Uh oh… I might have created a shopaholic… w. PICTURES! =)

[Barbie]

I don’t usually take Leroy out, but I had to get some things for Leroy, and I want to get him used to car rides, so I took Leroy to the petstore last week (it’s less than a mile from my house), and he loved it.  He was looking all around and really curious about everything.  And yes, I was very very careful with him in the cart and I made sure he didn’t get over heated.  I snapped this picture of him, and thought it was so adorable, I just had to share!

 

[Monkeybun]

oo I shoudl take moneky to the store when I get her fixed, and trained on a leash

[jerseygirl]

He seems quite calm and curious. At least he doesn’t go “I want I want I want!” I’m still so surprised it is quite common that people can take their pets into the stores. I don’t think it happens here much. Though I don’t go to pet stores much as they have animals in them. Too risky, they could possibly end up coming home with me.

Did you get many people approach you?  It would be a good opportunity to bust some myths about rabbits and promote house buns, adoption, good diet etc

[MimzMum]

Aw! How adorable! That’s just like the big loppy and the other bunny I saw in Petco a couple of months ago, the lop was riding in his cuddly cup in the kids’ seat and the other was in the basket part. They were so calm it was incredible!

Jerz, how do you know Leroy isn’t going, “I WANT!” Bunnies pronounce it silently. ^_^
I wish I could take my bunnies with me everywhere. I hate leaving them at home to even go to the corner store for the mail.

[jerseygirl]

True MM! And it’s just as hard to ignore!
I knew you’d like Barbies pic.

[Barbie]

Hehe, Leroy did well – he also enjoyed the car ride.  Since he did so well, I bought him a new bed and some toys for being such a good sport. MM, I know what you mean, I never want to leave him – I’ve thought about taking him into other stores as I’m running errands, like those little “purse dogs” but I don’t want to get banned for forever from stores like Bed Bath and Beyond – where would I get more NIC cubes?! Lol.

Jersey, we did get a lot of attention.  But someone please enlighten me… when did people become so rude?!?!?! I had 4 groups of people (two with VERY little kids) walk right up and just start touching him, without asking. The parents just picked their kids up and grabbed their kids’ arms and stuck them out so the kids could pet Leroy. I was taught when I was very little to never NEVER NEVER touch anyone’s animals without asking – so I never do. You just never know how the animal might react to a stranger. Granted, a bunny is a little more innocuous than say a rottweiler, but that still doesn’t give anyone the right to just start touching my bunny before asking me. Anyway, I was so irritated with the people doing that, that I didn’t even think to promote house bunnies and adopting and a proper diet and the like. I definitely will though, in the future. I’ll also speak up about needing to ask before touching people’s pets.

[bunnycutie]

awww leroy is giving the camera his cute face! hehe! i never realized how pretty he was! what a beautiful bun. he deserves a gold medal for beauty.  wow. i mean, seriously you are blessed with one beautiful bun. and… a shopaholic bun

(((((hugs to royboy)))))

[Barbie]

thanks bunnycutie! i don’t know what to call that marking on his face, but i love it. i think he knows he’s handsome – he definitely acts like a very self-assured, confident bun

[bunnycutie]

i love his face! its like a big zigzag! haha.  im sure he knows how handsome he is…LOL. my mom saw the pic and LOVED it. leroy’s all she’s been talking about since this morning.  i think she’s in love with leroy 

where did you buy him?

[Barbie]

Awww! That’s awesome!  I guess Leroy is just a regular little heartbreaker

I got him from my local humane society.  Here are a couple more pictures…

I can haz…? Pleez?

 

 

OMIGOSH! I gotz a stwawbeee!!!

[Sage Cat]

Love the Photos!

Barbie – don’t get me started on how rude people are! My brother almost smacked a friend of his when the friends kid hit my brothers cat. My brother gave a stern “NO!” to the kid, and his friend said “Oh, we don’t say no to her.”
In my family we were raised to be very polite.

All I have to do is run a few errands & I miss my pets!

[bunnytowne]

Ohhh few years well many years back some lady my ex knew came over with her brat and a boy friend.   The brat kept choking my cats and the idiot called mom ignored it.  I sure didn’t I tell you what.  The thing called mom ended up taking brat outside and I locked them out.  lol.

we visited with her boyfriend while she and brat werew locked out ahaaa. 

Yeah when people ask to pet Cotton I tell them no cuz he doesn’t like other people touching him.  At home he will run if they try to pet him.  Or turn his back and if they dont’ under stand bunny butt he runs off.

HE bit one guy once he smelled like cigarettes lol.  Apparantly Cotton wasn’t pleased about that. 

I love your rex.   Looks like he is having a blasts.  So he bought himself some strawberries oh yummy

[bunnycutie]

what a heart throb, ohhh leroy! hes so cute w/ his berry. thats nice that you got him from a rescue type situation. i love it when people go to humane societies.

[katie, max & penny]

he is soooo cute! i’ve been thinking about bringing max to my store with me- everyone at work hears so much about him and i think they should meet him
penny is waaaay too skiddish. she would have a heart attack.

and yes, barbie, you were raised CORRECTLY. i see it ALLLLL the time at work. and sometimes kids get snapped at. it’s ridiculous. people are lame.

BUT you have inspired me to get max trained on a leash how did you do it??

[Elrohwen]

That’s adorable. Otto would so not enjoy riding around in a cart like that 😛 You’re lucky your bun is so calm and easy going!

[MimzMum]

Ooo…bagging on brats day! YAY! lolz…Let me reiterate my worst nightmare story.

Waiting in line at Petco about a year ago, there’s a ‘mom’ (and I use the term loosely) and her young (maybe somewhere between 6-8 years?) boy in front of my daughter and me in line. The kid is ‘holding’ (another loose term) the cat in his carrier, apparently kitty had just had a grooming. The kid is picking the carrier up and knocking it around, sideways, upside down, shaking it all over the place and banging it on the floor and then laughing and poking at the poor, beautiful Siamese cat trapped inside. You can see him in there just terrified, but somehow it’s obvious he gets this all the time. And the ‘mom’ is just blatantly ignoring her kid! I mean she actually LOOKS at him doing this to the poor cat and TURNS AWAY and IGNORES HIM!!! LOOKS OUT THE STORE WINDOW OR ANYWHERE ELSE TO AVOID WATCHING HER KID!!!! (Except at other people of course.) 0_o I was absolutely SEETHING and wanted to give her a piece of my mind, (she looked like the type that was more into herself than anything else), I was staring daggers at both her and the brat, but you know, I am just one of those chickens when it comes to talking to strangers face to face. (Perhaps my parents taught me to be TOO polite.) Although all I wanted to do was grab the kitty and my stuff I was buying and run for our lives. I felt so damn sorry for that poor cat. God only knows if it’s even still alive at this point. (Death would be more humane.)
I just don’t know what goes on in people’s minds. I wanted to throttle that beotch. (And I don’t use that word often, but for her, it was appropriate.) My daughter and I were absolutely sick for that poor kitty. I was much too angry to speak coherently. I would’ve come off as a psycho. But I should’ve said something at least to the kid like, “Oh, may I see your kitty? What’s his name?” And maybe tried to hold the carrier in a way that he would learn to hold it right. Somehow I think that brat was beyond help though. These are the people who will grow up to take care of me in my old folk’s home someday…yikes on toast! ~_~

Yeah, I don’t think I would want someone just letting their kid come up and poke at my bunny. I’d probably have to poke them right back…in the nose. >_< And I really need to learn to speak up, and hang the consequences.

[kralspace]

I get a kick when my 2 grandkids come over, 3 & 4 years old. They run in the door ignoring me saying “pets, want to pets” and I tell them they can pet anything they can catch. Needless to say only one bunny, Pringles, will come to them, all the rest hide, including the 3 cats who just kinda melt into the woodwork. But Pringles likes to hop in their laps and follow them around.

[Barbie]

Oh man… seems like everyone has a story about bratty little kids!

Kralspace, that story made me laugh! =) It’s definitely different when the animals can get away if they don’t want to be bothered, but like that poor cat MM saw that was being swung around in his carrier, that’s just wrong. When I have kids, they are SO learning how to properly treat animals. Humans too for that manner!

Thanks guys, yeah, I lucked out with having a calm bun. Believe me, he has his moments though, lol. He can be quite a hyper little stinker sometimes. I have my kitchen blocked off with NIC panels because I don’t want him to get behind the fridge… last night he found out how to pull the whole “fence” back! I walked over there; he was just sniffing around and looking, but when he saw me, I didn’t even have to say anything, he did a 180 and skittered out of there so fast he was slipping on the tiles. Then I got a bunny butt. After we made up, he ran over to the tv area, that I’ve also blocked off with NIC cubes, and as if to prove a point, he started pulling that fence back too! So no more alone play time until I get that all reinforced!

The picture of Leroy wearing his harness was actually the first time I put it on him. I wasn’t sure how he’d handle it but he didn’t seem to mind. If you want to leash train your rabbit, I’d suggest slowly getting him used to the harness. Just put it on for a bit and give him some treats and praise, and let him run around for a bit, and then take it off. And work up until he’s comfortable in it. And remember, that even with a leash on, the bunny is still the master, so you just follow along on the other end of the leash. Bunnies don’t walk on leashes like dogs do =P The only reason I bought it was because I don’t want to lose him if I’m carrying him to the car and he squirms away from me. The harness I bought has straps that you have to velcro under the chin and then around the tummy – I haven’t been able to find a different kind that is safe for bunnies.  Anyway, both places that are sensitive to bunnies, so I’d keep that in mind when you’re trying to get him used to the harness.

 

http://hubpages.com/hub/How-To-Trai…On-A-Leash

http://en.allexperts.com/q/Rabbits-703/leash-training.htm

[MimzMum]

Pish! I’d rather be able to walk my bunnies on leashes than my dogs, whom I just came back from a particularly aggravating walk with.
(younger dog just snapped up and swallowed some cat’s ‘leavings’…half a dead bird that was all rotted and rained on…yuck! he’s not the sharpest tool…)

We’ve been trying to train my Griffy cat to walk in harness, since he wants to be out so badly and I am too scared he will get away and get hurt in our lousy neighborhood full of ‘wild’ animals. (A neighbor who kept her rabbits outside recently lost some to marauding dogs, which is why mine are ALWAYS indoors, much as I know Mimzy loves being outside.) Griff doesn’t like it much though. Big surprise there. It’s funny he’ll go flying through the house trying to ‘outrun’ whatever that is on his back. And I mean HUGE leaps through the air. Hilarious!

As wonderful as it would be, I couldn’t bear thinking that taking my bunnies outdoors on lead would result in them getting loose, I think in an xpen is okay, but I would be hovering over it the whole time.

[Furface]

Posted By MimzMum on 08/16/2009 04:44 PM
Pish! I’d rather be able to walk my bunnies on leashes than my dogs, whom I just came back from a particularly aggravating walk with.
(younger dog just snapped up and swallowed some cat’s ‘leavings’…half a dead bird that was all rotted and rained on…yuck! he’s not the sharpest tool…)

We’ve been trying to train my Griffy cat to walk in harness, since he wants to be out so badly and I am too scared he will get away and get hurt in our lousy neighborhood full of ‘wild’ animals. (A neighbor who kept her rabbits outside recently lost some to marauding dogs, which is why mine are ALWAYS indoors, much as I know Mimzy loves being outside.) Griff doesn’t like it much though. Big surprise there. It’s funny he’ll go flying through the house trying to ‘outrun’ whatever that is on his back. And I mean HUGE leaps through the air. Hilarious!

As wonderful as it would be, I couldn’t bear thinking that taking my bunnies outdoors on lead would result in them getting loose, I think in an xpen is okay, but I would be hovering over it the whole time.

Well:

Myth # 1 – the harness will hold the bunny – not – if it gets startled it will slip out that neck hole faster than you can blink.

Myth # 2 – it’s hard to leash train a bunny – not if it trusts you – but then again I have 4 that are very social lap bunnies

Myth # 3 – you rabbit will run away outside – not if it trusts you – even when startled, unless it’s being chased by something. My Dad, a exe bunny hunter *ducks & hides*, told me a long time ago that a rabbit will always run in a circle so, you don’t chase the beagle, you wait. As much as I hate hunting, he was right. When Bugsy got out of her pen, up north in the bush country, & she had a paniced woman (me) chasing her, she made 4 laps agound the camp site & ran into the trailer. Mind you she didn’t have a city street to worry about cars on. Rabbits are home bodies so to speak, yes they explore, but even in the house it’s a slow, tentative, run back to their cage exporation until they really know their house. They aren’t very likely to run far outside. You are likely to have trouble with them under a something to hide. Bugsy spent an hour under the trailer doing the same thing she does under the king size bed at home – looking at me laughing to herself, “Ha, Ha, You can’t reach me, Na, Na, Na, Na.

It’s good advice to let them get accustomed to a harness in the house 1st & if you’ve not got a very trusting relationship with your rabbit, they may think you are trying to hurt them & panic. I’m certainly not advocating that everyone run outside with their bunnies but it is not impossible. A security blanket for you would be to take a fishing net with you. Youl feel more confident about emergency captures after any escape atempts. I did catch Busgy like that once when she was heading for a dog that I didn’t know. Oh & yes she forgave me but, that only worked once, after that she knew how long the handle was. LOL

I should also say that I rarely take mine out anymore because I’m afraid of fleas in this area. They go out to be furminated & get their nails trimmed in the nice weather. Each is always alone for any free roaming time too. I have a NIC set up out there to have Bugsy & Buddy (bonded) out together.

[Furface]

Forgot to add: Watch carefully in pens with no bottoms, bunnies can dig under in milliseconds.

[Author]

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