Kerry Quintilliani caught a glimpse of a white, lop-eared rabbit outside her office in a business complex in Wakefield, MA.  She’d seen wild rabbits there before, but this one stuck out as a domesticated bunny.  She called her sister to help try to capture the abandoned pet, but to no avail. So she left some food out and decided to call the House Rabbit Network and try again the next day.

Unfortunately, the white rabbit was nowhere to be found. But Quintilliani and volunteers from the House Rabbit Network did discover the white rabbit’s buddy, a brown domestic rabbit, who was trapped in an air vent.  According to Quintilliani, “There was no way into this space except for a 3-inch gap the bunny had fallen through. The bunny responded to food and water passed into the space [by volunteers] and seemed to be healthy so a plan was made to find someone who could open up the grates so he could be rescued.”

That someone was Joe Voto, who spent 5 hours sawing through the vent to make a hole large enough for a person to get in and bring the rabbit to safety.

The rabbit, named Joey after Voto’s son, will be neutered and available for adoption from the House Rabbit Network soon.

Good job to the good samaritans and and the volunteers of the House Rabbit Network for sparing one rabbit’s life!

For more info: http://www.wickedlocal.com/wakefield/news/x2043504462/Volunteers-hop-to-it-in-rabbit-rescue-effort
House Rabbit Network

Ray Milkey of Los Altos, CA won $1000 when the photo he entered of his two foster bunnies was chosen as the best entry for PetSource.org’s “Cutest Baby Pet” contest. He has generously opted to give the prize money to The Rabbit Haven, the shelter where the two baby dwarf hotot rabbits, Lassen and Denali, came from. Due to the popularity of the contest, Lassen has already been adopted, and with any luck, Denali will find a forever home soon too.

For more info: http://www.santacruzsentinel.com/ci_9308508

Now is the time when many rescues get a lot of unwanted rabbits. It’s been just long enough after Easter that bunnies that were bought for the holiday start to lose their charm with people who didn’t have accurate expectations of owning a pet rabbit. And so the bunny gets “set free” in the wild or placed in shelters.

Bonnie Pulver of Dance with the Bunnies Rabbit Rescue in Greenville, NC has tried to curb this trend by passing out informational flyers and directing people to Make Mine Chocolate. She runs a foster home for bunnies out of her house through the Friends of the Pitt County Animal Shelter. And while “bounce-back bunnies” are less than ideal, she would prefer people relinquish their unwanted pets to a no-kill rescue/shelter rather than setting them loose in the wild, where they have little chance of survival.

According to Pulver, “Turning them loose does not set them free. It makes them food. That white bunny has no security in the wild … They are on the very bottom of the food chain.”

For more information, visit: http://www.bunspace.com/view_bunny?bunid=3547 http://www.reflector.com/local/content/news/stories/2008/05/05/RabbitRescue.html

Jody Caizza has run Kind Heart Rescue for 20 years out of her log cabin home, which is located on 14 wooded acres in Cream Ridge, NJ. Her rescue provides sanctuary to homeless dogs and rabbits. Devoting 35 hours/week to caring for the animals and contributing $5000-$10,000 of the necessary $20,000/year it takes to maintain the rescue, Caizza’s love for animals is unquestionable.

For more info: http://www.app.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=/20080407/LIFE05/80403079/1006/LIFE
http://www.kindheartrescue.com/

The Midwest Rabbit Rescue & Re-home finished in 6th place- a dramatic comeback from their ranking of 21 just a few days ago. Zootoo will continue to validate all the points all the shelters received, so their current ranking may shift a bit. Next, a panel of judges from Zootoo will visit each shelter and make their decision who is to be the first place winner of a million dollar shelter makeover! Second place will receive $10,000 and the other 18 contestants will receive $5000 each. Congratulations Midwest Rabbit Rescue & Re-home!

Zootoo.com’s contest for the million dollar shelter makeover ends tomorrow (3/31/08) at midnight. Help put Midwest Rabbit Rescue back in the top 20 (they are currently ranked 21) by registering on Zootoo using this link: http://www.zootoo.com/register/referrer/midwestrabbitrr

Then, under the heading, Affiliate with a Shelter, type in the zipcode, 48170, and select Midwest Rabbit Rescue and Re-home from the dropdown menu. This will earn them 200 points.

Midwest Rabbit Rescue is the only rabbit rescue close to making it into the top 20 (which is required to be eligible for the million dollar makeover). So all you bunny lovers out there, register with Zootoo, and get all your friends to register as well!

The dedicated volunteers at Midwest Rabbit Rescue & Re-home will be participating in a St. Patrick’s Day parade in Royal Oak, MI on Saturday, March 15, at 11 am.  Donning bunny ears, the volunteers will be holding banners and passing out information about their rescue and their quest to win a million dollar shelter makeover from Zootoo.com.

Well I just came across this story about Midwest Rabbit Re-home, which is located near Ann Arbor, Michigan. Apparently, they are the only rabbit rescue close to winning a million dollar shelter renovation offered by Zootoo.com. Currently, they are ranked 11 out of 20, and they can rise in the rankings if they get enough points via this page: zootoo.com/register/referrer/midwestrabbitrr

You have to register with Zootoo and put in Midwest Rabbit Re-home’s zip code (48170) and then choose their name from the dropdown menu. Registering gets 100 points, and you can earn more points by writing reviews, volunteering, commenting on news, and referring other people to the site. So far I’ve earned 140 points… I have to think of more products to review so I can earn some more.

In seeing photos of Midwest Rabbit Re-home’s current shelter, it does look like a makeover is in order. As of now, they are using an old warehouse as their shelter, and while they’ve done the best they can to fix up the space, a million dollar grant would go a long way.

Great Lakes Rabbit Sanctuary, located at an old farm in Whittaker, MI, is the largest rabbit rescue in the US. Currently, their rabbit population has reached 550, with 75 adoptable bunnies and 475 feral rabbits. The rabbits up for adoption live in pens while the feral rabbits live outdoors in two large enclosures. There, the rabbits have dug an elaborate warren, but come out to play in the snow and run around.

For more information, see kids’ news video: Bunny Town! and the Great Lakes Rabbit Sanctuary website.