Our pet rabbit died!

kelle

Hi, everybody
There's tears in our house this morning because we went out to the garage to feed our pet rabbit, sadly he died during the night. The kids are devastated.

We only got him last September, when he was 5 weeks old. He didn't like pellets in rabbit food, always left those behind- so I found a type without pellets he liked and that was all I fed him since he was 2 weeks living with us.

However, on Friday there was none of his usual food in the pet shop so I got a different one instead. I can't stop wondering if that might be the cause!
Could anybody tell me if it could happen that a pet's system gets so used to one type of food, it's a shock when a different type is introduced and could trigger a reaction?

godtabh

Haven done a little research on rabbits I heard that you are meant to leave them with their mothers until they are 8 weeks old that their immune system isnt fully developed at that stage and can cause problems if taken away from their mother before then

kelle

I guess it's probably the different food then - God, I feel so guilty now!

morganafay

I don't think that would have killed him, unless it gave him bad diarrhoea. If it did, then that could kill him from dehydration unfortunately. If he had no diarrhoea then I wouldn't think it was from the food. I feed my rabbits lots of different foods and it has never affected them. It does to some rabbits though.

Did he have water aswell?

Rabbits can hide illness very well, so you don't even notice there's something wrong and then they die. There's often nothing you can do. He could well have been sick since before friday but showing no symptoms.

Don't beat yourself up over it, it's not your fault, even if it was from the food.


Is there a car in the garage, and if so was it used last night? or are there any chemicals in there that would have fumes coming off them? Or was it possibly very hot in there (though you said it was at night)? Those are some other things that could harm him.


Anyway, sorry you lost your rabbit, and he was only young. But I'm sure it wasn't your fault.

morganafay

And yeah, if they're taken away from their mother earlier then it can give them digestive problems apparently. So maybe he wasn't able to handle the change of food. You would have noticed diarrhoea though I think.

Sigma Force

Sorry to hear about your bun.
As said 5 wks is a bit too young to be taken away and 8 weeks is more ideal.
I doubt it was the food although introductions to new foods should be done slowly it tends to give them an upset tum but not to the point where they would die from it they would most likely show signs of illness or have the runs first, did he have access to hay at all times?

Rabbits do hide their illness well though but if you are in tune with the rabbits day to day mood something odd can usually be detected but sometimes rabbits can die for various reasons and it can be down to bad breeding or genetic etc.

Don't be so hard on yourself it was most likely something that was out of your hands.

Was he fully vaccinated?

Wisco

So sorry to hear about the poor bunny
Did you feed him other stuff besides rabbit mix? The mixed diets usually aren't the best as rabbits need a LOT of roughage (ie hay). They can also have serious dental probs that lead to illness, but they're so good at hiding health problems that it's often too late by the time their sickness is discovered.
Don't beat yourself up- rabbits are pretty delicate and even relatively minor illness can end up to be deadly, unfortunately.

.SONIC.

really sorry to hear about the rabbit!!

i doubt it would be the food as i change my rabbits food quite often and they seem to ignore it for a day but soon they start to eat it, again sorry to hhear the bad news!:(

Zapperzy

For peace of mind you could bring him to a vet and have a postmortem carried out on him. A change in food should not kill a rabbit, unless as someone suggested it caused diarrhoea which resulted in him becoming dehydrated, but even this would not cause death overnight.
Was he vaccinated? Its been a while since Iv had a rabbit but from what I remember they're supposed to be vaccinated again myxomatosis.

Could something have gotten into the garage? My old dutch was killed by a mink a few years ago. I was away abroad at the time and my parents were looking after him. According to them anyways, a mink got into the cage one night and bit him. Now they could've toned it down a bit for me as I was very upset at the time, and they had already buried him, but they said all he had was one bite mark and must've died of shock. Apparently minks can go on killing sprees and not always eat what they kill.

morganafay

Zapperzy wrote: »

For peace of mind you could bring him to a vet and have a postmortem carried out on him. A change in food should not kill a rabbit, unless as someone suggested it caused diarrhoea which resulted in him becoming dehydrated, but even this would not cause death overnight.
Was he vaccinated? Its been a while since Iv had a rabbit but from what I remember they're supposed to be vaccinated again myxomatosis.

Could something have gotten into the garage? My old dutch was killed by a mink a few years ago. I was away abroad at the time and my parents were looking after him. According to them anyways, a mink got into the cage one night and bit him. Now they could've toned it down a bit for me as I was very upset at the time, and they had already buried him, but they said all he had was one bite mark and must've died of shock. Apparently minks can go on killing sprees and not always eat what they kill.

Myxomatosis is a possibility, if he has an outside run or something, where he could possibly have come into contact with wild rabbits. A lot of people don't vaccinate rabbits or don't know they can be vaccinated, so don't feel guilty if he wasn't vaccinated. I think you'd see some symptoms with myxo but not certain . . .

Good point about other animals, even a rat could have killed him I'd say. It's possible he could have had a bite mark that you couldn't see under the fur.

But I'd say it was probably just some illness or whatever that you couldn't have known about.

I had a baby rabbit died a while back there, he had no symptoms until one morning he seemed a bit quiet and was off his food, and 20 minutes later (when I was actually dialling an emergency vet number) he had a seizure and died. I have no idea what was wrong. They just go downhill so fast. Even if you take them to the vet, there's often nothing the vet can do.

allandanyways

So sorry to hear about your bunny, it really is horrible when that happens. We had a Dutch bunny (the black and white ones) and she got myxo and her eyes swelled up and she became very lethargic so we knew it was that and that the prognosis wasn't good but we didn't tell my little sister for a few days and at that stage the bunny was having trouble breathing so we brought her to the vets and that was it.

The kids might want another bunny in time, or they might end up too upset to want a pet again (and refuse to even acknowledge that you once had a bunny, as my sister did). It's very upsetting for them, I really feel for you especially with it being so sudden. I think they're very fragile pets, the slightest thing seems to upset them and make them sick.

For yourself, maybe a postmortem would be a good idea, but don't tell the kids, especially if they're young. You could just tell them that the bunny got the flu but flu is very harmful to rabbits and she just couldn't handle it but that she wasn't in pain at all.

kelle

I'm so greatful for your replies, thank you all. It's lovely to know there's a forum like this!

Morganafay, we didn't keep our car in the garage and always checked he had water. He didn't have diarrhoea, but he didn't eat much of the new food. Wisco, my mother-in-law always brought heads of her homegrown lettuce which he loved, and he loved chewing on the grass and daisies when we brought him outside - so he had a varied diet!

However, we didn't get him vaccinated - maybe that's an explanation!

We won't bother with a post-mortem (even though my brother's a vet and lives next door! You're all probably going to flame me for not getting him vaccinated, but I was never told he needed to be).

It's sad to read some of your stories here. It goes to show how attached you become to your pets! My 9 yo son sobbed until midnight last night and I felt guilty sending him off to school today, only I had to go to work - but the school was sympathetic!

morganafay

I really doubt it was because he wasn't vaccinated, I'd say it was something else, because there were no symptoms of myxo. They can get get infections and stuff that you can't vaccinate against, so it wasn't your fault.

Kalahari

Hi Kelle, very sorry to hear about your loss, I hope the kids feel ok soon. Were there fewer pellets than usual in his litter/around the cage? A big killer of rabbits is gastric stasis which doesn't really have many symptoms apart from e.g. loss of appetite, fewer/smaller pellets and a larger abdomen. It is a slowing of the rabbit gut, and can be fatal within a couple of days. The fact he didn't eat much of the new food might point to this.

It doesn't sound like myxo - myxo is horrific and you'd know there was something very wrong if he'd had it, but another possibility is VHD, which kills a couple of days after infection and sometimes without symptoms though 1 common symptom is loss of appetite. If you do get a new rabbit I'd recommend vaccines for both myxo and VHD. Vets and pet shops will often tell you there's no need to vaccinate for them if you aren't in the country but even indoor rabbits can catch these diseases and they aren't treatable so it's better safe than sorry. VHD vaccines usually last 1yr and myxo one lasts about 6 months to a year. Best time to vaccinate is around this time as myxo seems to peak (locally anyways) between july and november.

And if you do decide to get a new rabbit, just make sure to boil and disinfect everything the other rabbit touched (throw out any wooden/hard to clean stuff if possible) so that the new rabbit can't catch anything that your rabbit may have had.
In this case it doesn't sound like food was the culplrit but for the next one i'd really recommend a food like suparabbit excel as opposed to the rabbit mixes which are full of grain and colourful biscuits because they aren't very suitable for rabbits and the rabbit will pick out its favourite bits and leave the rest, so it doesn't get a balanced diet. Ironically those little brown alfalfa pellets are the most suitable bit of the mixed bags, so getting a complete food like suparabbit excel means they get what they need and can't ignore anything.

Sigma Force

kelle wrote: »

I'm so greatful for your replies, thank you all. It's lovely to know there's a forum like this!

Morganafay, we didn't keep our car in the garage and always checked he had water. He didn't have diarrhoea, but he didn't eat much of the new food. Wisco, my mother-in-law always brought heads of her homegrown lettuce which he loved, and he loved chewing on the grass and daisies when we brought him outside - so he had a varied diet!

However, we didn't get him vaccinated - maybe that's an explanation!

We won't bother with a post-mortem (even though my brother's a vet and lives next door! You're all probably going to flame me for not getting him vaccinated, but I was never told he needed to be).

It's sad to read some of your stories here. It goes to show how attached you become to your pets! My 9 yo son sobbed until midnight last night and I felt guilty sending him off to school today, only I had to go to work - but the school was sympathetic!

As said it could of been anything.
It's a pity though you were given the wrong information about vaccinating.
Who told you not to get the rabbit vaccinated? Not saying this was the cause at all that aside rabbits should be in general vaccinated wether they are indoors or outdoors.

morganafay

I've heard of vets saying there's no need to vaccinate indoor rabbits.

One vet told me that since it's passed through fleas on rabbits, that there's no way an indoor rabbit will catch it. Which makes sense . . .

Kalahari

morganafay wrote: »

I've heard of vets saying there's no need to vaccinate indoor rabbits.

One vet told me that since it's passed through fleas on rabbits, that there's no way an indoor rabbit will catch it. Which makes sense . . .

VHD is airborne so it can get anywhere, and myxo is also carried by mosquitoes, so if you leave a window open a mosquito carrying it can also bring it in. You also have to take into account that you and other pets can carry rabbit fleas back to your house if you've been on a walk in a field or even along a road with a grassy verge where rabbits might pass by. I lost an indoor rabbit to myxo 2 years ago, 7 months after he'd been vaccinated for it. It either came in with mosquitoes or the dogs picked up a rabbit flea in the nearby fields. It's not something you want to take a risk with as it is really awful and the only option is to euthanise.

kelle

Guineapigrescue wrote: »

It's a pity though you were given the wrong information about vaccinating.
Who told you not to get the rabbit vaccinated? Not saying this was the cause at all that aside rabbits should be in general vaccinated wether they are indoors or outdoors.

I wasn't actually given any advice about vaccinations. Pity I didn't seek advice from this page from the beginning, but I'll know in future!

robot5

Unfortunately, rabbits can go downhill rapidly. I remember a vet telling me when my rabbit died that sadly rabbits are not strong fighters when poorly. The mildest pain can have an impact and they give in and give up the will to live. They do not cope with pain at all. The digestive system in them is complex and they can be victims of the dreaded GI stasis. This is the dreaded killer disease feared by many rabbit owners. It is vital that a rabbit has access to HAY. The pellet food is a very good choice. Hay, hay, glorious hay is extremely necessary. some fresh fruits, green leafy vegetables as well as some other types of vegetables too, clean water.
A rabbit- savvy vet is essential. Track one down and you will be very glad you did. Not all vets are into rabbits and small animals in Ireland. Make sure you know one if you want to have a pet rabbit. Believe me it will be one of the best decisions you make for the sake of the health of your bunny.

Cherry Blossom

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