Charlie. My parents got him in secret from the local petshop as a family Easter present when I was about 4 (1987). He was probably 10 weeks? A little tiny agouti Netherland Dwarf. He was hilarious so I called him Charlie because there was a clown called Charlie. He lived his 3x2 hutch in the garage (car was outside
) for a few weeks while my Dad made him a run, and then he was outside in his 6x4x2 run with hs hutch atached for years. We brought him in to the garage a few times over winter so he didn't freeze and then we gave up and just left him outsoide as he seemed happier. We just put old carpet and a good groundsheet over his hutch, with extra hay, so he had somewhere to go when it was cold
We had to change his muesli every time we finished a bag because he was a fussy devil. Never ate the oats though. He ate grass and hay, but not really anythng else: if you gave him a dandelion you were VERY lucky if he ate it! :lol: We got him vaccinated against Myxi once (it was a 6m jab! :shock
and when he was about 8 my Dad thought he'd trodden on his head because he heard a scream as he got in and felt him run under his foot, and then he didn't eat anythng the next day. The day after that (!) we took him to the vets and it turned out there was nothing wrong with him except his incisors were overgrown. He went back about once a year to have them trimmed after that
He used to binky in summer. Mum thought at first the ants were biting him :lol: He also touched noses with a fox through the run mesh: they were in the garden all the time but learned quickly Charlie wasn't an easy meal, and Charlie was 'ard enough that he knew they couldn't get him. Only time he got really scared, apart from dogs in the garden (occasional visitors who came with family) was when cats were about and when he and the squirrel came out at exactly the same time and scared the bejeezus out of each other :lol:
He was never neutered: in 1987 it wasn't considered safe, especially on such a tiny thing! He was also never really handled: he enjoyed headrubs and the like but didn't like to be picked up and cuddled for more than 2mins. He hated the vet so much he attacked him once :lol:
He died of some sort of seizure on a snowy February Sunday morning in 1998. By the time my Mum, who'd witnessed it through the kitchen window, had gone out to see if he was OK, he'd practically passed. I've never seen my Dad cry so much
So he was probably 11. He had a damn good innings