Please help. Orange, CA

[dumbbunny]

I will take some tomorrow morning. We are bringing him in the evening for exercise and he sleeps in my sons room. I can't bear to have him in his outdoor hutch at night.

I wonder if I pick him up wrong. He really gets upset after a few seconds of being picked up and he starts kicking. I manage to calm him from kicking, but his little heart beats so fast.

I have found he likes to brushed very gently.

I still don't know if he's a boy, I tried to take a peak, but I'm afraid I'll hurt him. I thought I saw a cut, my husband said maybe its his (you know). I didn't want to hurt him so I decided maybe I will wait and get some help with sexing him, maybe from our vet.

 

[dumbbunny]

He's brindle colored. I will try to upload a picture I have from the Internet, its not of him; but it looks a lot like him.

Here's a link: http://www.njwrc.net/articles/varietypics/agouti.html

 

[Sabine]

bijoux wrote:

I just did some searching and I guess they are called pygmy rabbits.

I've seen pictures of those rabbits. I think they are the smallest breed and even smaller than a Netherland dwarf. I am not sure if anyone has ever tamed them and if they are even related to the domestic rabbit.

 

[bijoux]

Yeah, You have good points. I just assumed with all the bunnies I've seen down there that was where it probably came from. I think they pygmys are crossed with a cottontail but not sure. They look exactly like the pictures of the pygmys with the little eyelashes on the bottom. Really super cute but I guess if it had been a wild bunny, it would've reacted in that fashion and not accepted her help so willingly.

So back to the original issue. Did she ever look for the owner?

 

[Sabine]

Probably no harm to put up a note in a local store anyway, in case it is a lost rather than abandoned pet.

 

[Hazel-Mom]

bijoux wrote:

I just did some searching and I guess they are called pygmy rabbits.

It's highly doubtful they are Pygmys. Those are a specific kind of the Western Cottontail family (Brachylagus idahoensis), and they are nearly extinct in the wild. They live in very specific habbitat, mainly in the Columbia basin in Washington and Oregon, so I doubt they'd be running wild in Orange County .

ETA I looked it up, and according to Wikipedia, the last of the Columbia Basin Pygmy Rabbits died in 2008 . So they are officially extinct in the wild, though there are still a few in captivity. The rest of the species is doing better though, in the Great Basin in Idaho, Montana, Wyoming, Utah.

Too bad about the Columbia ones, they are such sweet looking little bunnies.