Born: April 2007

Gender: Male (Buck)

Breed: Dwarf Lop Rabbit

Appearance: Charlie has a fudge brown coat with some white areas and has dark brown/black eyes and big droopy ears and a little stumpy tail.  Unfortunately, he also features some battle scars on his ears from fighting with his ex-hutch mates!

Personality: He is a very sweet rabbit who can be quite anxious.  He likes to be left alone mostly, but will come to you in his own time, especially if any of his favourite food treats are on offer.

Favourite Food: He loves his rabbit pellet food but also can’t resist dock and dandelion leaves.

Habits: Charlie loves to go out on his rabbit lead and take you for a walk!  He has an uncanny way of seeming to know when you are trying to catch him and can take you on a merry dance around the rabbit run. 

Naughtiest Moments: He has an annoying habit of diving into his shelter within his cage, if he thinks you are trying to catch him. The only way of getting him out is to dismantle everything – by which time he’s usually shot past you anyway!

Although Charlie is quite a shy rabbit and doesn't really like to be handled, we were really surprised by his behaviour one day. Laura had taken him for a walk on his lead and popped into the house with him. She was in the room that the dogs sleep in and Charlie ran over and jumped on Laura’s lap, nestled his head into her neck – and wouldn't budge! This was very unusual behaviour for Charlie and we suspect that he felt very vulnerable from the scent of the dogs and was looking for comfort. It was lovely anyway, whatever the reason, and Laura intends to do this a bit more often to get more cuddles from Charlie.

At 4 months old we discovered to our horror that all 3 remaining rabbits were male! We had thought that we had 3 female rabbits and one male, and having lost Gemma our chances of having one or two litters of baby rabbits were gone. Our main disappointment though, was concerns over the rabbits continuing to live together as a group as male rabbits do not get on.

Part of the joy of having rabbits was seeing them live together as a group. We knew that as they were all male it was unlikely that this could continue, but we did want to give them every possible chance. This meant a trip to the vets and all 3 boys, Charlie, Phil and Snowy being castrated. As testosterone (the male hormone) from the testicles is largely what causes male territorial and aggressive behaviour.

We had all three rabbits castrated when they were 5 months old. Both the vet and experienced rabbit breeders had advised us that following castration, if we waited approximately 6 weeks, then gradually re-introduce the rabbits there was a small chance of them being able to accept each other again and live peacefully.

During the separation period we kept them always in view of each other and able to communicate through dividers and we rotated the areas so that they didn't get too territorial. It is now about 10 weeks since their ops and we are disappointed to say that the re-introductions haven't gone well so far but we haven't given up hope yet. We will keep you posted in the blog.

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