Do you take your bunnies out in the snow?

[Picksgirl]

Should I let my bunny Comet experience winter?  I’m tempted to get him a leash and let him ‘play’ in the snow.  Do bunnies like snow?  I’m from Southern Ontario (Canada) and we are getting hit with a huge storm right now.  Obviously I would wait til the storm ended before taking him out. 

Comet has been doing wonderfully.  I’ve had him over two mths now and his personality is just getting better every day.  He even licked me for the first time the other day!!  His tongue feels so weird!  lol  After two mths he finally decided to destroy the cardboard box in his ‘cage’.  Wonder what took him so long?  He is just loving his Timothy hay now (not sure if anybody remembers I was worried b/c he seemed to not be eating any. 

He’s out of his cage and running around the house all the time, which he loves.  I’ve even seen him do the ‘bunny 500’ quite often and binky too!  He loves my german shepherd.  Happy to say he is 100% litter trained and I never have to worry about accidents around the house.  Hope it stays this way forever.  He just loves loves loves attention.  He rests his front paws and head on my lap and will stay there for as long as I’m willing to keep petting him.

Yesterday he did something funny.  My brother was playing ball with him and he was ‘pouncing’ on the ball and kind of snorting at it!  Was he playing or was he angry?  I really don’t know.  lol

Comet has become such a huge part of the family and I love him to pieces. 

[Beka27]

i’m so happy to hear that everyone is getting on well!  about the ball… Michael (my son) has a ball that’s about 5 inches in diameter… Meadow hates it.  if she sees it she will pounce on it, but it’s in an attack mode, it definitely doesn’t seem to be playful at all.  one time Michael was still holding the ball when she went nuts.  i had him put it away in his room.  i don’t remember… how old is Comet?  is he neutered yet?

[Picksgirl]

I adopted Comet from an animal shelter beginning of Oct. of this yr and he was apprx one yr old, he was already neutered.

After hearing your story about your son and the ball, I think maybe Comet was angry at the ball!  LOL

Comet had been hiding under a chair and my brother was kind of rolling, gently tossing the dog’s ball toward him, he would come out from under the chair and pounce on it and make a sort of snort sound then hop back under the chair.  It was really funny and it was the first time I’ve ever heard him make any kind of noise!

He is such a gentle rabbit though.  My 2yr old granddaughter just loves to pet him, never unsupervised though.

What’s your bun’s name?  (HAHA, just reread your post and see that your bun’s name is Meadow.  Maybe I need more coffee!)  Very cute name for a very cute bun! 

[babybunsmum]

hey picksgirl… i’m in that storm too!  will have to venture out soon to shovel & i have my fingers crossed its the light fluffy kind.  there are one or two bunny parents here that take buns out in the snow, but more who do not.  rabbits obvioulsy live in the snow in the wild, but i think a pampered house bun may have to be carefully / slowly aclimated (word?) to the coldness before venturing into the snow.  i’ve read that they can be very sensitive to dramatic temperature changes causing shock.  not sure where i read that.  comet sounds to be such a sweetie!  good job on the litter training.  i also think the pouncing is more of an anger thing with rabbits.  my girl plays with the dog’s chew toys by chinning them and nosing them around, never pouncing.  enjoy the winter wonderland!

[Picksgirl]

Hey Babybunsmum!  I have a sister that lives in Waterloo, I was just there a couple weeks ago.  She’s at Erb and Fischer-Hallman.  She thinks Waterloo gets more snow than anywhere else in the world!  LOL

I think what I am going to try with Comet, just for fun, is bring some snow in the house for him.  I will put some snow in a big box and see what he thinks.  Could be cute.  I’ll have to delete some pics on my camera to free up some space.  I’ll post a pic if I get a good one.

I can’t take credit for litter training Comet.  Lucky for me, he came that way! 

[Scarlet_Rose]

That’s just great Comet is doing so well! Bringing the snow into the house or wet room where they can play but still be in the warmth is a great idea. Taking your house rabbit outside when there is more than a 20 degree difference in temperature can put them into shock and could even make them sick. Not to mention our furred companions have fur coats that are suited for the indoors. If you take them inside and out during the winter too much they also don’t know how heavy or light of a fur coat to have on and it can cause quite a bit of shedding to happen. I know my vacuum cleaner cringes at that. LOL It sounds like he was playing with the ball when he pounced and lunged, wondering what the heck are you doing in MY territory. If he’s not neutered he could be working up into his hormonal stage. Is he aggressive with you or anyone else?

[Picksgirl]

Good thing you guys warned me about the difference in temp from indoors to outdoors. I didn’t realize that could send a bunny into shock. YIKES!!!

Comet is neutered and is not an aggressive bunny at all. He is VERY gentle and tame and loving.

[babybunsmum]

i just got back in from shovelling… oi… i’d be tempted to take some snow inside for baby to ‘explore’ if i wasn’t so tired of moving the stuff around right now!  and it’s still coming down.   by the time i was done the place i shovelled first needed shovelling again

i wish my xcountry skiis weren’t busted… it’d be perfect to ski down the street today!

[Scarlet_Rose]

No problem!

Babybunsmum, so do you reckon that storm is headed my way? I just finished shoveling from the last storm and was looking forward to a reprieve!

[babybunsmum]

actually i think the storm came from your direction… on the weather maps it seems to be sweeping in from the south west.  i can’t believe how much has come down!  if the weather report says 5 inches you canbet there’ll be double that at least on my driveway because of drifting  .  i’m in a subdivision where yards arent huge, or else i’d put up a snow drift fence!  in this pic bogart is standing in my shovelled driveway… not only can’t you see the driveway anymore, but the street seems lost too… lol.

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[Scarlet_Rose]

LOL Poor Bogart! He looks like he’s having fun though! Well I hope you’re right about the storm, it’s sunny and 50 degrees outside today. Last year was the worst. I had to shovel the snow on the lawn to make room for more snow (it was getting too high to throw snow over) as I had to have some place to shovel it off from the driveway. At least it looks like you have a smaller area than I do though, thank goodness!

[Erbear]

I was worried about the temp change too…. so in order to have Radar experience something new I brought winter to her. I put an extra litter box out onto the balcony when it was blizzarding here in MN and I let it fill up a bit and brought it in for Radar.

I put it on the floor… she looked at it… she smelled it… bit it… and then began digging wildly into it.  I think that if you bring in snow do it in your bathtub or shower.  Unless you like a mess. 

[MooBunnay]

Wow…thats quite a lot of snow! I haven’t seen snow like that in a long time, since I have been in LA and now in Dallas. I think your bun might have some fun experiencing a bit of snow indoors Like mentioned in some other posts – since Comet has adapted to living indoors, his coat is probably not adequate to keep him warm outside, so its probably best to let him have his first snow day indoors!

[Picksgirl]

The bathtub!!!!  What a great idea!!!  Thx!  I will try that tonite.  Comet is most active around 8-11pm, right now he is busy lounging.  I will wait til he is ready to play.

[babybunsmum]

picksgirl… thats what i was thinking too… bring some snow in after the survivor finale tonight.  baby will be in play-mode by then!

scarlet_rose… i know exactly what you mean about having to shovel smow into the middle of the yard.  a few times the pile gets so high that when i toss up a shovel full it just tumbles back down lol.  doesn’t help that i share a driveway with my neighbor, so we each only have one side to shovel to.  together our driveway is 3 parking spots wide and 3 cars deep so it’s not all THAT bad.  only after the plough goes by!

[Scarlet_Rose]

Oh man*cringe* don’t get me started with the plow thing! I clear everything then whoosh, there’s more. But on the other hand, last year in the blizzard at first it was so slick no one coudl get anywhere, and then there were gigantic ruts that scraped the bottom of the car because they NEVER came through our neighborhood to plow and this year, a few inches and they were all over it!

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