Monday, March 16, 2009

Rabbit Rescue


I am excited to have something to share. I warn you that it not all happy, but I am going to share anyways. This morning Sheba, our cat, was playing with something in our room. She enjoys playing with twist ties and so I assumed that was what it was and didn't get up to check. After some amount of time, I came out of my sleep enough to think, "oh no, she has been playing with something for too long and hard for it to be a twist tie." I immediately jumped up out of bed to indeed find Sheba playing with a small live animal. Remember I had been awoken from my sleep, so I didn't know what it was yet. I grabbed Sheba and threw her in the closet while Zach got dressed to take the animal outside. At first I thought it was a mouse, but then thought it too big, but I knew it wasn't a rat. I forget what Zach guessed, but he was wrong too. My next guess was a chipmunk. Well, I turned on the light and got close enough to realize it was a tiny little cottontail rabbit. Unfortunately, Sheba had injured the bunny and it was not in good shape. We took the bunny outside and then freed Sheba. I took to cleaning the blood from the carpet while Zach when back to sleep. I got back in bed for a short period before I hear Sheba come back in the cat door and into our room. Of course she had another little bunny in her mouth. I made her drop it and I picked it up in a towel. I started calling vets (and my mom). Unfortunately, I had to wait a little bit before the vets opened. I finally got in touch with a vet that recommended calling some wildlife rescue places. Walden Puddle had a great answering machine that gave me ideas of how to take care of the bunny until they opened and could get back to me. As I was doing this, Sheba came in with another bunny. (I know, I am not a fast learner.) I took both baby bunnies and put them in a shoe box together lined with towels and then placed the box on a heating blanket to keep them warm. I close the door to keep Sheba out of the room and went to find the den. I watched Sheba climb the fence into our backyard neighbors yard. I found the den, but I could not find any more babies. I saw what I believe to be the mom in the next yard over (which I could not get into). About this time Walden's Puddle called back and said that I would have to bring them in because cat saliva is poisonous to baby bunnies and that they needed antibiotics. Because of the situation, they are safer there than here, so they now have a new home for a couple of weeks before they will be released back into the wild:D




2 comments:

Anthony said...

I hope this isn't the same neighbor that you steal flowers from...

Mooj said...

No it is not. It seems that I am disturbing a lot of yards lately though.