Deformed eye?

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DazyDaizee

DazyDaizee

Well-Known Member
Joined
Aug 26, 2008
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Location
, Massachusetts, USA
He will be 2 weeks old tomorrow. Eyes opened yesterday. Eyelid on the left side is open, but eye is sunken in. Has anyone seen this before? He won't open the lid voluntarily and does scratch at it sometimes. His teeth seem like they may be mildly misaligned as well. And he has had a bald patch on his head, the hair is now starting to grow back.

He was the smallest of a litter of 10 lops (8 adults were surrendered to the humane society. I'm fostering the litter) and I don't think he would have made it if I didn't allow for special nursing time with him and mom.
runt-8.jpg


eye in question:
runteye.jpg


runteye2.jpg


Good eye:
runtgoodeye.jpg
 
If its okay with you, I'm going to move this to the Rabbitry, at least for a bit. I'll leave a marker here, but I'd like to hear how common this is from those experienced in raising litters of kits.


sas :?
 
Thanks for moving it!
There's not actually any swelling..
The one issue with the vet is that unless I adopt this rabbit, I'm doubting the humane society will actually let me take him to the vet. This litter was going to be euthanized even after I offered to foster.. so I'm surprised they actually let me take them. I'm afraid they'd euthanize him rather than try to find out if it's a problem. If he required surgery, I'm thinking they would absolutely not do it.

I could be wrong.. and I'll mention the situation to the girl I know there.. but I'm really worried about what they might do considering they have 9 other healthy babies, then another litter to place, and the 8 adults surrendered.
 
It's good that the eye is not surrounded by any discharge. It's difficult to tell from the photos, but it looks like an ulcerated cornea. Either he got scratched by siblings in the nestbox, or his eyelid has a deformity that causes it to turn in (Entropian Eye) and this irritates the surface of the eye. Both issues should be diagnosed and treated by a vet.

You are in a difficult position if the rescue won't pay for the vet visit. Warm, moist Tea Bag compresses may help as well as a drop of Neosporin to lubricate the eye. But without a vets opinion, there is a good chance he will be blind in that eye. The problem will be that the eye will be prone to infection that can spread.

When an eye is affected, we defer to a vet. The eye is close to the mouth and the brain. Not something to be treated casually.
 
Well.. the eye is not protruding normally. it sits way back in the socket, which (I think) is what is giving it that appearance. There are other eye tissues that seem to bulge out around it, but more so because the eye isn't in it's proper position. The eye itself is hard to see clearly because of the surrounding tissues, but I sort of think it's underdeveloped and perhaps that's why it's not in it's right position.

The eye also stays closed. The eyelid itself is open, but whether the rabbit keeps his eye closed or cannot open it, I don't know. He opens and closes his other eye fine, but this eye he keeps closed.

The eyelid is normal. I've seen Entropion in dogs, and also Trichiasis where the lashes grown inwards. And I don't see that with this rabbit at all. The eyelid seems to meet normally and there's no lashes where they shouldn't be.

I will email the person I know at the humane society today and see if I can have a vet see him. Maybe I can commit to adopting him so that it will be my decision, rather than them just euthanizing him if they don't know how to fix it.
 
I agree with Pam. I haven't seen this before of course, but it looks more to me like the eye itself is underdeveloped than an ulceration. I guess it's possible that it was scratched early in development and that cause it to not grow correctly, but I think a congenital deformity is more likely. It seems that surgery to remove the eye tissue there is the only option. Putting neosporin on it may help keep it from getting infected for now. However, we had to get neosporin from the vet for opthalmic use, rather than the OTC stuff, because the OTC stuff wasn't right to put in eyes (or so the vet said). It's too bad that the shelter isn't interested in helping this fellow. He might be a candidate for a sanctuary or rescue near you. What about 3bunnies? Isn't Ali involved in that one?

http://www.3bunnies.org/

They're in Hartford, not sure how far that is from you.
 
Well, the humane society confirmed that they WOULD euthanize, so I asked if I could keep the rabbit myself, they said yes. House rabbit network has offered to take him and adopt him out after medical treatment. I am going to have to decide if I want to keep him myself or give him to HRN. I'm just not sure if I should wait and see a little while longer since HRN agreed, also, that it seems like an underdeveloped eye and that it may not need immediate treatment.
I do have antibiotic ointment for eyes, so I could use that, but I'm skeptical about treating him just yet. I'm going to try to email my friend who's a vet and see what she thinks...
 
I had a kit with both of his eyes like that, in my first litter. (The one who also had deformed legs)

What we did was just made sure to keep open his eyes daily, using warm compresses. Once he got older he was able to keep them open, but he was blind. He would often get weepy eye, which we would treat with Terramycin.

I don't know how much a vet could do for him, but they sure would be able to tell you exactly what is wrong with his eye. Hopefully the shelter will let you get him to a vet without affecting the future of the rest of the litter. ;)

Emily
 
Well, he's doing really well. I talked to my friend who's a vet who thinks it's likely the eye just didn't develop normally and doesn't think he should have any issues with it, except probably blindness in that eye. She didn't see him, I just sent her pictures, and she doesn't treat a lot of rabbits, but that was her opinion.

I don't think it's EC because there are no obvious lesions in the eye, it's the eye itself that is sunken in.

When he gets older (given he continues to thrive) I will definitely bring him to my rabbit vet and see what they think. But I'm hesitant to take him now, considering his age and the fact that my vet is 40 min from my house. I don't want to stress everyone and bring them all, and I don't want him to be away from his mother for that long. But he does seem to be doing great, so I imagine it's not a really urgent issue.

Lastly.. I just found out today that the girl who arranged the foster didn't exactly make it clear to the humane society that they are responsible for these rabbits. They think HRN is placing them. She said that she thinks they'll probably be able to adopt them out though. Probably? Needless to say I am not happy. I will not see any of these babies euthanized for no reason, so I'm trying to find as many homes as I can on my own. And if I can't find anyone to take them all, I'm considering surrendering them to another rescue or the MSPCA where they will be adopted out and have a chance at a good life.
I'm so annoyed.. I really just want them all to find great homes, including the mom, and it seems like they have all odds against them.
 
Also, here he is a few days ago.. so you can see he's growing well and still very active. He sometimes opens the eye and sometimes keeps it closed. I check it daily for any signs of infection and it opens easily.
scotty.jpg


He learned to swim...
ls1.jpg


And here's him opening his bad eye:
scotty2.jpg


These were taken a few days ago.. he's gotten a lot fluffier.
 
DazyDaizee wrote:
.

Lastly.. I just found out today that the girl who arranged the foster didn't exactly make it clear to the humane society that they are responsible for these rabbits. They think HRN is placing them. She said that she thinks they'll probably be able to adopt them out though. Probably? Needless to say I am not happy. I will not see any of these babies euthanized for no reason, so I'm trying to find as many homes as I can on my own. And if I can't find anyone to take them all, I'm considering surrendering them to another rescue or the MSPCA where they will be adopted out and have a chance at a good life.
I'm so annoyed.. I really just want them all to find great homes, including the mom, and it seems like they have all odds against them.
Click to expand...
That is really really crappy of them...good for you for sticking by these babies and taking such wonderful care of them!
 
So adorable! I love the pic in the bowl. I'm glad he's doing well. Just wanted to mention this because it was interesting to me, and I agree, the eye looks more underdeveloped than lesioned.

I wouldn't worry about finding these guys homes. We had a litter of 6 or so a while ago at the Humane Society, and we adopted them all out, mostly in pairs or with an adult rabbit. They went fast, as soon as they were fixed. A lot of people prefer a young bunny because they think, like dogs, that they won't bond as well to an older bunny, plus we get a lot of older bunnies with behavioral problems (nippy, cage aggressive) that the young ones don't have. Now, we do have a very good program where we keep adoptables in pet stores in a room where the public can just stop by and see them, which is where all of these babies were, and we're very lucky in Madison to adopt our animals out soon enough that we don't have space problems. We had a bunny that took a year to adopt out, and she was not in jeopardy of going to the back room for issues of space. It sounds like your Humane Society is different. However, everybody wants a baby bunny and they're so rare to be in shelters that there are probably people waiting for a chance to adopt a baby bunny (rather than buy one) so they will go fast.
 
I have dealt with this in one of my litters, another breeder called it 'pea eye'. Not only is the eye smaller than normal but so is the eye slit, making it impossible for the kit to completely open the affected eye. Also the eye becomes bluish, due to being covered for so long. I do have some good news, as I kept and grew out the kit, as the rabbit grows so will the eye and eye opening, and the kit will better be able to control it. My kits eye was blue, and then slowly cleared to nearly normal, I do not know if it had sight in that eye or not. As a full grown rabbit it had a small eye that looked normal otherwise, and was perfectly healthy. I'll have to ask my friend how its doing, as I gave it to her as a pet. Perhaps I'll even see it this weekend, and I'll let you know how the eye looks. It may not need treatment, give the bunny some time to grow and see what happens.
 
That sounds really good.. glad to hear it! Hopefully that's the case. He's still doing really well so I can't imagine it's causing him real problems.
 
I hope this little cutie is still doing well!

Sabine got a bunny recently that is older than this guy, and he has an eye problem that may be similar. However, it looks to me like the eye in Sabine's bunny is more developed than the eye in DazyDaizee's bunny. I'd appreciate it if those of you who have seen this before could take a look at the pic in this thread:
http://www.rabbitsonline.net/view_topic.php?id=50403&forum_id=16
 
Yes I've just been reading through this thread and it seems a rather similar condition.
My vet said that she had seen this condition (she believes to be genetic) in dogs and cats before but never in a bunny.
Seeing this little rabbit it makes me think she could be right. The eye looks rather similar.
 
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