Yearly Vet Visit for Leo the Lionhead

Rabbit & VetSo first thing this morning we were off with Leo to the vet for a yearly well visit exam. His first two visits a year ago were a check up for his health right after we adopted him and then to have his neuter surgery. Thankfully Leo has been a very healthy bunny since then and did not need to see the vet this past year for anything.

The vet we had taken him too initially had moved away from our area, so we needed to set Leo up with a new vet. We figured the new vet and staff would love him as they are quite fond of rabbits. The vet is new to Leo, but someone we had seen with Tigger, Shadow and Portia for many visits during their lives. As expected, the troll doll mop of Leo’s was a huge hit and could not be resisted by vet and staff. So Leo got lots of head pets which hopefully made the poking and prodding just a wee bit more acceptable.

Leo weighs in with an adult weight of 4.2 pounds and is in good health. The biggest challenge the vet sees is making sure he eats enough hay for roughage and has good grooming to help prevent any hairballs forming in his tummy. We figured this would be the case and had questions about what would be the best diet for him and amounts of things based on his ideal size. The vet feels Leo is at the right weight. Since he isn’t a super active little bunny, we need to keep an eye on fattening foods and treats he likes being minimal amounts so that he doesn’t gain too much weight.

Each rabbit brings their own challenges to their humans based on the rabbit’s individual personal likes and dislikes. Grooming is high on Leo’s list of activities to be avoided and he makes sure I know how much he hates it by either whimpering or chattering his teeth no matter how gentle I am.  So will have to practice tough love about that and hope at some point Leo will reach a bit more acceptance of it. It is also going to be a bit tricky trying to evaluate if he is eating enough hay, since he likes to eat his hay in private when no one is watching him. The vet had suggested a measurement system. Leo does seem to like to eat hay when he is lying around, so I am thinking I will be following him around putting handfuls of hay wherever he flops to have it handy as a snack and then have a log of how many handfuls he eats per day. It was easier with Tigger and Shadow as we could have a hay bin and they hopped in and ate away not caring if we watched and we could tell how much they were eating pretty easily. Leo is more secretive.

 I thought I would take this opportunity to share some good articles from the House Rabbit Society about vet visits and help with paying vet bills:

Tomorrow the plan for November …

 

 

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