Rest In Peace

RIP Webster Rabbit

Webster, our family house rabbit, and for whom this blog is named, died last week.
He was very loved and will be dearly missed.

He was a six years old white rabbit with black pointy ears, black eyes, and a black cross on his back. We think he was a Himalayan breed of rabbit.
He was born at the Humane Society in Milwaukee, to a mother who was pregnant when she was brought there, and was one of 8 siblings.
He was litter box trained and lived in our house like a cat.
He was part of our family every day.

We had a funeral and he is buried in the back yard, with flowers over his grave.
Each of the boys wrote him a letter that is with him.
We lit candles and each shared good memories of Webster.

We remembered that he was the softest thing in the universe.
He always won a no-blinking contest with whoever tried.
He liked to play hide-and-seek with his blanket.
We would throw the blanket over him and say "Where's Webster?" and he would poke around under it, and just loved when we "found" him.
We remember that nobody could catch Webster if he didn't want to be caught. We learned that is why rabbits have such loose fur. When you grab them, the fur becomes almost "slippery" and they get away and you just have hands covered in a thin film of angora.

His job was family Greeter, and Watcher.
The job of being a prey animal is to Watch, or be dinner.
When he was naughty we called him "Hasenpfeffer." (The German word for Rabbit stew.)
Its a good thing he didn't know what that meant, but he knew when he was being "bad." Which wasn't that often.

He was a very good bunny.
He was silent except for sneezes. Every time he sneezed it was eleven times.
And for thumping. Remember the movie "Bambi?"
The rabbit in Bambi was named "Thumper" because he thumped to warn the other rabbits. Webster did this, too.

He started by thumping at the vacuume cleaner, but later on, faced it down and actually followed me around while vacuuming.

One time I was on a kick to learn everything I could about the practice of Fung Shui. Feng Shui is like a decorating style, but also has ceremonial aspects, one of which is the practice of "Space Clearing" which involves ringing a bell loudly to clear out old energy in your living space... we were ringing a large cast iron school bell in each room, and of course, couldn't really explain things to Webster. He got a lot of extra lettuce that day.

Webster liked to jump in our laps and watch TV with us. He also enjoyed going outside occasionally on a leash while we did gardening.

I grew special things in our small organic urban garden, just for Webster. His favorites were red leafy lettuce, parsley, cilantro, and carrot tops.

He always noticed when I missed giving him his special treat of five raisins per day. (Any more and he would get a tummy ache.)

His diet consisted of mainly organic thick rolled oats, rabbit pellets, fresh green things -- the greener the better, like broccoli, sunflower seeds, pumpkin seeds, and tons of organic hay.

We took Webster to the Animal Emergency Clinic in our area, but it was too late by the time we got there. The clinic was very helpful and examined him and helped us to deal with his sudden death.

I can't be sure, because the veterinarian didn't know, but I think he ate too much Kale the day he died. I had just been to the local Farmer's Market, and had bought a ton of organic Kale. He loved it and kept begging for more of it, but I think it didn't agree with him. Rabbits get sick so quickly that within a few hours of him acting just slightly funny, he had what looked like a seizure and he died.

There was no evidence that he had gotten into anything that he shouldn't of, since I searched the entire house for evidence of anything being left out where he could get into it. Our whole house is rabbit-proofed, but we keep the bedroom doors closed when he is out just to keep down the rabbit fur.

He was our first rabbit, and so perhaps we might do better caring for another one, but for now we are going to be rabbitless, and wait a respectful amount of time before considering another pet. I think it is good to miss the pet you had, so you can appreciate the place they filled in your life, and appreciate the benefit of any new pet's companionship even more.

I think a rabbit is a great pet. Before we got Webster, we checked out books at the library on caring for rabbits, and bought a book on the style of rabbit keeping called "HouseRabbits" at the Humane Society. We also learned from them tips on keeping a Rabbit. Webster came to us with an identification tag under his skin, and having been neutered/spayed (I can never remember which is which) he was better behaved from having been neutered, I think.

We went on the web and read up on house rabbits and their care before we brought him home. We bought all the things he needed a week before bringing him home, so he came to a house that was ready to become his home.

Our Humane Society gave us Webster at no cost, right after Easter, because they get a lot of rabbits after Easter, when families realize the time and expense of caring for a rabbit is more than they bargained for. It helps to research a pet before getting one so you don't interrupt each other's lives so much.

So for this reason, we are waiting some time to adopt again, and next time we are considering getting a bonded pair. Rabbits don't all get along well with each other, and they can fight and hurt one another if they don't. But a bonded pair can stay bonded for life, and they grieve terribly for each other if they are separated. So they are hard to adopt, because not everyone wants two. And the Humane Society tries to keep bonded pairs together.

The boys are older and busier and won't have the same amount of time to play with a pet, and so a pair can entertain each other.

These are great resources that we used before deciding to adopt our first rabbit.

House Rabbit Society
http://www.rabbit.org/

House Rabbit Handbook
How to Live with an Urban Rabbit
By Marinell Harriman