Bless your heart. He may do OK out there, if he can cope with predators. Some people get rabbits for pets for their kids, and then find out they're a little more trouble than they think they will be. A buck rabbit is nothing to mess with, and I found out the hard way many years ago when I tangled with my sis's "what she thought was a doe" rabbit. He got my hand, and hung on and let me have it with his hind legs. Youza. That smarted.

My mother, who lived on a street where the back yard bordered up to the wilds, in town, had a big blue rabbit who showed up in her driveway and hung around the back of her house. We say him nightly for at least two years when we would pull in the driveway, as he froze in the car's lights. It was a domestic, not wild. He disappeared but I swear I saw wildlings who looked a little like him and they're still around.

You can litterbox train rabbits. Bring him in for the winter.

If this was our house DH would already have named him Fluffy & would be planning on how he was going to integrate him into what our vet calls "the herd."

I had a friend who always had a tangle of cats....and a rabbit. The rabbit was litter trained and really acted pretty much like a cat.
Don't know if it was a buck of a doe...but since all critters were black and white you didn't know which was which...until they moved.
bring the bunny in....feed it rabbit chow.

I suppose you could always build a little hutch for him on your porch. Something small and tight so he can keep warm with straw on the bottom...

You're right to worry about a seemingly domesticated animal going it alone in the winter.

Lee used to have a pet rabbit.
I think he and his wife have another one now.

If he checks in he'll know what to do.

Keep us posted on the bunny! Gotta wonder how he's avoided being eaten by dogs in the neighborhood??

Joan

Snowing and the wind is blowing speeds of over 50 mph. Had made a snug little house for Spook some years back when she though she would be an outside only cat, she changed her mind. It is insulated botom, top and sides, so, put it out for Mr. rabbit See if he uses it

Maybe he is late, for a very important date?

AARGH>>>>>
I was thinking he might need a top hat to sleep in.

Mr. Bunny stayed overnight in our shed. I left the door ajar and put the insulated house in there. Bought a little sack of rabbit food yesterday snd put some out by the shed door. Its gone so either the rabbit or a possum or coon got it. Would hope it was the rabbit. Have to round up some straw or other litter for the floor of the box, carpet in there now and tell tale little brown pellets on it. Have plenty of fall spinach to supplement this guys meals and he sure seem to like it. There almost never are any dogs running loose and our back yard is fenced so even if they were they couldn't get in. There is a little hole by the back gate, just cat or rabbit size that the animals use. Put an ad in the local weekly so we'll see if we have a rabbit for good or is just a visitor. He'll let me touch him but seems more comfortable around the cat.

You're a good soul, George. Thanks for caring about the little creatures. :o)

Karen

What a great story. Where on earth did the little guy come from? I hope he makes it and that you'll keep us up to date on him. Could you put a notices up in the post office,grocery store etc. that you had found a pet rabbit?

You have a good heart and Mr Bunny is probably thankful for a warm place to sleep and food to eat.
wish we could see a picture....hint, hint...........

You'd best give him a name.......so we can quit calling him Mr. Bunny, lol. There used to be a design hobos would carve at a household's gate, so that other hobos would know that this was a good place to get a warm meal. It was called the "kind hearted woman" rune. I think the wildlife have your household pegged.
Good luck.

George, thanks for helping the bunny. You and Leone are kind-hearted people.

Now, how are you faring with the blizzard? Did it hit your part of Nebraska? My DH is from Mitchell, SD and on-line, yesterday, he read that I-90 was closed from Mitchell to the Wyoming line. If I remember correctly, that's around 300 miles! Hope maybe it missed your area.

George, I'll just bet that the bunny did belong to a family
with a cat. If no one claims him, he'll be just fine with you and Leone.

I know Lee's rabbit lived in the house and used the litter box. I wish he would check in.

My niece has a couple of rabbits and 3 cats. They get along fine, but they have different litterboxes. Calliope, I just had to laugh about your hobo remark. My husband said the same thing yesterday after a second possum and another stray cat showed up at the front door.

Aw, that's great. Glad he is using the house. The spinach sounds good to me too.. lol. When we lived in New Orleans we had 2 rabbits. There was a big low wide window that I built a hutch on the outside of. The rabbits had free reign in the house and would jump up into the hutch to go to the bathroom. At the time we also had a doberman, a cocker spaniel and 4 cats. They all got along together and would lay together in a big pile. The biggest rabbit liked to groom everybody. His favorite was my doberman. Those two were always laying [ or lying.. hmm.] together.

A related story. I've probably told this here at one time. The biggest rabbit was Babette. A big white one. At the time Christy and I worked opposite shifts dispatching for a barge line. She worked 6am to 6pm, then I worked 6pm to 6am. So, one night when I was at work Christy called all freaked out. She said there was something wrong with Babette. That she had hurt herself and there was flesh hanging. OKK.. I ask is there blood. No blood. Her.. come home. Me.. I can't leave the fleet. If she's not bleeding I'll be home in 3 hours and will check. I get home.... The hanging flesh was... testicles. Babette had grown up and become Bobette as he was then known forever more. The rabbit testes are very long, sorta shaped like their feet..lol. Poor Christy. She hasn't lived that one down yet. She was sure he/she was dying.

so have you named him yet George?

Not yet, mentioned it to Leone and her reply, wait until the paper comes out, see if anyone claims him and if he is still around, if he is, then we will give him a name.

Two boys about 10 and 12 showed up this afternoon and asked if we had seen a white rabbit. We questioned them and apparently our guest belongs to them. Seems their dad sometimes lets their rabbits out of their hutch and lets them just roam their yard. This one, "Pierre Lapin" apparently got through an open gate and made himself at home with us for the last 2 weeks. Its dark now and I don't know whether or not the kids caught the bunny. Probably will know in the morning.

Well, I sure hope that Pierre shows up and gets to go back home. I am not impressed with a Papa who would let domestic rabbits out for a jaunt, however.

That's a pretty sophisticated francophilic name for a white rabbit. LOL. If he doesn't get found and caged pretty soon his name might end up being Hassenpfeffer.

Suzy!! LOL! I hope that Pierre has now gone home to his real family. I'd really hate to see someone's pet wind up on the dinner table.

I guess it depends in which area of the country one lives, but rabbit is (or at least used to be) pretty common fare on the dinner plate. I've eaten my share of it. My sis lost her huge buck rabbit that way. Someone just trespassed onto the property and took it out of its cage.

I used to see rabbit commonly in the market meat cases, but not much anymore.....only on rare occasions in the more sophisticated stores. It was a meat my ex and I used to hunt for. They're great sport and it takes a decent shot to hit them. I was a crack squirrel hunter, but my startle reflex was too honed to be good at rabbit hunting or dove. By the time I recovered, they were history and giving me the raspberry. LOL.

I like rabbit, just not ones I've been introduced to. One of my favorite restaurants in St. Louis used to serve rabbit pasta in the winter time. It was a very yummy dish.

And Suzy, my dog isn't good for much, but he's a really good rabbit & squirrel hunter. Maybe I could loan him to you.

Andie, I'm exactly the same way. I had pet rabbits as a kid, and I love my neighbor kids' pet rabbits, but I didn't hesitate to order the rabbit special when I saw it on the menu in Nice last week. And before my whole family started staying with me for Easter, it was my tradition to cook bunny for Easter dinner alongside baby carrots and colored roasted potatoes. The farm raised rabbits I buy live much nicer lives than just about anything in my grocery store's meat case.

Both my dogs are awesome bunny chasers and are happy to scare them out of my garden for me. They have shown no aggression towards (and have even play-bowed to) stray cats in our yard. I wonder how they would have responded to a tame bunny. Something tells me that bunny was lucky to have wandered into George & Leonne's yard & not ours...

Did the boys ever find Pierre Lapin, Gandle? Suzy's right, there's no excuse for that father to have let that bunny out unsupervised!

Would have to guess the boys got the bunny because there is no sign of it today. Didn't eat the pile of rabbit food I put by our shed door or no signs of it being in the shed last night. Wish I had gotten the kids names, would have called to see if they were successful in their rabbit chase.

I'm thinking those boys have Pierre at home - at least I prefer to believe that.

Lucky Pierre! :)

You called?
Ah, you were just referring to the rabbit's good fortune.

We had a black and white mini-Lop bunny when the kids were small, given to us by some of our veterinary clients. I am NOT a pet-in-the-house person, despite being a veterinarian, so mister bunny was relegated to an outdoor life. He terrorized our dogs, but loved the little Holstein calves down at the barn, and took up with them - once getting a broken leg when one stepped on him, but a splint and a few weeks put everything good as new.
Somewhere in a photo album there's a fuzzy photo of the rabbit and a Holstein heifer - both with similar black and white spot patterns - nuzzling one another.

Lucky! How wonderful to see you hop, ah, pop in! Hope all has been well with you and yours. Happy Thanksgiving!

"I am NOT a pet-in-the-house person, despite being a veterinarian, so mister bunny was relegated to an outdoor life."

Sorry, but if an animal is made to live its life outside alone, it's not a pet. It's livestock, or a working animal, but if it isn't part of the family and isn't loved, cherished and an important part of the lives of the humans, it's NOT a pet. So, if you don't have animals that live with you and are a meaningful piece of your life, you have livestock or working animals. You do NOT have pets.

Lucky didn't say he had a pet.....any pet, he just said he had a bunny.

When I saw this thread still going I had to check and see if Mr. Rabbit found his home. It looks like he did and hopefully all is well. Must make you feel good Gandle.