Stella and Sylvia

Today, we're going to discuss Stella and Sylvia - two abandoned rabbits. We ended up taking them in after they weren't claimed and had been living at the veterinary practise for several weeks. We will discuss their stories independently, as the pair weren't actually found together!

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Stella:

Image is taken from Charter Veterinary Surgery's Facebook Page

Stella was handed into Charter Veterinary Surgery in Congleton. She was found wandering the streets of Congleton. We shared their post to help try and find her original owner. Unfortunately, she was unclaimed. We all suspected she was intentionally released.

Sylvia:

Images were taken from Wright and Morten's Facebook Page

The following day, Sylvia was handed into Wright and Morten small animal veterinary surgery. It was believed that Sylvia and Stella were initially a bonded pair who'd escaped/been released together. Sylvia was transferred to be with Stella at Charters. 

Bringing Them Home:

Due to unfortunate circumstances, plans to rehome Stella and Sylvia had fallen through. Although their original owners were never found, other individuals had offered them a home. We'd set up to be "Plan B" with Charters.

Stella and Sylvia had numerous areas of their lifestyle that we wanted to amend. First of all, they needed to settle into life in our home as indoor rabbits. We had to litter train the rabbits, basically, train them to behave as pet rabbits.

One thing that we immediately suspected was that the rabbits were unspayed and unvaccinated. Before we collected them, we arranged for Stella and Sylvia to have their RHD1 and myxomatosis vaccination. 

2 weeks later, the rabbits were booked in to have their abdomen checked for a surgery scar (suggesting they'd been spayed) and for their RHD2 vaccine. During the appointment, Stella and Sylvia had no scarring present, and the vet was able to palpate uterine horns.

Within a few days, we booked both rabbits in to be spayed. It's highly recommended to neuter your rabbits as it improves their general behaviour and promotes longevity.

Stella took slightly longer than usual to come around from her anaesthesia, but she did make a full recovery. Although, the pair didn't appreciate wearing suiticals!

Stella did have one run-in with dental issues at her post-surgery check-up. The vet discovered she had lingual spurring of her left mandibular/lower arcade. There was no damage to the tongue, and her eating habits at home had not changed. The vet was suspicious that Stella may have had abnormal eating habits whilst she was a stray which contributed to the development of molar issues.

We opted to have Stella's molars burred under anaesthesia, she handled the procedure well. There has been no reoccurrence of dental issues since.

Bonding a Quartet:

We decided to try and bond the does to our other permanent resident rabbits - Wallace and Quinnie (Quinnie has a malaligned jaw which causes uneven wearing of her molars which require frequent dental procedures).

Bonding a quartet wasn't something we'd ever done before, and we had to wait several weeks until Stella and Sylvia had made a full recovery from their procedures.

It took weeks of allowing the rabbits to be comfortable just seeing the rabbits through a meshed baby gate. Eventually, when we saw the rabbits flopped next to each other either side of the gate, we started allowing them to meet on neutral ground.

Eventually, we neutralised both territories and gave the rabbits access to the lower floor. Quinnie and Wallace were quite dominant at first, but no blood was drawn. 

It's lovely to have four happy bunnies!