Wow! Everyone has such great stories!
I just finished reading all of them.
Hmm... about mine...
The first animal I came into contact with was a big orange longhaired tabby cat named Freya. My parents first got her as a kitten when they had moved into an apartment together, and they took her with them when they got the house I was born in. I'm not sure how old she was, and I barely remember her... Because a couple years later, my mom's allergies to her got so bad, and the injections weren't working, so they had to give her away. I remember being sad, and I never heard anything about her again. I was probably about three-ish when she left.
After that, my brother was born, and a while after that (Maybe a year) my parents thought it would be a good idea for me to have a rabbit. So, they contacted a breeder, and we brought home the sweetest, most beautiful red-eyed-white Holland Lop girl I've ever known. I remember playing with her around the house, and how if I turned her upside down, she'd trance immediately with all four paws straight up in the air and just lay there. She never bit anyone, and she was the best rabbit ever. I learned how to handle rabbits from having her. (She also had malloclusion, and we had to get her teeth trimmed every once in a while, but she was otherwise healthy).
One day, she escaped from the yard, and was lost.
But not forever.
The next day, as we were making 'lost rabbit' signs, she hopped right into the backyard. We caught her, and were just so overjoyed to have her back.
But she died overnight in her cage. We think she might have eaten something poisonus, and was returning home to be with us in her last moments. (Even though she didn't seem sick when we caught her)
After her death, my mom researched more rabbits, and we had almost decided on getting a Himalayan, as there was a breeder not far from where we lived. In the end, we decided not to get one, because of their delicate bones, and the fact that we were still very young kids. So instead, we went and brought home two French Angora brothers, named Cinnamon and Spice.
They turned out to be sick (I think it was snuffles, but I don't remember), however, and we returned them to the breeder.
Soon afterwards, we found the Dutch breed, and bought two Dutch sister babies from a breeder not far away. They were the normal black and white pattern, and were showable, and had tattooes in their ears. (001 and 002 ) my rabbit was 001, and we named her Clover. 002 was my brothers, and her name was Blackberry. Clover and Blackberry did not get along. At all. In fact, if they were ever accidentally out together, they'd go flying in a whirlwind of black and white and start ripping each other's fur out. So we had them in a hutch that was separated in the middle by a wooden board, so they couldn't get at each other.
Clover was my favourite (Being mine, naturally) and she was also the sweetest. She wouldn't nip like Backberry would, and she'd hold very still if you pet her on her forehead.
One night, some dogs got loose and ran into our yard. They got under the bunny's hutch and started biting their feet.
We scared them off, but on both rabbits, several toes had to be amputated, and half of one of Blackberry's back feet had to be removed.
After that, we made a wire barrier around the entire bottom of the cage, so nothing could get in there again.
Clover, though, came down with pneumonia and died when I was in second grade.
Blackberry lived, and died of old age at 12.
About a year before she died, though, I had been wanting my own rabbit (Since Blackberry was my brother's still, and I hadn't had one of my own for a long time) and one day while my parents were gone on vacation, I went to a pet store with my friend (I'd often take walks to the pet store) and fell in love with a white New Zealand laying in the back in a cage. And I almost bought him/her, too, but I was only sixteen at the time, and couldn't
So when my parents got back, I talked to them about me being mature enough for a rabbit of my own, and how I'd take care of it, and also how I really missed having one, since mine died back in second grade.
They caved, and my mom mentioned that her best friend's sister is a rabbit breeder. We checked her out, and yes, she did have an available buck for sale that was four months and pet quality for $25. That rabbit's name was M&S Butterfinger.
So we met up with her at a show, and she brought out little Butter, and I held him. It was love. I brought him home and have had him with me ever since. I'm nineteen now, and he's at college with me, cleaning himself while I'm typing.
I've had several animals in between rabbits, and they were....
A garter snake named Kirara, a mountain horned dragon named Hakku, red-headed agama (Lizard) named Isis, and my hamster, Mochiko, who still lives with me. (The reptiles all unfortunately passed away from various causes, but I was particularly devastated by Isis's passing, as she was the best lizard in the history of ever, and was so full of energy and life--She died last year on Halloween). I still daydream about having reptiles again, but my luck with them is so unfortunately bad that I wouldn't want to doom the poor little thing to living with me. I do have some goldfish, though.
Okay! Sorry for writing all this
I've had animals my whole life, so writing out my history with animals is like writing a life story, haha. That's it!
~Diana and Butter
