Today I had the sad duty of saving two bunnies from a bad situation. Our rescue works with my local humane society, Suncoast. Well, yesterday I got an email from Suncoast asking for help. They had received a call from a lady who wanted to get rid of two bunnies. She couldn't afford to feed them, so she said that she would let them starve to death or let them go if somebody didn't pick them up. She said she couldn't afford to bring them over to the humane society (so WHY did she take them in the first place??) Suncoast has a service to pick animals up, but they charge a fee. It's understandable. Gas certainly isn't free. So...Suncoast asked if we could help.
Unfortunately, our rescue has more bunnies than we know what to do with at the moment, so we have absolutely no space for anybun else. Suncoast would take them, but we needed to get them there somehow. I offered to go pick up the buns and transport them over there. I was so worried about those bunnies! I made arrangements with the lady to pick them up...and I was hoping she wouldn't do anything rash before I got there!
They all but shoved those poor bunnies at me. I asked them if the bunnies had names. No, they didn't. I asked if they were male or female. One of each...in the same cage. She said, "They've been humping each other, but I don't think he can reach her." Great. The female is most likely pregnant, and I told the lady so. She didn't care. There was one nasty piece of carrot in the cage. They must have ONLY been eating carrots. Their poops were ORANGE. There was a bit of urine-soaked pine shavings in the cage. It smelled to high heaven.
Before I took them to Suncoast, I cleaned out the nasty cage and gave them some hay. They LOVED the hay. I doubt they had ever had any! Fortunately, they seemed pretty healthy, at least outwardly. They were both very friendly. Their nails were extremely long. I should have brought my nail clippers, but the humane society will clip them.
They got to chill out with me for a little bit. They enjoyed getting petted. They are just darling. The female is a white mini-rex (possible mix) with gorgeous blue eyes, and the male is a little Dutch mix. It boggles my mind that this lady was threatening to starve them to death or let them go, which is a death sentence anyway.
The humane society is taking care of them for now, but we're hoping that we can find placement in our foster program soon for some of the Suncoast buns. If you live in southwest Florida and are interested in fostering or adopting a bunny, please visit
www.pigsnbuns.org for more information. We need your help!!
