Esmee and her abcess that wasnt an Abcess

UPDATE on mummy bunny ESMEE

Well .. firstly she is home and eating . Back with her babies after a day at the vets.

For people who don't know her story -
We sent her in as she had a lump on her lower jaw . I was sure it was an Abscess . Vet thought it probably was too although we did discuss a few other possibilities .
She is feeding 3 babies who are only a few weeks old and is possibly pregnant again , so she was having a local anaesthetic and having the abscess drained .


WELL ... things didn't go as planned . She didn't have an abscess at all . Instead it seams that she has a tapeworm cyst . It is a fluid filled bag that is home to tapeworm eggs .
We ..and our vet ...have never come across this before . But after some research it seems that this part of the parasites lifecycle is not harmful to the rabbit . The eggs would stay dormant unless the rabbit was eaten by a dog or fox .. they would then be ingested and hatch .

The cyst sadly could not be removed today as it was too firmly attached to be done with out a GA . So she will have further surgery in the future to remove it once its safe to do so.

Thank you to anyone who has donated so far towards her vet treatment .

And lastly there is a footnote to this story .
WORM and DEFLEA YOUR ANIMALS . Esmee came from a totally indoor home . There was also a dog . It is highly likely that this is how she came to be infected . Her babies had fleas at 10 days old.

enough said .

(I have a pic of what the vet found in the lump . I haven't posted it as its quite gruesome . but if anyone is interested and wants to see please message me . Might be useful info for other rescues )

well, good luck to her with the next op when it comes. poor thing!

Gosh, does sound very gruesome. Bless her, sending vibes for her xx

Eeeep, nasty !! I have heard of a couple of other cases before. I hope that Esmee's next op' goes well xx

I read about that in my (admittedly American) Dwarf Rabbits book yonks ago! Sounded awful :S I got quite experienced at de-fleaing Charlie as he liked to hang out at night with the hedgehogs... :roll: And I've been advised to worm Lopsy when he's more handleable as he's from a relatively unknown (but certainly unmedicated) background Will try and do that sooner rather than later: thanks for the reminder!

Poor Esmee. I hope that it can be got rid of easily and is no bother to her... and she has no more of the pesky things.

One of my bunnies (Little Dot, from Kirkby, who stayed with her Auntie Denise (bunnyaddict) for a couple of weeks) was found to have a tapeworm cyst but hers was in her abdominal cavity and it was found when she was spayed. It wasn't in her intestines but just attached to the outside of them *bleugh*.

Bunny Buddy said:

Poor Esmee. I hope that it can be got rid of easily and is no bother to her... and she has no more of the pesky things.

One of my bunnies (Little Dot, from Kirkby, who stayed with her Auntie Denise (bunnyaddict) for a couple of weeks) was found to have a tapeworm cyst but hers was in her abdominal cavity and it was found when she was spayed. It wasn't in her intestines but just attached to the outside of them *bleugh*.

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yup been reading her thread .

I googled it :shock:

Poor bun, hope she's on the mend soon!