seperis house of rabbits

So I have yet to rewrite the introduction post on how I acquired so many rabbits. In lieu, Bunny Files on tumblr.



Kowalski, the only brown one born, started having unexpected convulsions on July 4th. We found a pet clinic that could see him that night, the vet examined him, and--long story short--they put him to sleep that night.



Now, about the Seperis Warren!



Housing

I've gone through many many so many iterations of Bunny Housing, but there's actually a reason for that other than my search for new things.

Bunnies can eat through anything. Even zip ties. Even dozens of zip ties. Even all the zip ties. That is how I ended up with baby bunnies in the first place. They can also jump under duress three feet at a run and two feet just because they're assholes. (One of my tiny psychopaths can do three and a half feet, catch himself halfway over the top of the play area, and shimmy over.) Rabbits also like access to small, comforting, dark spaces to hide and cuddle (each other, not me.

So ideally, all housing has to start with primary "thing with walls and roof" (because jumping) and "within thing space for hiding" and "larger area to play". I have learned this by trying 'Open but confined space' and 'closed confined space'

Below is the current iteration. You'll notice signs of chewing. Rabbits chew on anything.



Three rabbits are visible; one is in the top floor under restriction because Gareth is a psychopathic asshole, and two escaped and are hiding in Child's room. There is going ot be so much poop vaccuming, God.

The yard is, in some ways, the hardest part to get right. It's very much a space issue as in, apartments don't have much, and free range rabbiting simply doesn't work well in an apartment even with litter boxes everywhere and rabbit-proofing with so little space is nearly impossible.

Food

The days of giant salads at every meal have been suspended, as my precious bunny darlings do not understand nutrition and flat refused to eat half their required nutrients according to my meticulously documented rabbit meal spreadsheet and stressed the fuck out of me (AKA they would literally skip entire vast quantities of their meals to eat all their favorites which were all redundant for proper rabbit health). They'd also eat less hay, which was extremely concerning since rabbits need to eat hay pretty much all the time.

Switching to rabbit food + salads for extras has worked out much better if not nearly as much fun as the biweekly salad-creation and portioning (aerialiste was visiting one weekend and helped me do it by dint of me dropping the containers in front of her and saying 'help').

Believe it or not, this is not actually less expensive and may be slightly more, but now that all are fully grown, I am tentatively considering switching to half and half (one week food, one week salad, repeat). The biggest problem with rabbit food as opposed to salads is that yes, they love rabbit food but they don't have to work for it (aka chewing down broccoli or carrots or munching through dandelion and lettuces and kales) and so it's not as interesting. Healthy rabbits also need entertainment (or they will entertain themselves with really questionable results) and salad meals last longer and provide stimulation. Also, rabbit food can also easily lead to rabbit weight issues if I'm not very careful when feeding them.

Hay became my second great problem.

Reasons:
1.) My rabbits do not like just any hay. They like expensive, organic, small-batch hay and go through roughly twenty pounds of it a month, but at least the nice people send me cool bunny postcards for every ridiculous twenty pound box I buy (a month).

Note: If you're wondering why on earth I don't put a stop to it--they won't eat the cheaper hay. Literally. They hunger striked me during an emergency end of the month hay shortage where I had to use a bag from the pet store. Then they spread it on the floor of their enclosure and pooped all over it. This actually happened.

So yes, I have a hay budget.

2.) I am, as it turns out, somewhat allergic to Timothy Hay. Orchard Hay and Oat Hay--both of which my rabbits' provider of choice carry--are slightly more expensive alternatives so I variate to those but unfortunately in subscribe and save I hit "Timothy" this month so everything sucks.

Personalities

The Seperis Warren include the following:

Original gift bunnies:
Augustus (male) - golden, zen
Charlemagne (female) - black (sometimes with grey mane), kind of high-strung

They are the parents of the below:
Gareth (male) - black, psychopath
Zenobia (female) - black, sociopath, smarter than me
Berenice (female) - black, tricky, smarter than everyone
Arsinoë (female) - black, a little shy, probably smarter than me

First note: rabbit warrens are matriarchal. There's a reason those three are named after powerful queens and one an emperor. In general, unless mating is involved, the women want nothing to do with the males and beat the shit out of them. As mating is no longer involved, it becomes a hierarchy thing and the males are generally at the bottom. Currently--I think--the hierarchy is Charlemagne-Zenobia (they trade), Berenice, Arsinoe, Augustus, and Gareth.

Primary relationships:
Charlemagne, Zenobia, and Berenice get along as a group; Arsinoë gets along best with Augustus.

Secondary relationships:
Arsinoë is not popular with the Three; they don't really like her but will put up with her due to being female; Augustus is fine with Charlemagne, but Berenice and Zenobia don't trust him and try to fight him unless Charlemagne intervenes. Most hierarchical fights are fairly bloodless (I watch those); there's some stomping, chasing, a quick jump at someone's hindquarters, and they give their submission and everyone goes back to eating hay or throwing themselves dramatically onto rag rugs to pout (not kidding). Just with Augustus, it happens more often because they're assholes. In general--after a lot of reading on this--short of really trying to hurt each other, I leave them alone during weird-ass dominance battles

Gareth
Gareth is another story.

Gareth gets along with no one, fights with everyone, and hates Augustus, and the feeling is mutual. As in, I have done the wild kingdom physically separating my rabbits and checking them for injuries more than once because what the fuck? but yeah, left to their own devices they'd kill each other. But for reasons (why?) Gareth does like me, and will on occasion crawl into my lap to see what my phone is doing or check my feet to see what they are. It's--IDEK. So he's pretty much always quarantined from the others since I have yet to work out what his problem is with pretty much everyone.

As rabbits do not do well without companionship, I try to spend personal time with him more than the others--as he is actually into that--but honestly, I feel like he may be just a solitary rabbit.

Rabbit Human Relations

If you come from a background of cats and dogs and animals not born sociopaths and also predators, not prey animals, it's like opposite day plus rampant hostility. But that is a whole other entry.



Living the rabbit life.

ETA: Augustus and Arsinoë have been returned to the Warren. Currently everything is in a sort-of armistice.

Comments

[timespirt]

My parrots are like that. I tried to switch them over to pellets. First I mixed the pellets into the food for a while. I decreased the food amount and increased the pellets until it was just pellets. Food strike for 2 days and I broke. Gave up feeding them pellets. Watching them not eat hurt me more than them!

[seperis]

God, this. I was like OH GOD YOU ARE GOING TO DIE and not gonna lie, these aren't thin rabbits. So...were pet-whipped.

[timespirt]

Yes, that would be us...LOL

How can one look at those doe eyes and not just give in. I only lasted 2 days...so whipped.

[seperis]

I rearranged my budget to make sure that never happeend again. I was so freaked out.

[that_mireille]

We have one rabbit (our male) who will ONLY eat tough, crappy hay. If we bought him those super-cheap bags of hay at Walmart? (Not even Kaytee, but the nameless ones?) He'd be in heaven. He is so fussy about this that he literally almost killed himself by refusing to eat perfectly decent second-cut timothy that the other rabbits eat; he went from "healthy little asshole" to "in GI stasis and near to death" overnight.

(It's extra-fun because one of the guinea pigs wants her hay soft and fresh, gets picky if it isn't, and is elderly with health issues so we're terrified if she eats even slightly less one day than the day before, so it's an endless juggling act. Fortunately the other four (two rabbits, two guinea pigs) aren't picky and will eat whatever hay we give them, as much as they can shove into their mouths.)

[seperis]

Oh God, I am so sorry. Yes, that's a rabbit, its' like "OH GOD WHAT FINE".

(It's extra-fun because one of the guinea pigs wants her hay soft and fresh, gets picky if it isn't, and is elderly with health issues so we're terrified if she eats even slightly less one day than the day before, so it's an endless juggling act. Fortunately the other four (two rabbits, two guinea pigs) aren't picky and will eat whatever hay we give them, as much as they can shove into their mouths.)

I have to admit, Small Pet Select is expensive but it's super consistent in quality and freshness, which I think may have formed their tastes (I had a coupon, I was a fool). And admittedly, they pack it so tight--and I mean tight--it feels like it lasts longer than bags.

Guinea pig is a third cut timothy eater? I keep meaning to test it on the rabbits but it's expensive but supposed to be so nice.

[that_mireille]

Third cut is nice, but really soft, so it's not as great for their teeth as second cut. (OTOH, the guinea pig is not in a position where we're considering the long term. She's very old and basically in the "hospice care" stage. She can have what she wants.)

Small Pet Select is usually really good. We tend to buy the 50-pound boxes of it. We just always have to hope there are enough crappy bits to appease His Highness, Lord Picky Eater, and his dislike for fresh, tasty hay. He's such a little ass. (I love him, but, you know. RABBITS.)

[seperis]

I can't lie, the expense is worth it with Small Pet Select; it's always fresh and never musty and because of that I can afford to buy and store extra if I get a coupon unexpectedly. And they're pretty much the only ones who consistently have oat hay in large quantities (and comparatively, the price is reasonable). If Rabbit Hole will ever have a sale, I'd like to try them at least once, but eh.

...though I have considered buying a quarter bale of hay--I live near farm country and know where to go--but storage in an apartment is impossible and oh God the sneezing. But man it would be fresh. Or the gulf grasses, just for variety, but again, not practical.

[bratfarrar]

...see, this is why my current pet roster consists of a betta (bought to eat mosquito larvae), and a tankful of water snails. Just have to buy new water plants every 3 months or so.

[seperis]

You are wiser than I. Water snails?????

[bratfarrar]

I had a rabbit snail in with a water plant, but it did some kind of algae bloom and the poor thing ... suffocated? Not sure exactly how that works. Expired, at any rate. But I have a large mystery snail in with the betta, and an ever growing assortment of tiny baby snails. They're a lot of fun to watch while brushing my teeth.

I do not have this many, though:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=l774T38hN_g

[olanthanide]

That was a hilarious and wild read (familial soap opera: rabbit version). I'm curious: how do you handle the wire situation? Back when I'm around rabbits (had one, then roommate had one, after that I did volunteering with the small animals at the local shelter) the constant worry was that they'll accidentally electrocute themselves. They'll chew threw the protective covers on the cords, the electricity plug are at just the right height and they'll chew threw the boxes that block those, etc.

(Also roommate's tiny rabbit used to bully the cat we were fostering at the time, which was hilarious but also: yes to the hostility.)

[seperis]

I'm curious: how do you handle the wire situation?

That's the main reason my experiemnts in free-range aren't working; there's no way to bunny proof for every wire, much less every book, paper, piece of clothing, furniture legs, rugs....

Currently, I do have covers on most permanent running wires but yeah, rabbits given enough effort can chew through that. I give them a lot of chewing toy and their litter boxes are disposable chewable (because they chewed on them anyway so I got rid of plastic) but--they really like to chew.

(Also roommate's tiny rabbit used to bully the cat we were fostering at the time, which was hilarious but also: yes to the hostility.)

Rabbits are super-bitter they aren't predators; they would kill you just to watch you die to prove they aren't prey.

[archaeologist_d]

I have no pets. I travel too much and even parakeets needed to be taken care of after a few days.

[seperis]

Until the rabbits, I hadn't had my own pet since the last warren.

efharistó

[jesse_the_k]

Epic! Educational!

Re: efharistó

[seperis]

Thank you!

[domarzione]

I read through everything all at once (Waffles! I remember Waffles!) and it brought me great joy and bunny Dynasty will be my favorite soap if you continue it.

[seperis]

It's all very weird-soapy dominance games and half the time it's almost rote like "well, time to make you submit" *SIGH* *POUND FOOT HALF HEARTEDLY* *SIGH* *CHASE*. Then they'll all throw themselves--I mean throw themselves--to the ground full length and stare into space like everything is soooo tedious.

But that's only about twenty percent of the time. The other eighty is split between eating, louning, trying to get out, working out key zip ties to eat, cuddling each other, and lying very still staring into space that may or may not be rabbit sleep you just don't know.

[zippitgood]

That was a journey.

Yay, rabbit armistice.

[seperis]

They're eating the hay and doing the rabbit thing right now. It's cute.

[krait]

Aww, they are cute!

The rabbit life sounds like there are definite similarities to the 2-cats-and-snake life (which I am living right now), just multiplied by a factor of three due to population density. :)

A few years ago we had 20 rabbits from a hoarding case at the rescue where I work, and I fell in love with one of them. I've always had a soft spot for rabbits (I blame reading Watership Down at a critical age) and did my best to socialise them while there; my fave became my particular project, and I wanted so badly to adopt him. He was huge and black and had a gnawed-up ear and I would have named him Blackavar in a heartbeat. :D Alas, I had done enough research to know there was no way I could keep a rabbit at that time - living with my parents, on a tiny budget - but I still have his picture on my phone and think about him often.

I hope you do future Rabbit Life updates! I love seeing their fancy house and hearing about their various adventures and relationships. :D

[seperis]

If it reassures you any, ever more than dogs and cats, there's literally no way to know a rabbit's temperment. It takes them a while to relax in a new environment and they can be SUPER ACTIVE SPEED BUNNY or THING THAT LIES THERE AND STARES AT NOTHING. And especially if you don't get pairs, they can be like very hostile cats; they want affection but wont tell you how and reject all your wrong ways of showing it but not directing you to the right kind.

I bet he was cute, though. I can see why you'd want him.

[krait]

I wish I had managed to get a better photo of him, but my phone at the time was tiny and cheap, and he wasn't interested in posing. :D Still, if I ever manage to get it off my phone, I'll post it for you! He was very handsome and cute, and feeding him stalks of parsley and cilantro by hand made both our days. :D

[sylvaine]

Ahahaha, oh man, my girlfriend and her husband used to have rabbits and they had very definitely taken over the entire apartment :D

(forgot to lock in the first time)

[anotherslashfan]

True, but at least we only had two bunnies ;)

Re: (forgot to lock in the first time)

[sylvaine]

True! Can you imagine the kind of chaos they'd have caused if there'd been more of them? Goodness ^^;;;