Injured wild bunny

Question
Our cat is a hunter and on two occasions has caught small bunnies in our yard.  On this occasion I was able to retrieve the bunny and found a large area of his skin torn loose near his rump.  Can this animal survive such a wound? What would be the best first aid in this case?  An antibiotic spray? Or just turn it loose and let the parent bunnies deal with it?

Answer
Hi

While rabbits can heal from such wounds, the bigger issue for this poor bun is shock and stress. These can kill it before infection does! If the wound is quite angry looking your best course of action is to find your nearest wildlife hospital and take it there. Trying to treat it can kill it with stress so it may also be kinder for the bun to be put to sleep. It's usually only very young rabbits dug out of nests that have the best survival to be rehabbed and returned to the wild, when they're older they are more easily stressed and wary of humans.

The parent rabbits are unlikely to look after an injured baby, sadly. If the rabbit was released with an injury it's unlikely to last the night before another predator finds it.

Good luck with what you decide to do with the bun!
Cat