Oh Joy, We’ve Reached Adolescence!

[Hokankai]

Yes, it’s true. My sweet little Ariadne has reached become a teenager. She’ll be 4 months in a couple weeks and she is outta control! The most annoying thing is definitely the litterbox issue. She poops EVERYWHERE and is peeing outside of the box too. Unfortunately Theodore has followed her example as well. Ugggh. She’s also been digging a lot and has been attempting to get Theodore’s attention by flashing her hoo-ha with her tail straight in the air. It’s really entertaining because Theodore couldn’t care less about her . He’s a good sport though, and simply hops away when she tries to hump him, haha

I just gotta say that I contacted the vet today and will be making the spay appointment as early as I can, lol.

Anyone else going through this glorious phase at the moment?

[Pandorachik]

Yikes, I don’t know when my new bun, Jack will go through it..
Scared :/ lol

[Stickerbunny]

My girl is finally growing out of her baby phase and calming down. Glad of it. lol I feel your pain. I adopted Stickers at 4 months, just in time for her most “fun” bunny phase! I am just now getting to see what a fun bun she can be, when she’s not being an insane teen. Hang in there and get ready to do some mad bunny proofing as she finds all the things she can destroy you thought you had protected.

[Hokankai]

LOL thanks Stickerbunny. She’s not allowed out unsupervised until she’s over this crazy phase in her life juuuust in case. especially when we’re living at my uncle’s house for 6 months! I always have a squirt bottle at the ready too

[Usagi5]

Usagi is at this stage right now too. Not a lot of fun! He’s getting neutered in a couple weeks though, so hopefully a few weeks after he will calm down a little

[bunnyfriend]

Ugggg…I don’t like that phase very much My Wilbur was a sweet little baby with perfect litter habits and then one day she started lunging at me and peeing out of her box. She returned to normal shortly after her spay Good luck and hang in there!

[peppypoo]

Don’t worry, it doesn’t last forever! I remember those months of terror…I would joke with my ex-bf that Peppy is lucky she’s so darn cute, considering the damage she’s done lol.

[Hokankai]

UGH, I vacuum the poops up every morning and they’re all back by the afternoon! I took out the mat flooring in their cage because I knew she was peeing on it but I couldn’t see it. They’ll be on coroplast until she gets her head screwed back on.

[Hokankai]

Called up the vet and it looks like I have to wait a whole month before I can get her spayed (so she’ll be 5 months old). Ugh.

Also, what are you guys feeding yours? Are they on unlimited pellets? Ariadne is looking quite…round on her sides. Haha

[Usagi5]

Most rabbits around about 6 months and under get unlimited pellets, and veggies, and hay. If your rabbit is looking a little chubby though you can try to limit his pellet intake.

[Les huit scaroles]

It depends also a lot of the kind of pellets you’re feeding her with. I don’t know how it is in your country, but here in France, most of the pellets that can be found easily are bad for bunnies (sugar, milk, cereals …), and would make any of them become too big.

About feeding her with unlimited pellets, in my opinion it’s not a problem as long as she keeps eating lots of hay, but anyway now she’s 6 months old you can start to give her less pellets, she’s old enough to be fed as an adult.

Actually even the fact of giving young bunnies unlimited pellets could be debated because if your hay is good enough, rabbits will found most of what he needs to be healthy in the hay, which represents something like 80% of the food.  Juste like for horses, for example, pellets are here to complete the food, nothing else, and they come after hay and vegetables.

[Hokankai]

She’s not 6 months yet, she’ll be 4 months in a couple weeks

She’s being fed Oxbow pellets right now, with access to alfalfa and timothy hay as well as a big handful of mixed veggies.

I think I might start decreasing her pellets. She gets a cup (1/2 cup in morning and night) right now and she definitely is a little rounded on her sides. I think I’ll take her down to 1/3 cup each meal and see how she does.

[Freyja]

i would personally keep with the unlimited pellets, Parsley is also at the joyous adolescent stage…although has calmed down a bit since he got desexed a few weeks ago. Anywho, he is 6 months and gets unlimited pellets, my boyfriend was convinced he was eating to much and was a little fattie but the vet confirmed he was just a healthy bun and a great weight, she said to stick to the unlimited pellets until around 7-8 months and then cut back. at 4 months she still has a bit of growing to do so i would keep on with the 1 cup.
Adolescence is one giant poo explosion isnt it! that and the CHEW EVERYTHING, MAKE ALL THE MESS, EAT ALL THE THINGS, KNOCK OVER ALL THE EXPENSIVE OBJECTS, EAT ALL THE WIRES, mentality…. defiantly looking forward to bun adulthood lol

[Hokankai]

Hallelujah! We’ve got a spay appointment for Wed. morning!!! They said that since she’s had behavioral changes for several weeks now that they’ll do it a little early. She’s started lunging and grunting like mad, and peeing everywhere, so it’s definitely time.

[LoveChaCha]

Yay, congrats! Crossing my fingers all goes well!

As for the pellets, my vet told me to switch Chacha over to the timothy pellets and cut down on the amount when she was 6 months of age. She has done very well with the timothy pellets since, with no issues.

[Hokankai]

The surgery is tomorrow, and just in time. She BIT my finger today as I was putting pellets in her bowl, and she’s becoming quite aggressive 😐

I’m giving her several months after her surgery to settle down, but if she’s BITING people and drawing blood….she might not be here for very long. We have a special needs teen in the house who likes to stick his fingers in the cage and doesn’t know how to read bunny language, and I’m not always here to watch him.

Sigh

[tanlover14]

Hey! Saw this post and couldn’t help but comment because I happen to have THREE little rascals all in this terror stage. Mine just turned 4 months on the 15th and are all from the same litter. One of them is neutered (breeder did it before we got him) and the other two are being done this coming Tuesday! Was supposed to have it done on the 15th but then the vet said she’d prefer to wait a little bit longer and so got in a few extra weeks.

Our newest puts terror into TERROR. He is a rascal n a half and isn’t scared of anything. When we brought him home he wasn’t scared of us or anything in the house and gets into EVERYTHING. He LOVES to cuddle though and when he jumps up next to you on the couch you can’t help but love him despite his ability to destroy everything including his cage and just about every toy we’ve given him.

Also, our little guys get a little rambuctious and have bitten us a few times too — it helped when they bit us to shriek really loudly and push their heads down gently. After a few battles of head pushing they finally gave us and realized we were the head bunny and stopped their biting.

Are you feeding your girl the Oxbow Young Rabbit Food or the Oxbow Bunny Basics? I would recommend the Bunny Basics over the Young one if you’re using the Young because if you compare the percentages on the back, the Basic has only 2.0% fat while the Young Rabbit one has 2.5%. May not make a huge difference but I was crazy over making sure they had the exact percentages that were better for them and the Bunny Basic seemed to be the best on all accounts!

Hope this helps!

[Hokankai]

Thanks! Ariadne had her surgery today and is very subdued. She isn’t interested in food, but when do I need to worry about getting food into her?

I am feeding Oxbow Basics, not the young formula. If I did that, I’d have a bag of adult and a bag of young rabbit food and both would go bad before I could get through it all. Ariadne has free choice alfalfa hay, which is where the fat comes from (and she’s already pretty round in the middle) so I’m not concerned. She’s been on it for awhile now too.

SO, post-spay care. Just keep her chilled and relaxed for the next couple days?

P.S.  If there’s anyone in the Portland, Vancouver area or even just near there, my vet did Ariadne’s spay for only $75 and is very familiar with rabbits! It was at the Camas/Washougal Animal Hospital

[Hokankai]

Looks like we’re right on schedule. She and her incision look good today, mainly just chilling on the middle level of the cage with her tummy against the cool linoleum floor. She nibbled her pellets and ate some alfalfa leaves this morning too. Not a lot, but it was something. I put a water bowl up there so she doesn’t even need to leave that level of her cage if she doesn’t want to.

[tanlover14]

Awww. Hope she keeps up the positive attitude. I’m getting my girl spayed and my boy neutered next Tuesday. So NERVOUS for them! Our vet told us that would be fine to start switching them from the alfalfa to the timothy since they’re house buns so they don’t get chunky — so if you feel comfortable with it, it may help. We still let them have access to alfalfa but we put timothy in their litter boxes and half and half in their hay holders and at first they picked through it but not so much anymore!

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