Handling and grooming a boisterous bun?

[Fosterish]

I am writing this while holding a bag of frozen peas over my face where Casper has kicked me and given me a black eye. Unintentionally of course.

He’s the cuddliest of cuddles – I can lift his front half up. I can lift his back half up. I can rub his tummy and hold his paws. I can sit with him sprawled on my lap and wiggle his ears around. I can lie with my head next to his and have my face totally licked. I can push him out of my way or into a carry case. I can quickly lift him, cuddle hI’m then put him in a box or cage, but he hates it.

I cannot pick him up.

Sure I can cuddle him in my arms and check each of his footsies and trim his nails.

But I can’t pick him up. And sometimes I need to pick him up. Like today, when I noticed he had sat in a cecal and it was stuck under his tail. I know I need to catch him and check him and clean the matted mess out, but when I FINALLY caught him (lots of thumping and running) and tried to check him, he flew out of arms kicking me in the eye in the process.

When he was little I could handle him quite well. Now he is strong. And has the toughest kick I’ve ever felt!

Anyone have any tips for grooming / cleaning / checking a strong and wiggly boy that either don’t involve picking him up or that could help me to actually lift him? No trancing please – it worries me. And bunny burritos are so far unsuccessful.

Ps. Casper was very sorry that I had been hurt and jumped straight onto my lap to lick my injured eye. Which wasn’t great for the injury itself, but made me feel slightly less like my boy hated me. He is now flopped next to me chattering his teeth reassuringly.

[Kokaneeandkahlua]

The only thing you can do is keep practicing, and start small-only move up when he’s ready. Maybe lifting 1-2 mm off the ground for just a second, and up from there.
Oi-sorry for your eye-I hope your feeling better soon. And if it’s literally black, well that will be an interesting story to tell while it clears up! “Well my cuddling bunny kicked me…”

How do you lift him? I ask because there are different ways people do it. I find that using one hand under the front paws and one under the back-so they are basically standing on your hands is the best. Mind have become ridiculously easy to handle (note I’m not saying easy to give meds to-I have my own booboos often too!) but they are very comfortable being lifted in that manner. Can you picture what I’m describing?

[Q8bunny]

Oooh… I’m going to try that technique with Chewie. He’s a squirmy nightmare to pick up as well. Except he’s also got lift radar and bolts before I can even touch him with the intention of picking him up.
Otherwise he’s a shameless cuddlebug.

[vanessa]

I agree with Kokaneeandkahlua. When I pick up my buns, they react better when I have one hand under their front legs, and the other as a platform to scoop them up so their back feet are still “on the ground”. Once the back feet are not on something, when they are int he air, the bunnies freak out. So feet on hands – always. That being said – I still have to be super quick to grab Avalon – after 2 years. I prefer to catch him in a cat carrier, move it to the bathtub, and then I can take off the top and lift him up. Morgana is even more difficult. I am at the point after 2.5 years at where she lets me stroke and pet her. Big break through. But I always coax her intoa cat carrier, move it to the bath tubm and then wrap her in a towl to pick up. I never pick her up any other way. She fights, jumps, squirms, acts like your little one. Bunny burritos work on all the other 3 buns for trimming their nails, but she manages to curl up into a little ball, like a turtle retreating into it’s shell. Some bunnies are just plain difficult to handle. So I stick to whatever is the least stressfull for them. In this case, I use the cat carrier, and for Morgana, roll her up in a towel from there. I also cover her face if possible to try to keep her at least an ounce calmer. With Lancelot, the feet in the air thing is a problem as well. He does the mid-air-sprint unless I place his feet eithr on my hand, or I tuck his back legs under my arm.

[Love4Bunny]

Gosh, I know this well. Thor hates to be picked up. I do a similar thing with one hand under the chest, but the difference is that I support the hind end by anchoring the hip to either my elbow, or my body as I lift Thor off the ground. I sorta squeeze him together as I lift him up, and this relaxes him somewhat. The reason I do it this way is cos Thor will use any surface to launch off – my knee, my hand, my thigh, especially on the descent, so I cannot put anything under his feet. He has kicked me in the chin with his hind legs, and it hurt. When I pick him up this way, his feet dangle, but he is supported from the haunches upward, and everything else is immobilised.

I used to put Thor on a chair when letting him down, and then he would jump onto the floor. This helped me minimise any possible injury to my rabbit, because he would often fly out of my arms. Nowadays, Thor knows I am not going to let him get away with it (I keep my grip on his midsection when he is on the floor, so he knows what’s coming), and this seems to work for both of us.

I never chase my rabbit in the traditional sense… I just calmly follow him for a bit, and he will surrender when he knows he has to go back to his enclosure. For a stubborn bun, it is pretty amazing to see him relax his tummy into my hands for “lift off”. This has taken over a year to do. It is not perfect by any means, but he is used to it now, and doesn’t lunge at me like he used to.

[Fosterish]

I’m so glad I’m not the only person with this issue! I was starting to worry that I just wasn’t good enough!

Kokaneeandkahlua I lift him with the hand under the chest, scoop butt into my arms (kind of like picking up a cat? Also how I tend to lift my baby cousin…)

I always make sure that I am holding the feet or that they are firmly pressed against something. I think because he’s blind he panics? He trusts me lifting him up to around a foot off the floor. Any higher and he goes mental.

Similarly to Love4bunny I never chase. I do, however, ignore Caspers thumps – he is a drama queen. He thumps if I bring him broccoli which is not purple sprouting. He thumps if he has thrown his toys into the wrong place or if he can’t find his carrot piece – usually because he’s sitting on it.
When he’s really upset, he screams. (Only happened once. He started screaming at 3 in the morning. I panicked and thought he was dying or injured so ran to him on the verge of tears. He was stood over his food bowl screaming. There was a spider in it.
When the spider was removed he stopped screaming and licked my arms and went back to usual. Vet check the following morning showed nothing wrong with him. We think that the spider warrented a higher alert than “this is the wrong type of broccoli” and the only step up from thumping was a scream. Drama queen.)

I wouldn’t ignore any other bunny thumps, but I know my boy well!!
I can lift and cuddle the other bunny fine. In fact she likes to sit on my shoulders and sniff my ears while I’m reading.

I shall continue to persevere with Casper! He always manages to keep me on my toes! And I wouldn’t have it any other way.

[vanessa]

Try putting a hand over his face, or in front of his eyes. I do that with Avalon. I coax him into the pet carrier to pick him up, but when I put him back, I hold him myself. In order to prevent him from doing the flying bunny leap/kick/fung-fu/karate-chop out of my arms as I put him down, I cup my hand over his eyes, either on his fur or above his furm whichever he prefers. That way he can’t see, and I can put him down without a struggle. In order to have a free hand, I cup him under my elbow just like Love4Bunny describes. It’s like holding a rugby ball under my arm, elbow and ribs supporting his rear quarters, and forearm supporting his front legs. Preventing him from being able to see – HELPS.

[Fosterish]

Vanessa thank you for the mental image of bunny rugby ball! Lol!!!
Casper is blind so he can’t see anyway. But he does like having a hand over his face so I will still try this to comfort him as I put him down!

[Fosterish]

Vanessa thank you for the mental image of bunny rugby ball! Lol!!!
Casper is blind so he can’t see anyway. But he does like having a hand over his face so I will still try this to comfort him as I put him down!

[Azerane]

I worked out a great technique for picking up Bandit, but I’m not really sure how to describe it.

Basically, if you’re kneeling in front of your bunny, they’re facing you. I use my left hand to hold around the front leg (bunny’s right) and chest. Two fingers in front, and two behind the leg with my thumb curling up around to the top of bunny’s neck. My left hand goes around to the bunny’s butt for scooping, but you want to make sure that your right arm is pressed against your bunny’s body. This way, when you lift the front, you can rock their weight onto your arm which aids with the butt scoop and helps the rabbit to feel more secure. Rather than just having their chest and butt support, their whole left side is supported as well. I practiced it a lot with Bandit once I “discovered” it and I would just lift him up for 5-10 seconds a couple inches above the ground before putting him down again. He was always very calm when I used this technique as opposed to just scooping and supporting at both ends.

In terms of grooming, I only picked Bandit up to take him outside onto the table I used for grooming out there, so he was never “captured” during the grooming process, he would shift around on the table a lot but it was easy enough to brush him. Nail clipping I usually did in stages while Bandit was just sitting around (if he was stretched out on the couch I would just clip a couple of nails while he was chilled out). I made myself a chart (which was just a crude drawing of four rabbit feet with all the nails) and I would mark off on the chart what nails I had clipped and when, that way when I got a chance to do a couple more nails I could check to see which ones were already done last time.

[Love4Bunny]

Posted By vanessa on 3/30/2016 9:33 PM

Preventing him from being able to see – HELPS.

Yes! I forgot to mention that I also do this, particularly if either bun tries to get squirmy. The vet assistant told me it minimises visual stimuli, so apparently they panic less. Thor is hilarious because he does try to peek, but it works most of the time. I think bunnies can sense tension in one’s hands, so I try to pick them up with conviction, and this has improved both of our experiences.

[vanessa]

Silly little rugby balls 😉

[Author]

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