Dixie Bunny

Oops. I didn't mean to forget this on my last post. It was an honest mistake. One other significant thing that has happened in our lives is the loss of our sweet pet rabbit, Dixie. We knew that the day was coming because there is nothing too promising about a 9 year old rabbit with a 6 year life span, but it is sad to see her go none the less. The timing of it all is still a bit crazy to me. In anticipation of our move we spent a lot of time trying to decide what the most humane thing to do with her was with our options being 1. move her with us, 2. Give her to a rabbit santuary (there is such a place, I checked). 3. Have her humanely put down, 4. Leave her in our Davenport house as a gift to the new homeowners, and 5. Try to find her a new home.

As time marched on, no suitible adoptors applied, and our move date rapidly approached we began to feel more and more convicted that we had chosen her as our pet (along with her sister who we had to put down after an encounter with a puppy that was a little too playful), and we needed to be with her until her time was up. So, we carefully considered how to best transport her so she'd have to spend the least amount of time possible cooped up in the pet taxi.


At the new house, Craig dutifully spent an evening building a rabbit run in the garage to be moved to the basement and upon completion learned that a 4x8 sheet of plywood will NOT fit down our basement stairs, which incidentally led to our first disagreement in our new home. Dixie ended up living in the garage, but the weather had been mild and she seemed to like it there....until the day I came home on an already bad day and found her with her head on crooked and breathing funny. No lie. It was crooked and I knew that she was near the end. Although I thought she looked rather comfortable Craig and Maddie thought we should take her to the vet so I started making phone calls.

The first conversation went something like this:

"Yes, um, Hello. I have an elderly rabbit that doesn't seem to be doing too well. We just moved and she was fine but now is not moving much and her head is on crooked."
"Ok, what is her name?"
"My name?"
"No, the pet's name"
"Dixie"
"Thank you. Now what doesn't seem right about her?"
"Um, she's not moving much and her head is on crooked."
"Hmmm. What time can you bring your dog in?"
"I don't have a dog. This is a rabbit."
"Oh, I'm sorry, we don't have a rabbit vet available until Friday (2 days away), would you like to make an appointment?"
"No thanks, I don't think that she will make it that long."


Vet's office #2 answered the phone as the something to the tune of "Exotic Pet Specialists." I knew that they were going to be pricy, but what do you do, so I made an appointment for 45 minutes later then returned to the garage and found my little punkin seizing. Seriously? Have you ever seen a rabbit seize? Let me just say that it is an experience. Sigh. Within a very short time she was gone. It was a very sad afternoon at our house. We buried her in the back yard when Craig got home. Unfortunately, this was one of the first times our neighbors observed us outside as a family. Now they think we're strange I'm sure.

While being pet-less was kind of strange at first, we have decided that it is kind of nice. We can plan to be gone from home without concerns of how she'll get fed or how bad she'll smell when we get home. No plans for any new pets anytime soon.