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do rescues rehome to a snuffle bunny?

biscandmatt1

Wise Old Thumper
we aren't sure if and/or when bisc will need a new friend. if he does though i am getting worried that no-one will want to rehome to us because he is a known snuffle bun, even though his snuffles has been under control for a long time :(

i've been looking online and alot rehome any snuffle buns as single house rabbits, so i can't imagine them sending a healthy rabbit to be with a snuffle bun.

i'm getting worried that bisc might need a friend and won't beable to have one. :(
 
I am so sorry that you lost Matt :(:(:(

Spring came from the Society of Abandoned Animals at Sale. They are very knowledgeable there, very helpful and were brilliant in helping to bond Gabriel and Spring. Four of the buns also boarded there whilst we were on holiday this year. I would suggest speaking to them and see what they say.

This is the link to their website http://www.saarescue.co.uk/
 
I am so sorry that you lost Matt :(:(:(

Spring came from the Society of Abandoned Animals at Sale. They are very knowledgeable there, very helpful and were brilliant in helping to bond Gabriel and Spring. Four of the buns also boarded there whilst we were on holiday this year. I would suggest speaking to them and see what they say.

This is the link to their website http://www.saarescue.co.uk/

i noticed their website when i was searching.

did they do the initial bonding for you?

i might email them just to get some idea of where they would stand with regards to rehoming to us. i am hoping that if we provide a history of bisc's condition and maybe get the vet to confirm it all and give his opinion, that maybe they would consider it.

:wave:
 
We have a long-term snuffles bun, also under good control at the moment.

She had one husbun from Elaine at Tameside Rabbit and Guinea Pig Rescue, who did not have any concerns about him coming to us. When they turned out to be incompatible we bonded him with one of our outdoor girls, and tried our snuffle bun with another rescue boy from Pawz For Thought in Sunderland (we went all that way as he is also a special needs bun), who also did not have a problem with him coming to us.

On neither occasion did I take her dating first, as stress does cause her snuffles to flare up. But we knew we could accommodate any boys she rejected into other groups of buns - we have 16 in all.

I think most properly rabbit-savvy rescues know that buns do not easily 'catch' snuffles from each other. Many of them carry it anyway and most of them only suffer from it when their immune system is under stress.

Good luck with your hunt. I lurk more than post but have a soft spot for several buns / pairs on here. Bisc and Matt were one such pair and I am really, genuinely, sorry that Matt passed away. I hope you find somebun Bisc takes to :thumb:
 
We have a long-term snuffles bun, also under good control at the moment.

She had one husbun from Elaine at Tameside Rabbit and Guinea Pig Rescue, who did not have any concerns about him coming to us. When they turned out to be incompatible we bonded him with one of our outdoor girls, and tried our snuffle bun with another rescue boy from Pawz For Thought in Sunderland (we went all that way as he is also a special needs bun), who also did not have a problem with him coming to us.

On neither occasion did I take her dating first, as stress does cause her snuffles to flare up. But we knew we could accommodate any boys she rejected into other groups of buns - we have 16 in all.

I think most properly rabbit-savvy rescues know that buns do not easily 'catch' snuffles from each other. Many of them carry it anyway and most of them only suffer from it when their immune system is under stress.

Good luck with your hunt. I lurk more than post but have a soft spot for several buns / pairs on here. Bisc and Matt were one such pair and I am really, genuinely, sorry that Matt passed away. I hope you find somebun Bisc takes to :thumb:

this is exactly what i was hoping for because alot of things are said about snuffles and it seems to frighten people off.

tameside is our closest rescue so it would be really great if elaine knows about these things and would rehome to us. i'm undecided at the moment whether bisc should choose his own friend. he doesn't tend to have very bad flare ups but of course he does get slightly worse when under stress. it's also going to be difficult to bond them myself as we don't have much room at all and that means we also don't have the space to keep any bun that bisc didn't warm to sadly. i would feel terrible about this but there really isn't anything i can do about that. :(

another option would be for me to move into my nans for a while and bond them there, before moving back home but again, it's all additional change for bisc.

it's so hard to know what to do. i'm just getting some idea at the moment as bisc is doing ok for now, but i want to know what i'm doing should it become clear that he needs company sooner.

aw, it's lovely to hear that you have a soft spot for bisc and matt. :love: :D
 
It is really difficult to know what to do, and I hope you are able to make a decision as sometimes that is tougher than not making one at all.

Here's a little tale that might make you feel a little more positive:

We had a bonded pair had been together since they were about 6 weeks old and were completely inseparable. They rarely left each other's side and really wanted nothing to do with us, which was fine. I've never known buns so close, before or since. The doe had occasional tummy trouble but never anything that caused us real concern, a couple of days on meds and she would be fine. One weekend she was a little off and ended up at the vets on the Monday morning, who also were not terribly concerned, gave her the usual meds and sent her home. She went downhill so fast she was back at the vets within a couple of hours for an X-ray. That showed a twisted stomach and an intestine full of gas. She was too poorly to put through an operation so within a few hours of 'seeming a bit poorly' we had to have her pts. I expect that, just at the moment, you can relate to how devastated we were.

Our boy bun was absolutely beside himself for the first day or two. As it had all happened so fast we'd not been able to give him a chance to say his goodbyes, although I think he did know she was very unwell. He gradually became more friendly towards us but we took the decision that he would need a companion very quickly. Five days after losing his wifebun, we took him to Tameside. We couldn't even bear to go in and visit the buns, we just told Elaine to bring out the girl she had had there longest and that nobody else had wanted. The bun she brought out became our Layla, and she is the goofiest, funniest, most affectionate, entertaining ball of orange fluff you can imagine. She has brought Jack completely out of his shell, he is like a different bun with her around, and unlike his first wifebun she actually quite likes people too. She could not have been a more perfect rabbit for what we needed in our lives at that moment and I would like to think that if our Missy had any influence about which bun we would be sent next, she picked Layla for us. Of course, it wasn't easy having this new bun taking Missy's place and there were plenty of mixed feelings for quite a while, but 18 months on I can say we did absolutely the right thing, and Missy would not have wanted us to wait longer - she would have wanted Jack to have a companion and for us to put all Missy taught us about buns to good use helping another rescue bun.

They did have a very easy bond and I think that is partly because Jack had always had a companion, so was very open to having company, and Layla is quite laid-back.
 
It is really difficult to know what to do, and I hope you are able to make a decision as sometimes that is tougher than not making one at all.

Here's a little tale that might make you feel a little more positive:

We had a bonded pair had been together since they were about 6 weeks old and were completely inseparable. They rarely left each other's side and really wanted nothing to do with us, which was fine. I've never known buns so close, before or since. The doe had occasional tummy trouble but never anything that caused us real concern, a couple of days on meds and she would be fine. One weekend she was a little off and ended up at the vets on the Monday morning, who also were not terribly concerned, gave her the usual meds and sent her home. She went downhill so fast she was back at the vets within a couple of hours for an X-ray. That showed a twisted stomach and an intestine full of gas. She was too poorly to put through an operation so within a few hours of 'seeming a bit poorly' we had to have her pts. I expect that, just at the moment, you can relate to how devastated we were.

Our boy bun was absolutely beside himself for the first day or two. As it had all happened so fast we'd not been able to give him a chance to say his goodbyes, although I think he did know she was very unwell. He gradually became more friendly towards us but we took the decision that he would need a companion very quickly. Five days after losing his wifebun, we took him to Tameside. We couldn't even bear to go in and visit the buns, we just told Elaine to bring out the girl she had had there longest and that nobody else had wanted. The bun she brought out became our Layla, and she is the goofiest, funniest, most affectionate, entertaining ball of orange fluff you can imagine. She has brought Jack completely out of his shell, he is like a different bun with her around, and unlike his first wifebun she actually quite likes people too. She could not have been a more perfect rabbit for what we needed in our lives at that moment and I would like to think that if our Missy had any influence about which bun we would be sent next, she picked Layla for us. Of course, it wasn't easy having this new bun taking Missy's place and there were plenty of mixed feelings for quite a while, but 18 months on I can say we did absolutely the right thing, and Missy would not have wanted us to wait longer - she would have wanted Jack to have a companion and for us to put all Missy taught us about buns to good use helping another rescue bun.

They did have a very easy bond and I think that is partly because Jack had always had a companion, so was very open to having company, and Layla is quite laid-back.

:love::love::love: sounds very much like bisc and matt, together from around 6 weeks and completely inseparable and devoted to each other.

i also don't want to choose a bun. i either want bisc to choose, or the rescue to choose.

could you tell me more about the bonding? did you bring them home in the same carrier? and then what happened once home? :wave:
 
We took Jack with us and put him in a puppy pen at Elaine's then popped Layla in. Jack was a bit unsure but Layla was just interested, and they were fine together. After about 20 minutes we walked away so they weren't being stared at and when I peeked back around the gate Layla was humping Jack :roll: but he wasn't bothered.

After about an hour we brought them home in separate carriers but face to face on the back seat, a journey of just under an hour. At home we set up a 3' x 2' pen outside as it was a nice day and put them in there for a couple of hours. Again, Layla was very relaxed although Jack was little bit uncertain but there were no negative signs from either of them.

Jack and Missy had had a huge pen at one end of our living room, so we set up a smaller one at the opposite end - about 4' x 3'. We put Jack and Layla in there and gave them a large dog-bed for a litter tray so they could both get right in it comfortably. They spent the night in there (with my husband on the sofa :lol:) and the next day, then we let them out into the living room for a while in the evening. We carried on like that for a couple more days - nights in the pen but free-range in the evening and then let them free-range completely.

I did come home from work one day a few weeks later to orange fur *everywhere* so they had obviously had quite a scrap. If I had witnessed it, it might have seriously worried me but by the time I came home they were snuggled up together and fine with no injuries so I left them to it (I don't think I even restricted their space again, I can't remember for sure). Since then they have been fab together. They have a very different relationship from Jack and Missy's - they were together all the time. Jack and Layla spend more time apart, they both seem to like their own space at times, but they also spend a lot of time together snuggled up and snoozing or grooming. Layla humps Jack at times (especially food times). Jack grooms Layla, she never grooms him. But then if Layla is being naughty he will nip her on the bum :lol: so she is not entirely the boss. In fact we have to be careful about telling her off because if we do he will nip her on the bum :lol:


I've done quite a few bonds and always, always have best success if I can start the bond in a neutral outside space, whether the buns live outside or inside. I have no idea why :?
 
Alice at Windwhistle Warren rehomed Annabella to me, knowing that Barney was a snuffle-bun :wave: She knew that most buns come into contact with it anyway, no matter what you do, so there's no reason to not rehome a bun to live with a snuffle-bun. In fact, because she knew he had snuffles, she helped me choose a bun that we thought would bond easily with him, to reduce stress, as he couldn't come for 'dates'.

I bonded in a very low-stress way, and he didn't have a flare-up at all. It was a nice easy bond.
 
We took Jack with us and put him in a puppy pen at Elaine's then popped Layla in. Jack was a bit unsure but Layla was just interested, and they were fine together. After about 20 minutes we walked away so they weren't being stared at and when I peeked back around the gate Layla was humping Jack :roll: but he wasn't bothered.

After about an hour we brought them home in separate carriers but face to face on the back seat, a journey of just under an hour. At home we set up a 3' x 2' pen outside as it was a nice day and put them in there for a couple of hours. Again, Layla was very relaxed although Jack was little bit uncertain but there were no negative signs from either of them.

Jack and Missy had had a huge pen at one end of our living room, so we set up a smaller one at the opposite end - about 4' x 3'. We put Jack and Layla in there and gave them a large dog-bed for a litter tray so they could both get right in it comfortably. They spent the night in there (with my husband on the sofa :lol:) and the next day, then we let them out into the living room for a while in the evening. We carried on like that for a couple more days - nights in the pen but free-range in the evening and then let them free-range completely.

I did come home from work one day a few weeks later to orange fur *everywhere* so they had obviously had quite a scrap. If I had witnessed it, it might have seriously worried me but by the time I came home they were snuggled up together and fine with no injuries so I left them to it (I don't think I even restricted their space again, I can't remember for sure). Since then they have been fab together. They have a very different relationship from Jack and Missy's - they were together all the time. Jack and Layla spend more time apart, they both seem to like their own space at times, but they also spend a lot of time together snuggled up and snoozing or grooming. Layla humps Jack at times (especially food times). Jack grooms Layla, she never grooms him. But then if Layla is being naughty he will nip her on the bum :lol: so she is not entirely the boss. In fact we have to be careful about telling her off because if we do he will nip her on the bum :lol:


I've done quite a few bonds and always, always have best success if I can start the bond in a neutral outside space, whether the buns live outside or inside. I have no idea why :?

you sound really confident with bonding! i would be a nervous wreck i think. i've bonded guinea pigs but never rabbits.

it's good that elaine does the initial introductions. :thumb:

it's alot to think about and work out because we just don't have much space and bisc is in the lounge so it's his space but him and his new friend would have to live there once bonded and i worry that even if i neutralise it and replace everything, that he will still know it is his lounge :? . we have some space in the bedroom to bond if but not much and nowhere else big enough really. :? my nans would be the only place i could think to go for while to bond them slowly.

it would have to be very well planned i think! it all depends on bisc really and how soon he seems to need a new bun.
 
Alice at Windwhistle Warren rehomed Annabella to me, knowing that Barney was a snuffle-bun :wave: She knew that most buns come into contact with it anyway, no matter what you do, so there's no reason to not rehome a bun to live with a snuffle-bun. In fact, because she knew he had snuffles, she helped me choose a bun that we thought would bond easily with him, to reduce stress, as he couldn't come for 'dates'.

I bonded in a very low-stress way, and he didn't have a flare-up at all. It was a nice easy bond.

:love: it's great to hear how it has worked out well for others.

could you tell me how you did the bond if you don't mind? :wave:
 
you sound really confident with bonding! i would be a nervous wreck i think. i've bonded guinea pigs but never rabbits.

it's good that elaine does the initial introductions. :thumb:

it's alot to think about and work out because we just don't have much space and bisc is in the lounge so it's his space but him and his new friend would have to live there once bonded and i worry that even if i neutralise it and replace everything, that he will still know it is his lounge :? . we have some space in the bedroom to bond if but not much and nowhere else big enough really. :? my nans would be the only place i could think to go for while to bond them slowly.

it would have to be very well planned i think! it all depends on bisc really and how soon he seems to need a new bun.

We couldn't really neutralise our lounge, you just can't get rid of the smells completely I think. We did move 'their' things around and had them in the small space for a little while, on a new £5 offcut of carpet so that smelt neutral. They're just both easy-going buns so it wasn't hard to bond them at all. It depends on Bisc's personality really, and that of the bun he would be meeting, but bonding is not always difficult...
 
We couldn't really neutralise our lounge, you just can't get rid of the smells completely I think. We did move 'their' things around and had them in the small space for a little while, on a new £5 offcut of carpet so that smelt neutral. They're just both easy-going buns so it wasn't hard to bond them at all. It depends on Bisc's personality really, and that of the bun he would be meeting, but bonding is not always difficult...

hoping we get very lucky with an easy bond! i'll get everything in place and sorted though before going ahead just to give the bond the best chance and hope that it works out.

thanks for your help :wave:
 
i noticed their website when i was searching.

did they do the initial bonding for you?

i might email them just to get some idea of where they would stand with regards to rehoming to us. i am hoping that if we provide a history of bisc's condition and maybe get the vet to confirm it all and give his opinion, that maybe they would consider it.

:wave:

:wave:

Yes, they did do the initial bonding for me. After two unsuccesful attempts with Gabe I had lost confidence and was also working more hours than normal so it was a better option for SAA to start bonding for me. I went across at the weekend at the start. The first rabbit we tried was Rose (who sadly is still looking at a home) but her and Gabe just flew at each other so the bonding attempt lasted all of 10 seconds. Once Gabe had calmed down we tried him with Spring which looked a lot more positive despite Gabe being very very very humpy :roll:. Gabe and Spring had several dating sessions before the staff felt confident to leave them together. They kept Gabe for a week before I brought them home - but that was due to my work committments meaning I couldn't bring them sooner. If you are able I would certainly visit the rescue - a bit tricky to find but worth it. The staff involved with the bunnies are great :)
 
I agree that snuffles is not always contagious. I have two brothers who both have minor flare ups so you would assume they caught it from each other - but they live with other healthy buns who have never caught it so I think its just unfortunate they both have it.

My other really bad snuffle bun who was on daily meds/nebuliser etc lived with his partner for 6 years and she never got it either.

Personally with bonding I'm more worried the stress of it may upset the health of the actual snuffle bun, so I always keep a very close eye to make sure they don't get overly stressed.
 
thanks for the advice.

bisc and matt never caught it back from each other either, and they're related. we got bisc stable quite quickly, but matt took another year and a half to become stable at least, but bisc never got worse even when matt did. the had the same thing but it affected them in different ways.

it's good to hear some successful bondings done and rescues willing to rehome aswell. makes me feel better for when/if bisc needs a friend. :wave:
 
:love: it's great to hear how it has worked out well for others.

could you tell me how you did the bond if you don't mind? :wave:

Sorry I didn't reply sooner! I started off with changing litter trays over with each other every day and blankets etc as well and then moved on to meeting with bars between them and then meeting face-to-face in a large space and then moved to a small space. I basically watched for signs of stress and stopped each stage before he got stressed and didn't progress until he was comfortable with that stage.

Here are the threads from when I did it:
http://forums.rabbitrehome.org.uk/showthread.php?283092-Low-stress-bonding

http://forums.rabbitrehome.org.uk/showthread.php?283975-Bonding-Time-)-(warning-pic-heavy)


What the threads don't say is that, after being in the cage in my bedroom (Barney's territory) for a few days, and increasing the space to the max of the cage (4ft8 by 4ft8), they actually escaped the cage whilst I was at work, into the non-neutral room. They were just fine though, and so I never needed to neutralise the room.
 
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