It's Heating Up!

After a soggy, cold spring, things are finally heating up here in beautiful Portland, OR! We haven’t seen temps in the 80s all year, never mind nearly 100. We at the Rev are not fans of the hot weather, not only because we’re not hot weather folks, but also because it’s so hard on our friends in rabbit fur coats.

Once the the weather hits the mid 80s, rabbits really start to suffer. At 85, the bucks become sterile.* And with good reason. Pregnant and nursing does suffer the worst. Keep an especially good eye on them.

When the temps reach the 90s and you notice your rabbits lying stretched out and breathing rapidly with their ears erect, it’s time to take action. If you can’t move your rabbits inside to a cool basement or air conditioned room (and we can’t), here are some things you can do to help your rabbits through this stressful time:

1. Make sure their waters are filled always. We’ve frozen partially filled water bottles before, but I don’t really think this helps. When it gets hot, the rabbits stop moving. Which means they stop getting up to drink. Rather than hassle with frozen water bottles, I stick to step 6.
2. Cut back on pellets and give free choice hay. Hay keeps the gut moving and helps relieve stress.
3. Provide lots of shade. Direct sunlight can kill them very quickly. Towels and sheets draped over the cages provide shade but still allow air flow.
4. Drape wet towels and/or sheets over the cages. The water helps cool the air.
5. Run an oscillating fan. It will help prevent fly strike* by keeping the flies down and really cools the area down. Especially if you’ve draped wet towels over the cages.
6. Provide cold. Most people say to freeze plastic jugs of water, but we’ve found that the rabbits just chew them up. Not good! I fill freezer safe canning jars (the wide mouth kind) with water and freeze them. I’ve also heard of freezing small marble slabs for the bunnies to lay on.

One of the most disturbing things you can see your bunny do is pant. A rabbit will lie there, stretched out, breathing with an open mouth, and drooling. When things have reached this state of affairs, act quickly. Wet her ears down with luke warm (not cold!) water. Do this as gently as possible to minimize stress. Keep wetting the ears as they dry. If wetting the ears does not help, you can immerse her up to the neck in luke warm (not cold!) water. Immersion should be a last step, as it is really stressful and increases the likelihood of fly strike.

Taking care of rabbits in the heat is a lot of work. Last summer was a real nightmare with temps in the 110s. We lost one rabbit to heat exhaustion and another to mastitis related to the heat. This summer is going to be a little more challenging if we have another real heat wave. Joy and I are both out of the house most of the day with school and work. We’re considering paying a neighborhood kid to come and re-wet all the towels around 3 pm when it gets really really hot.

*Don’t worry, the sterility isn’t permanent. The boys get their mojo back for a few days after it finally does cool off.

*Fly strike, or myiasis, is a condition where flies lay their eggs on your rabbits. The hatched maggots then feed on your living rabbit. Ew.