What’s up ?

Ok, had a chance to read through. Hard to say really but the fact that bunny had a rough start could mean she is a little more resilient to noise, unfortunately it could also put her on higher alert. How is she currently responding to extra noise ? Is she thumping ? One thing that will help is to throw a towel or sheet over her enclosure, the darkness will help her feel secure. If you are in the Northern Hemisphere heat will be a concern so you don’t want to block ventilation.

How are you going with diet. Do you know the bunny pyramid ? 80% hay, 15% greens, 5% pellets. They are susceptible to heat so keep them as cool as possible in hot weather, frozen water bottles, bricks, tiles and big iceblocks help. Indicators of illness include hunching, tooth grinding, cessation of pooping and not eating. Pooping and eating are very important for bunnies. They hide pain and illness as they are prey animals so lack of poop and appetite is often your first and only indicator before a medical condition escelates to being critical. Have some baby gas drops, simithecone on hand as it helps with gas and bloating.

Laura, I think every bunny would react differently. For example, my bunny doesn’t care about vacuums and some other loud noises, but when we recently brought a dog in the house (on a leash), he heard the dog before he saw it and immediately was behaving scared. Keeping the bunny separated from the dogs for a while is probably a great idea.

Thank you for taking in this bunny.

We have lots of members here with dogs. I think if bunny is used to hearing the dogs bark he should be okay. For the most part, the times I’ve heard about dogs causing bunnies to have heart attacks is when they are dogs the bun is not used to. Like someone brings a dog over and it runs over to the cage and starts barking at the bunny. Or when the dog actually chases and frightens the rabbit. Keeping them separate is good. You may be able to later on introduce them but this will have to be done very carefully and slowly. Some dogs can get along well with bunnies, others not so well. Terriers and other small rat catching dogs often have a hard time curbing their hunting instinct. There are some threads here on BB for later on if you plan on trying to introduce them.

Thanks for the taking of the bunny.  You need to know that bunnies are prey animals and they are experts in hiding fears.  If you take care of your bunny and it bonds with you. it will become a very different animal.  Actually, I think what a bonded bunny really means is that the bunny thinks you are another bunny…albeit a BIG bunny.  Once they accept you for this level of companionship, they are different animals and so much more interactive. When your bunny bonds with you, they will make vocalizations to try to communicate with you, and actually they can become a little bit possessive with their territory.  My previous 11 1/2 year old Bunny was really quite mischievous when it came to interacting with me and my wife. She really did have a bit of a brain. I think they are at the same intelligence level of cat. 

Also, all our rabbits have, after being caged to initially to establish litter box behaviours, have been turned loose in the house. Having free running bunnies in your house is not a littler box problem (my experience), it’s  a chewing problem!  Their teeth are always growing. If you don’t address this problem with a house bunny, they will literally eat your house down!  Oat hay is our solution. It’s abrasive and wears down their teeth.  They both just enjoy chomping on hay.  We also have cardboard boxes for them to play with.  They like to jump into the boxes and then shred the boxes..They so much enjoy eating the boxes,  even though they have copious amounts of normal bunny food.   Bunny stomachs can transform the cellulose in paper, vegetables, hay, into glucose.   They have two stomachs. One is like ours where it’s between the esophagus and the small intestine.  The bunnies main stomach is between their small intestine and the big intestine. This is where cellulose to glucose transformation takes place. Its the cecum.  For humans this stomach is a vestigal organ and known as the appendix.

Cliff’s Notes: Read more  about feeding and taking care of them in other  binkybunny.com threads. My wife and I really love out buns.

They are not cats and dogs.  It takes a while for them to really become very closely bonded with you. Once they bond, you’ve got a pretty good pet. My advice is to let them sleep in your bedroom.  Their sense of smell and sound is far better than humans.  lIf anything out of the ordinary is happening in your house they will start thumping. …thumping loudly and non stopping.