Sterling jumping on bed

If you watch the first few seconds carefully, you can see Sterling jumping high and running around happily!

Invasion of the orange sphere!

 
I left a ball outside of Coconut's favourite box/hideout for her to play. She was obviously intimidated by it and I thought I'll leave it there for her to work things out. When I came back in a few minutes, I saw the ball has taken over her spot and she's too afraid to go back in. The ball must have drifted in and she moved away (she was napping there, where the ball is now). Poor girl is hiding from the ball as you can see from the picture. 

Fitting in

 
Sterling is settling in nicely. I just witnessed his first binky last night. I've never seen a small rabbit binky. Also, he has claimed a corner on my bed and sleeps there with me. He knows when I'm going to bed and would run around on my bed then spend a few minutes grooming before laying down. He does that routine every night. His litter habbits haven't been perfect, but he's been very good this week. I'm hoping he'll keep it that way. During the day, he likes to climb up high and nap on this box you see in the picture. 

Sterling is adopted!

 

We've officially adopted Sterling last week! Then we found out he has bad litter habbits. Actually, he's very consistent to where he goes, just that not where we wanted... e.g. on my bed. But after almost a week of training, and many loads of laundry, I think he understands now. He's been free for two nights in a row in my bedroom and have been very good so far. By the way, he has claimed a corner on my bed as his own to sleep on. I'll let him out when I'm not home today too and see how it goes. 

Coconut new eyelashes

 

I just realized this morning that Coconut has grown some darker coloured eyelashes. either that or she's put on some mascara last night. Coconut is becoming a pretty lady!

On another note, I think I haven't posted the link to my photo album. So here it is. You will find both Coconut and Sterling's photos there. 

new rabbit Sterling

 
We are currently fostering to decide to adopt this 2lbs Netherland Dwarf. He is so tiny! Coconut's head is almost the size of his entire body! But this little rabbit is packed full of energy. He doesn't seem to like to sit still at times. If you pet him though, he'll melt right in your hand and let you pet him for a long time. He's really friendly and climbed all over us for attention when we sat on the floor. He also doesn't mind being picked up. So now I have two opposing personalities rabbits, Coconut is large and laid back, while Sterling is tiny and adventurous. 

Bon Echo Provincial Park

 
I went to camping for a couple nights at Bon Echo Provincial Park here in Ontario with my dad and girlfriend. The hiking trails there are excellent. Unlike many other trails in southern Ontario, this one actually has lots of hills and valleys to climb. The shower station near my camping site are also top notch. They seem very new and is well maintained on a daily basis. The showers themselves have good water pressure. One thing I don't like about camping there is the close proximity of the camping sites. I stayed on site Sawmill 59. It is surrounded by 3 other sites each just a few trees away. It's also pretty noisy at night as people stayed late. If anyone intends to stay there, I'd recommend some of the 60's numbered site in Sawmill. They're up the hill and provide more privacy. Overall, the place is okay, but I have no plan to return there as there are a plethora of camping places in Ontario. 

Upside down

 
Here is the front view of Coconut upside-down in the tunnel. 

Digging a tunnel to China

 
Speaking of games, here is Coconut's other favourite - playing in the tunnel. She would play inside but the tube just keeps rolling. Sometimes she end up being upside-down like in the picture of her rear end, feet pointing up. 

Identity crisis

 
Coconut's been out more often now. But still limited to the immediate vacinity to her cage. She also has a new favourite game of pretending to be a turtle. She would go in the box in the picture and walk everywhere inside it like a turtle with a shell. Sometimes she can't see where she's going and just crashes into things. It's quite funny seeing this box moving around the floor on its own. 

Coconut is spayed!

 

It's been 5 days after Coconut's spay already. The picture is taken a few minutes ago. Her belly was shaved for the operation. Her bare skin are getting more reddish (see picture) as I think because of the hair growth and hot weather. Her behaviour and diet are back to normal now. For the first few days, she just sat there all day and didn't drink or eat much, except for the veggies, which she always finish. However, despite the pain, her litter habbit has been perfect throughout. I'm surprised that she would fight the pain of hopping into the litter box and do her business every single time. She also kept up with the grooming too. This girl is such a lady. So everything's good now, this whole process has gone by quite smoothly if I might say.

On another note, Coconut is still very timid and not very active. She still spend most of her time in the cage or near the door. But she does come out at night when I'm asleep now. It will be a slow process for her to adopt to this new home for sure. 

Bunny burrito

 
Here's Coconut wrapped in a bunny burrito. She's quite calm in this state and I can syringe feed her medication for the sneezing. On the other hand, she struggles a lot when I pick her up. I just got my first battle scar with her last night. Oh the sting of these scratches... 

Coconut is here!

 
Coconut, my new foster rabbit, arrived before noon today. She's been cooped up at the shelter for a while. We arranged for her to be spayed this Tuesday, but due to some respiratory infection, the procedure is postponed. Now, she's on antibiotics for 10 days to fight off the sneezing/coughing (I couldn't tell the difference).

She seems to be a cautious girl. It took her over an hour to move out of the carrier and into the cage. But after she's out, she seems eager to explore and is moving in and out of the cage to nearby places just sniffing around. At 9.5 lbs, she's bigger than Poppy (8 lbs). And when she stands, her head can peek out of her cage top (2 ft high). She also seem to have a big rear end. I think some of the existing tunnels in my house might be too small for her. At the moment, she's stretched out resting. So I'd say she's settled in nicely so far. 

Poppy II?

So I have been looking for a new rabbit for the past few days. Then I came across this rabbit in the picture above that looks like Poppy from a local shelter. I have seen other rabbits that look similar to Poppy before, but this one is different. Not only with her look, but guess what she is called? ... Poppy! How often do you come across a rabbit that looks like yours and with the same name? Plus, this is while I'm looking for a new rabbit. From a person that have met her, she said Poppy II is a very nice bunny too. Unfortunately, for me that is, she was already adopted. I had imagined calling her P-Two or P-Jay, for Poppy 2 or Poppy Junior. Oh well, it's good that she found a home nonetheless. From the looks of things, I'll probably be fostering a big bunny named Coconut (picture below) from Rabbit Rescue for now.

Sad news of Poppy

A week ago (May 19), I noticed Poppy didn't finish her pellets that I left for her from the night before. She usually just gobbles them all up in a few minutes. Immediately I checked up on her and saw that she seemed very lethargic. So I've kept an eye on her for the whole morning and noticed she haven't touched any food or water since the previous day. I realize there's trouble and quickly called the clinic that I have prepared. Unfortunately, the vet that specialize in rabbits wasn't in that day. I called a couple other places and they all say the same. It just so happens that it is the day before a long weekend holiday, bad timing. As the day go on, Poppy seems to be more and more stressed. She's not moving much and is curling up. Something is definitely very bad. I practically called every clinics I could find in Toronto that I can reach by public transit. Nope, it just so happens that none are available. So I seeked for help from the people of Rabbit Rescue, where I adopted Poppy from. From doing some research of my own, I thought Poppy was having some gas problem. They suggested that I medicate her with Ovol, an over-the-counter gas reducing medicine. Since I've never syringe feed before, that took a few trials before I am certain Poppy took in a good amount. I kept trying every hour for the night hoping for her to improve. After sleeping for a few hours, Poppy still doesn't seem to be getting well by the morning, in fact, she got much worse. She didn't groom herself and her bum was getting dirty. She looks as though she's in real pain. I went to the only clinic that kindly accepted to squeeze me into their schedule for 11am that day, which is now Saturday (May 20) already. After an hour of diagnosis (the vet clearly isn't too used to treating a rabbit), an x-ray shows that Poppy had a hairball stuck in her belly. By now, there were some other clients lining up, so the vet had to run in and out from me to the other clients. After a long while, I finally left the clinic with a whole stash of drugs for Poppy, but balanced with a much lighter wallet. I never imagined it could be so expensive. Anyway, I took Poppy home and put her in the cage to rest a bit since she's been out all morning. I thought I might let her relax before force feeding her the medications. While I'm preparing the concoction for Poppy, she suddenly started to shake and scream very violently. She's clearly in a lot of pain. I caressed her to calm her down and once she's ready, I lifted her out for the medication. While I'm holding her for the medication, I could feel that she's getting weaker and weaker by the second. Then finally, she passed away in my arms around 2:45pm, May 20th, 2006.

Although it is very sad for this sweet rabbit to leave, her memory will live on with the thousands of viewers that are enjoying her videos which I've posted on Google Video. There is a total of 10 videos of Poppy posted, a few I just added this week. Also, here's a tribute for her.

Toronto Pigeon

 

A well-fed pigeon in downtown Toronto. Most of them seem overweight as far as I know. There are just too many people feeding them. This one is just sitting there by the entrance to the subway, totally comfortable with people walking by inches away from it. 

Phonebook tastes good!

 
With all the hay and veggies available, Poppy still like an occasional tasting of paper. Her mouth got choked full of paper in this photo. I was waiting for her to come for help, but she did eventually freed herself. 

Poppy with a hat

 
Poppy pretending to be a sea captain. Captain Lazy. Specialty: lounging around all day long. Poppy has a tendency to hold still if something is touching her. So I tried putting some stuff on her head and sometimes it looks very funny. Speaking of putting items on a bunny's head, this site has some amazing pictures. The rabbit was even showcased on New York Times, truly extraordinary. 

Poppy's video collection

I've been adding videos of my rabbit, Poppy, online. Use this link to see them.

I realize this is becoming more of my pet's gallery, but it reflects what my camera's been shooting at. Anyway, here's a video of Poppy eating hay from the new hay rack I built for her. I initially placed the hay in her litter box as suggested by experts, but I find that sometimes a large amount of hay becomes wasted. Not from soiling as one might expect but Poppy just doesn't like the bottom stuff. So I built this hay rack, an idea I got off another web site. I thought it's a brilliant idea since all the bits and dust can fall right into the litter box. But I forget the fact that Poppy would be right under too and so as you'll see in the video, she gets pretty dusty. Luckily, she's smart enough to not eat right under it most ofthe time. I'll let her test it for a few more days and see if I need to disassemble it or not.

A video of Poppy playing