yet another mysterious illness!

Question
Hi, im Liz and me and my mom are the very proud owners of an adorable lop eared rabbit!  If your curious, heres 2 of his best baby pictures:

http://img173.imageshack.us/img173/4285/bunu24ks.jpg

http://img173.imageshack.us/img173/7518/bunu15nq.jpg

im not sure what breed Bunu is(Pronounced like Bunny, "Bun-ee", but with a "U", Bun-YOU").

(Just so you know, the bedding we use for Bunu is that recycled grey stuff that isnt based on wood shavings, its kinda papery and in chunks... it comes in the green bag...)

I got Bunu from a pet store, (one that i feel is cruel to its animals after seeing how they have been treated... but i have a thing against all pet stores anyway....) and after seeing this cute bunny i just HAD to save it!  little kids would carry this tiny palm-sized bunny around the store, and he really seemed to enjoy it!  it was obvious that he was very friendly... so i guilted my mom into letting me buy him! (we had just lost a cat to old age AND a dog to old age/cancer that same month...)

after about a month of having the cuddly sweetie, i went to pick him up one day and he had liquids dripping from his mouth! i knew rabbits couldnt throw up, so the first thing that came to my mind was that he was sufficating to death from some respitory infection (this happened to a hampster i got from the exact same pet store, i think most of their animals must be sick...)

i freaked out and ran my bunny around town trying to find a vet that would see bunnies!  i went to about 3 or 4 different vets before finally someone recommended a "Bunny Specialist" in a small town about 35 min away.

keep in mind that this was when I thought my bunny was a girl.  my bunny was the cutest little princess ever!  I sadly had to leave my Bunu there, but they called me later that day.  The vet said that Bunu was in fact a girl, and did in fact have a upper respitory infection... me and my mom spent about $40 on the antibiotic.  Bunu HATED taking this medicine.  We moved his/her cage downstairs in the middle of most of the family activity so we wouldnt forget to give it to him/her.

Well time went on, and Bunu took all of his/her medicine, and the vet said at a follow up checkup that he/she was cured.  but then his eyes turned runny, and he got these scabby-like things on the back of his ears. He would get these sneezing fits and his nose was extremely runny and matted and hard with bunny snot.  he wasnt very cute anymore.

Bunu also had turned very fearful of people, because the only time he was ever taken out was when we gave him medicine.  He barely even let people pet him, he NEVER bit anyone, but if we let him out of his cage, he would chew wires and it would take almost an hour to catch him to put him back in his cage.  So sadley, our Bunu started to be neglected... i felt horrible about it, but i didnt have the time to fix it, and i really didnt know what to do!

Bunu's eye continued to worsen, so finally i convinced my mom to let me take Bunu to another vet.  My mom wasnt too fond of Bunu then, but she knew my love of animals and how horrible our recent losses where, so she agreed.

Imagine my shock when i found out that my Bunu, my adorable princess, was a STUD!  the vet also said that my bunny was a VERY sick bunny, and could possably die!  he said the things on the back of his ears may be ring worm(or some kind of gross worm lol), he did a swab of his ears and nose, to find that Bunu had ear mites and that his infection was so bad, that his eye and nose infection had also spread to his ears!!!

Bunu was put on medicine that cost near to $600.  Skin stuff for his ears, drops for his ear mites, drops for his ear infection, antibiotic that we gave him once a day, antibiotic we gave him 3 times a day, and then medicine for his food that would aparently replace the stuff in his tummy that we where killing off with all his other meds!

WELL!  his ears got better, and fortunatly his ears where only like that because of the mites.  but unfortunatly, he didnt get much better overall.  his eyes got better, but his nose and his right eye continued to run.  so Bunu goes BACK to the doctor!

the doctor says his infection was fine, but that he might now have an upper respitory infection that needed to be treated with a SPECIAL antibiotic.  

in the end, Bunu had a new antibiotic, and a shaved eye, and had the tear-duct cleaning surgury.  

after months of medicine and surgury, our bunny now worth well over $1000 was... still sick...

He eats fine, and still has his energy.  I went back to the pet store and complained.  They said that the bunny breeder rubs the area of the eye a lot and thats how she fixes it, because aparently most of the bunnies have this problem...

It took about a month to finally get control of his bunny snot.  it was hard, matted and crusted all around his poor little nose.  at first we had to wrap him up in a blanket, because it obviously hurt him.  his nose was so red and looked VERY sore.  we put neosporin (sp?) on it after every cleaning.  we also washed his eye area to keep that from getting matted too.

Now we have our daily routine!  Bunu is VERY friendly, and he loves to be picked up out of his cage and cuddled with!  he nuzzles his little face into your neck and is very content being carried around.  He is pretty big now (bigger than one of our cats that he chases around hehe)  when we let him out, he actually runs up to you and puts his head down so you can pet him, and if you ignore him, he'll jump up onto the couch and sit next to you or on your lap!  my mom adores him and loves cuddling with him too!  he also loves his cage and if he gets a little spooked by company or anything else, he just jumps right back in there! sometimes he just has fun running around the house, jumping into his cage and then back out, and then running around the house again.

since he has very obvously hit maturity, he likes to run circles around me and my mom and *try* to mount (again, i miss my little princess) and his bathroom habits dont seem as sharp as they used to be.  he tends to sit in his own pee so me and my mom give him a bath every week that he really doesnt mind at all, if anything he likes the attention!  we wash his face once a day, twice if its really bad, and he doesnt mind that at all either (no more towel is needed!)

i really want to take Bunu to a new Specialist i found out about.  We live in Gainesville, FL and aparently the University of Florida has a very good exotics program.  I want to get Bunu fixed because even though he is around 8 months old and never bit anyone, im afraid he will develop the habit, and i dont want anyone to fear him since pysical contact with him is neccisary.  

also, i want his eye to be fixed for good.  right now me and my mom dont have much of a problem bathing him and washing his eye daily, but im afraid that it will become a hassle since i just recently became a victim of teen pregnancy (18 and about to graduate isnt too bad, and the father is very supportive so not too much to worry about there!) but having a baby is going to take a lot of time from Bunu!  when i get a job and have to take care of a kid, i want my Bunu time to be spent on playing and cuddling, not on just washing and then pinning his cage.  

i have read that sometimes the shape of the face can effect the nose and eyes, and i hope that maybe if this is the case, there is still some way we can fix it.  i hate putting my bunny into surgury, because the idea of putting such a (seemingly) frail and delicate animal under anestisia seems dangerous and makes me nervious.  also, me and my mom feel really "ify" about putting more money into the bunny, since we feel really scammed from previous vets.  we have little trust in vets, but i do have a little hope in the University.  

SO! the questions-
>>Do you have ANY idea what this illness could be?  his eye liquid is generally clear, his nose still runs on some days but is typically clean, but he still has horrible sneezing fits and he washes his face constantly so i know his eye and nose bother him too!
>>Also, what are your feelings on anestisia in bunnies, and do you think i REALLY should get him fixed?
>>When snuggling with him, i can usually hear him breathing really hard, and at night when everyone is asleep i can hear him laying in his cage breathing really hard in there too.  sometimes he even seems to cause his own sneezing fits from trying to breath... is it normal for bunnies to breath kinda loud and hard?
>>Is there a surgury that could fix his eye if the problem could be the shape of his face?
>>Any other comments or help you could provide would be great, i love my bunny VERY much and have won many battles against my dad, who wants to keep the bunny outside ("But Dad!  He has long hair and will overheat!  Its so hot outside!"... i got my mom on my side too hehe)  I just want Bunu to be as happy and comfortable as possible.  

hmm well i hope that wasnt too much to read, thank you for your time and i know i drew that whole story out but i wanted to tell it =]

take care and thanks again!

~*~ liz ~*~

Answer
Dear Liz,

What a story!  I'm glad you didn't give up on your bunny.  He's really been through the wringer, and now he has his happiness at last.  Let's get to those questions, one by one:

>>Do you have ANY idea what this illness could be? his eye liquid is generally clear, his nose still runs on some days but is typically clean, but he still has horrible sneezing fits and he washes his face constantly so i know his eye and nose bother him too!

Well, the good news is that he won't have to go through surgery to have the "shape of his face fixed."  The bad news is that the runny eye and nose problems are *very* likely related to his molars.  Many lop rabbits that have come from breeders who inbreed their rabbits (mating close relatives--very bad for the bunnies!) have congenital problems such as a face too short to accomodate the teeth properly, and that means they will have lifelong dental problems.  You can read more about this here:

www.bio.miami.edu/hare/dental.html

and

www.bio.miami.edu/hare/sneezing.html

(complete with pictures)

It sounds as if you finally have vets who know what they're doing, so stick with them.  

>>Also, what are your feelings on anestisia in bunnies, and do you think i REALLY should get him fixed?

An experienced vet can do this surgery very quickly and without much risk.  It depends on how good a candidate for surgery your bunny is.  But you're right, his sexual behavior will not get better (and might get worse, along with his litterbox habits) if he's not neutered.  He's still young, so ask your vet about his surgical risk, and if he's healthy enough to undergo surgery.  If he really does have a chronic URI (upper respiratory infection), that will have to be under control before he goes under anesthesia.

>>When snuggling with him, i can usually hear him breathing really hard, and at night when everyone is asleep i can hear him laying in his cage breathing really hard in there too. sometimes he even seems to cause his own sneezing fits from trying to breath... is it normal for bunnies to breath kinda loud and hard?

No, but this, too, could be related to his dental problems.  Some rabbits have molar roots that actually intrude *into the sinuses*. We had one bunny like that, and it was the cause of her chronic snotty nose.

The problem is that the only good way to diagnose this for certain is via head radiographs and--preferably--endoscopy up the nose to look for the bony protrusion that would indicate that a molar root is intruding into the nasal cavity.  

If this is the case, the molar can be extracted.  But that's not a surgery for the faint-hearted, and certainly should be done by a vet with lots of rabbit dental knowledge and experience.

>>Is there a surgury that could fix his eye if the problem could be the shape of his face?

Simple answer:  No.  In a truly dire circumstance, a problematic molar could be removed.  But only if there are no other options.

This is why we rabbit rescuers hate breeders and pet stores. They have no regard for the health of their rabbits.  They just want your money.  :(

>>Any other comments or help you could provide would be great, i love my bunny VERY much

You can find excellent information on how to care for him here:

www.bio.miami.edu/hare/rabbithealth.html

and

www.rabbit.org

You should also consider joining Etherbun, a free listserve about health, care and behavior of rabbits:

www.bio.miami.edu/hare/etherbun.html

There are more than 4000 subscribers, and you can get plenty of help and advice about almost any problem your bunny might have, 24 hours a day.

Hope that helps.  Please write back if you have any other questions.

Dana