Bunny care: Ethel shows us new bunny illnesses

Ethel is about 6-1/2 now. She had a bout of stasis years ago and been beautiful since.
Until now.

Recently, she was not behaving as her usual chipper morning self and so we rushed to our rabbit-savvy vet(s). She wasn't eating and my first fear is stasis or hairball or something like that.

Well, another reason bunnies might stop eating is their teeth. Bunny teeth grow continually and this is why they need to keep busy and chewing safe things. Hopefully, not your phone charger cords.

Ethel's never had teeth problems before but she did this time. So a brief procedure is done under anesthesia to fix them into the right shape so that they don't hurt the bunny anymore. She started eating again almost immediately.

When our bunnies have to stay at the vet,
we visit them every day.
Ethel hates to be in a car or away from home.
Here, Ethel snuggles under Dr. Mrsbunnymom's
arm/elbow and calms down for a while.
Ethel will sit on her lap like this,
with her head tucked under and
getting her tushy scratched
while Dr. Mrsbunnymom is at the home computer
(Ethel stays for a half hour or so).

Here it is from the other side.
You can see that one hand scratches the tushy and
leaves the other hand free for the computer mouse.

Fortunately, that resolved itself reasonably quickly. She never had teeth problems before but now that she has, protocol is to have her checked at least every 6 months. Or, of course, if she is not behaving as her usual perky self.

So then Ethel decided to show us what a messed up bunny eye can look like.
*sigh*

Ethel's sore eye

Soooo... back to the vet.

Some fluid and wash was put in her eye and
examined under black light.
Fortunately, Ethel's cornea was not scratched.
(Only thought to get a picture when it was almost over,
so not the best shot here, but you get the idea.)

Now we are putting medicine in her eye twice a day. After I saw the doctor do it, I said that I wished I had filmed it so that I would know exactly what to do. She reenacted the application of the medicine for me, in this video (so no more medicine was actually re-applied here).

Wish I had videoed it the first time so you could see the actual medicine. The vet laid a line on the top of the white of Ethel's eye perfectly and made it look so much easier than it is. At least, compared to when I did it. Maybe it has something to do with girls learning to apply make-up or something. Then again, could be, I am just that uncoordinated.

If you are a RRRR (Regular Rabbit Ramblings Reader), you know that we take all bonded bunnies to the vet, even if only one needs care. This is to maintain the bond and so one doesn't come home smelling funny (like a "stranger", like the vet's office). So while Ethel is getting her first dose of eye medicine, Bunya starts sneezing.

Take a look at Bunya and he's got a runny nose. So they both needed to be there anyway and Bunya has his own (different) meds.

But they love each other and we love them, so we want everyone healthy. If you are somebunny's human, it's a cost of doing business. You might want to consider health insurance for your bunnies; we enrolled Bunya and Ethel a short while ago (and probably should have done it years sooner).

Thanks to Drs. Mike & Karolyn Akins and Dr. Julia Hill of All Creatures Animal Hospital for helping us take care of our bunnies. We are lucky to have a practice close by with 3 exotics vets and a very caring staff, who tolerate a crazy bunny person (but the doctor said I was the "good crazy", I swear).