier? If I try and just grab him with my hands he furiously tries to get free and literally tries to leap out of my hands.

I guess I'm just frustrated today because its too hot, Reggie still has a dirty bum which I can seemingly do nothing about and to top it off even though he does all his wee's and most of his poops in his litter tray, the floor still ends up covered in uneaten cecotropes that seem to harden instantly and are anightmare to get off the (thankfully tiled) floor.

It is very frustrating when you are trying to help them and they aren't cooperating - it would be so much easier if you could just explain it too them!

Although he's got a mobility problem that's effecting his ability to clean, I think it would still be worth taking a look at his diet (a potential cause of excess cecotropes) just in case that's contributing to the problem. What does he eat?

For making clean up easier, I'd suggest getting him shaved. A vet or groomer can do this for you. It sounds drastic but it doesn't do any harm just makes them look slightly odd. They can give him abuzz cut in the area that the poop gets stuck to, which should help stop the poop getting stuck there in the first place and make it easier to wipe him down if he does get dirty.