How do treat snuffles or should they be sold?

Question
Hi, My mom raises Lionheads and Astrix rabbits. They are pedigreed and are breed standard but not nesisarily show-quality. She's been raising them as a hobby and really loves all her rabbits. She mostly sells them for pets and breeding stock since our area does not have many lionhead/astrix breeders. She has several does and one buck with snuffles. She has been treating them with VetRX (I think) but so far none of them have gotton better or if they do they get sick again. Obviously, she doesn't want to sell bunnies that will get sick but she doesn't want to lose all her breeding stock. She has all the sick ones isolated in seperate hutches outside and whenever she moves them she thoroughly cleans the cages with vanadine. Do you have any suggestions for treating snuffles and getting it out of her ?herd/flock? (As you can tell I am not the rabbit person:) She doesn't want to have to sell all the sick ones but is that the only option?

Thanks for you help!

Answer
Hi Laura,

This is a very tricky question.  Snuffles can be caused by several different organisms.  The problem with snuffles is that it never goes away.  You could treat the symptoms but more often than not they come back again.  Rabbits with snuffles usually require several treatments of prescription antibiotics.  This can be very expensive.  

I am personally against selling sick animals.  This can give a breeder a very bad name.  A responsible breeder would never do this and although she loves her animals she should never sell them to someone who may not be able to afford to treat them.  They should also never be kept around other rabbits which could also make it difficult.  Even taking these animals to a livestock auction is unethical and illegal in most places.  I inspect animals at our livestock auction and if they are sick the only place they can go is to the cull truck.  This is a very sad place to sell your beloved animals.

It would be best if she kept a closed herd.  She needs to keep  the sick animals isolated and consider that keeping rabbits with snuffles could wipe out her entire herd.  I do not tolerate sick animals and as harsh as it may sound it is easier to humanely euthanize the sick animals than to watch your entire herd die a slow and painful death.  

Snuffles is a very difficult situation but I can tell you from experience that a breeder that knowingly allows snuffles to remain in their herd will never be able to sell the animals.  When we see some of these people at shows we do everything possible to make sure our animals are very far away from theirs.  It only takes one person to know that a person has  a sick animal and pretty soon the entire rabbit community knows.  Selling for pet stores causes the same effect.  If the pet stores are responsible they will not accept animals from sick stock.

I understand that you are just trying to help her.  Just let her know that keeping animals that are sick and are not under the care of a vet is where people get the name of backyard breeders.  Responsible breeders would never allow this to happen.  Depending on the size of her herd she could potentially treat them all.  Keep in mind that it can be very expensive.  We had an outbreak of a non life threatening disease and the medication was $170 a day to treat 72 animals.  They all had to be treated for 10 days and some of them still did not recovery and were humanely euthanized.  Imagine having to treat them repeatedly and how expensive it could cost.

I hope I was not to harsh.  Good luck

Pam