Well, even though rabbits are the third most popular pet, and there’s certainly a strong rabbit owner community that has developed, I guess the world isn’t ready for bunnies on buses.

I came across this entertaining article from the UK’s The Independent which describes the author’s experience while riding the bus.

“I was sitting on a bus yesterday when a woman came down the stairs clutching a rabbit on a lead. The woman was delicate-looking and rather beautiful, and on the spectrum of eccentricities, I’d say she was in the zone of colourful characters rather than rum coves. Nevertheless, the rabbit was wearing a pink lead and a pink bow in its fur, and as she staggered down the steps with it, all the other passengers sized her up, decided she was probably a dangerous oddball, and did what British people do in such a scenario – they pretended she wasn’t there. I watched with interest because, apart from the fact that the rabbit wasn’t a dog, there was nothing odd in her behaviour at all. I found myself admiring the self-confidence of someone who was prepared to be branded “weird” and damn well wasn’t going to apologise for it.”

I can’t say I would ever bring Coco or Cosette on a bus with me just on a leash. I think I’d spend the whole time trying frantically to keep Cosette from bolting out of my arms and attempting to wriggle free of the harness. And she’d probably pee on my seat out of spite. (She’s used that tactic before.)

If you love bunnies in space suits, flying kites or riding scooters, you’ll love Nakisha Elsje VanderHoeven’s Etsy shop. Her store carries very whimsical original watercolors as well as limited edition fine art prints of little rabbit adventures.

For more info: Nakisha’s Etsy Shop

A new housing option is now available to rabbit owners! For those who want to keep their home looking classy, RabbitHouses.net offers beautiful wooden enclosures for your house rabbit that complement the furniture in your home. They are multi-storied, and they come with an opening roof for upstairs, a grass den downstairs for relaxing, a removable plastic liner pan, and rabbit sized holes so your bunny can go in and out as he pleases. Other accessories are also available such as a rabbit cabinet (another enclosure with two drawers), a plastic floor tray to catch any accidents, a litter box, and a box of hay.

They look like they’d be charming additions to your home and fun for your bunny (or bunnies) as well!

Ray Milkey of Los Altos, CA won $1000 when the photo he entered of his two foster bunnies was chosen as the best entry for PetSource.org’s “Cutest Baby Pet” contest. He has generously opted to give the prize money to The Rabbit Haven, the shelter where the two baby dwarf hotot rabbits, Lassen and Denali, came from. Due to the popularity of the contest, Lassen has already been adopted, and with any luck, Denali will find a forever home soon too.

For more info: http://www.santacruzsentinel.com/ci_9308508

Melanie Lapich, from New South Wales, Australia, recently lost her two pet bunnies to Myxomatosis. When the vet had initially diagnosed the rabbits, Melanie did her best to treat their symptoms. But soon, the lumps on the skin, swollen, oozing eyelids, labored breathing, and lack of appetite became too severe, and the rabbits had to be put to sleep.

So Melanie is on a quest to legalize the vaccine for Myxomatosis in Australia. Currently, the vaccine is in use in the UK. (See My House Rabbit Myxomatosis vaccination article here.) Since Australia has a major ecological issue with wild European rabbits destroying native plantlife and crowding out native wildlife, the Australian government has so far refused to legalize the vaccine for domestic rabbits in fear that resistance to the disease may eventually spread to wild rabbit populations.

But for pet owners like Melanie, it means there is little hope for prevention of this incurable disease for their pets. If you would like to sign the petition to legalize the vaccine, go here: www.gopetition.com.au/petitions/make-myxomatosis-vaccine-legal.html

For more information: www.myxomatosis-vaccine.com

Now is the time when many rescues get a lot of unwanted rabbits. It’s been just long enough after Easter that bunnies that were bought for the holiday start to lose their charm with people who didn’t have accurate expectations of owning a pet rabbit. And so the bunny gets “set free” in the wild or placed in shelters.

Bonnie Pulver of Dance with the Bunnies Rabbit Rescue in Greenville, NC has tried to curb this trend by passing out informational flyers and directing people to Make Mine Chocolate. She runs a foster home for bunnies out of her house through the Friends of the Pitt County Animal Shelter. And while “bounce-back bunnies” are less than ideal, she would prefer people relinquish their unwanted pets to a no-kill rescue/shelter rather than setting them loose in the wild, where they have little chance of survival.

According to Pulver, “Turning them loose does not set them free. It makes them food. That white bunny has no security in the wild … They are on the very bottom of the food chain.”

For more information, visit: http://www.bunspace.com/view_bunny?bunid=3547 http://www.reflector.com/local/content/news/stories/2008/05/05/RabbitRescue.html

Nominated in the category of Animation, 30-Second Bunny Theatre was not only the Webby Award Winner, it was also the People’s Voice Winner.

For more info: http://www.webbyawards.com/webbys/current.php?media_id=97&season=12
http://blog.wired.com/underwire/2008/05/bunny-parodies.html