$600 Bunny

I've been saving up for something serious. I wanted to write more about the Devils Lake project, but hey North Dakota just opened the gates and are letting it flow into the Sheyenne River, nice international relationships. So I was going to write about guns coming over the US border, but hey the Washington Times says that there are fewer getting into Canada this year. So I thought maybe the Liberal Scandal or the horrible jet crash is Cyprus. But no, these are to serious for me and I have to tell you about my $600 bunny.

It all started about a year ago in the spring of 2004 not long after Easter, I discouvered a rabbit eating my flowers. Not a wild rabbit but a young domestic rabbit that someone had tired of and let go in the park behind us.

At first a neighbour had asked for it, but their grandkids soon tried of it. Well my kids wanted it, "Dad Mom we will feed it", "Dad Mom we will clean its cage", "Dad Mom, Please let us keep it". Against our better judgement we let the kids keep it, now I wish we handn't.

We built a cage for the rabbit, I thought we had read up on rabbit care (little did I know), we learned how to feed it and care for it. All has been good for a year now until this week.

Wife and I went shopping on Saturday morning, we put the rabbit outside on the porch like we always do.
He seemed fine at the time. Later in the day when wife and I got home, she noticed that he didn't look good, in fact he looked like he was in pain. We grabbed him and took him to the vet clinic near us. After a look at him and a check up we were told that he was in serious condition and that he would need x-rays and would have to stay over and that it would be a $500 deposit. WTF, Wife and I discussed it, both of us had to think for a bit (this was a free rabbit remember) but we decided we were reponsible for him and that we would have to care for him. So we told the vet to go ahead.

Later that night we received a call from the vet, saying that we were very lucky that we had brought him in when we did. He had build up calcium in his bladder to the point where he could barely pee, and when he did it had burnt his genitals so bad he couldn't shit. He also had maggots (very young maggots) in his butt. He did not need surgery (thank God) and we could pick him up the next day.

We now have a very unhappy rabbit with a bucket on its head, we have to clean its butt twice a day, spread ointment on his butt, give it two kinds of medication and change his diet from a easy to find pellet to harder to find grasses and pellets. The final bill came to $612.00, for a rabbit. What we will do for our pets.