I know it might seem strange, but are there any pet groomers around?

Some dog/cat groomers will do rabbits as well, just a few tips:

1) Ask if they do rabbits.
2) Ask if you can stay and watch what they do.
3) Ask if they have ever trimmed rabbit nails before.

If they say “No” to any of this then I suggest to pass them by, don’t use them. Also ask what nail clippers they use, how they restrain/hold the rabbit.

Once you have okayed a place, they still might not know how serious you are about rabbit safety

1) Show them/ tell them how to pick up a rabbit. don’t say “Usually I pick him up like this.” say something more commanding so they know you want them to walk the talk, “Whenever you need to pick him up, you MUST do it like this, not any other way.”.
2) Feel free to tell them no, you are paying them so if they say “Oh, sometimes we do it this way.” tell them it’s not what you want, make sure they know this.
3) Make sure they have a rabbit safe blood clotting agent, I think “quik stop” is a good one. As accidents do happen.
4) Make sure they don’t put any perfumes or animals near your rabbit.

Hope this helps, I know how you feel, I felt evil the first time I cut Muffins Nails.

I believe a member here has their bunny’s nails clipped by a non rabbit savvy vet. Might be something worth looking into?

Medical care should always be done by a vet that specializes in bunnies but nail clippings aren’t something they need special training for really. It seems like more often than not just getting a bunny out of their comfort zone makes them easier to handle/groom.

Have you tried enlisting the help of a partner?

I work for a vets office that I would consider to be not very rabbit savvy. We see rabbits occasionally and every once in awhile we do a neuter/spay but in all we just don’t see enough rabbits to be specialized in them. We do however know how to be calm around all animals, we are trained to hold all animals even if we don’t see them often and we know how to clip nails because at the end of the day a nail is a nail. We clip nails all day. Anyway, just wanted to second MoveDiagonally’s recommendation about looking into all vets.

By the way have you tried this method – http://www.howcast.com/videos/514678-How-to-Trim-Your-Rabbits-Nails-Pet-Rabbits

I can do pretty much anything to my bunny if I take his front feet off the ground like held about 1/4 way through this video. I like what she says about some buns needed less restraint then you think. I find at the vets office a lot of animals do better with less than more. We usually start with the least amount of restraint and build up if needed.

For my bun I just place some veggies in a pile and have my daughter lay along one side of Spot while I lay along side the other and I clip his nails while his feet are on the carpet as I can get around his foot pretty well without even touching it. I just slowly pull his foot out from under him and then clip while he eats.

Same here. There’s a clipper that’s lying around for months. We just can’t get him still enough to make the bunny burrito!!! The $12/15 ar the vet is totally worth it for us man! Binky LOVES to be petted, scratched, rubbed on the head, nose and chin and everything…but he won’t let you wrap him up or even touch his paws

Like what njbunny said – a nail is a nail. So long as they can safely restrain the animal and understands what a quick is… They can pretty much handle a rabbit.

Petco sounds fine. Just make sure that they’ll do a rabbit, they don’t have anything toxic or irritating near them, and will hopefully allow you to watch, I’d say they’re fine. Really if you see them do 1 nail, they’ll likely not screw up the others… Just the handling that’s most important. Wether or not they’ve clipped a bunnies nail is pretty irrelevant, since a nail is a nail.