Some of you might remember that 18 month - 2 years ago I had a suspected outbreak of samonella caused by a contaminated bag of food which subsequently caused me lose over half of my bunny family in about a 2 week period.
After a quarantine period I adopted 4 rabbits - 2 longtermers from Alice @ Windwhistle and 2 very disabled bunnies from Bath Rabbit Rescue. Both these rescues were happy for me to adopt as was my vet.
Of those 4 rabbits I only have 1 now.
I honestly believe that the two disabled bunnies (Missing legs/ears) were possibly deformed internally aswell as externally. Part of me wonders if this is what caused the mother to mutilate them and that perhaps in saving them nature had possibly been intereferred with.
The other rabbit Ned appeared healthy.
In hindsight I wish I had got a PM done on Ned, but after everything I had been through and comfortable that all bunnies were vaccinated for VHD2 I wanted to just put him to rest peacefully.
I didn't feel like I wanted any more rabbits or to take the risk.
However I have noticed lately that whilst the two trios are all well bonded they are not as content as when they were in bigger groups - sometimes 1 is left on its own and this makes me a little sad.
I am tempted to adopt another single or pair and hopefully go back to a bigger group and improve dynamics. I am a experienced bonder and confident that I could re-bond each trio if a bonding failed. But I am also very scared.
My heart tells me the bad luck was just a coincidence, my head tells me my heart is being selfish as I am sad to have only 6 bunnies when I once had 16.
Does anyone have any thoughts? Please be honest I wont be offended.
(I should add bonding both groups together is not an option as I have already tried it and two of them just didn't get on).
After a quarantine period I adopted 4 rabbits - 2 longtermers from Alice @ Windwhistle and 2 very disabled bunnies from Bath Rabbit Rescue. Both these rescues were happy for me to adopt as was my vet.
Of those 4 rabbits I only have 1 now.
I honestly believe that the two disabled bunnies (Missing legs/ears) were possibly deformed internally aswell as externally. Part of me wonders if this is what caused the mother to mutilate them and that perhaps in saving them nature had possibly been intereferred with.
The other rabbit Ned appeared healthy.
In hindsight I wish I had got a PM done on Ned, but after everything I had been through and comfortable that all bunnies were vaccinated for VHD2 I wanted to just put him to rest peacefully.
I didn't feel like I wanted any more rabbits or to take the risk.
However I have noticed lately that whilst the two trios are all well bonded they are not as content as when they were in bigger groups - sometimes 1 is left on its own and this makes me a little sad.
I am tempted to adopt another single or pair and hopefully go back to a bigger group and improve dynamics. I am a experienced bonder and confident that I could re-bond each trio if a bonding failed. But I am also very scared.
My heart tells me the bad luck was just a coincidence, my head tells me my heart is being selfish as I am sad to have only 6 bunnies when I once had 16.
Does anyone have any thoughts? Please be honest I wont be offended.
(I should add bonding both groups together is not an option as I have already tried it and two of them just didn't get on).