I am having trouble clipping my buns nails

[yayforalexis]

Hello,

 

My bunny Totoro has dark nails… and I mean REALLY dark. I tried the whole flash light thing and sometimes I can see the quick, but most times I cannot. He hates getting his nails trimmed. Sometimes randomly when hes sleepy he would let me clip 2-3 nails, but then runs away.
His nails are getting pretty long So long that I think he got one caught diggin in his litter box and it ripped off. I never saw blood, but the nail is realllllly short.
He can stay in the bunny trance for like 1 min and he can wiggle his way out of it so I haven’t had any luck cutting his nails that way.

At this point I only tiny trim them every chance I get because I am affraid of cutting them too short, but they are getting so long, trimming them isn’t doing much and I am worried another nail can rip off.

What should I do?

[Stickerbunny]

Trimming a nail when you can’t see the quick is harder, but not impossible. I can’t see the quick on Powders nails either, so what I do is I trim it a little longer than I do Stickers (since I can see her quick easily) and I have never made him bleed. Since his are long, the quick is going to further out than normal. So you’ll need to do more frequent trims to avoid making him bleed until they are down. Or, you could take him to a professional and they could show you exactly how much you can cut off. If you do it yourself, keep styptic powder like kwik stop on hand, then if you do cut too far you can just dip his nail into the powder and the bleeding will stop.

I don’t use a trance. What I use is holding the bun to my chest, with my arm supporting the back legs, my chest supporting the side/back and my hand around the shoulder blade area, which keeps mine from freaking out. If your guy is not calm enough to just be held, you can use a bunny burrito (wrapping him in a blanket, it’s shown in the grooming FAQ section). Different methods apply for different rabbits, figure out what is best for yours.

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