An Absolute Beginner's Guide to Keeping a Pet Rabbit Handling, Feeding, Housing, and Grooming

Learn everything you need to know to care for your new pet rabbit from a renowned rabbitry owner who specializes in bonding and socialization techniques.

An Absolute Beginner's Guide to Keeping a Pet Rabbit is essential guide for rabbit owners. Author Adriana Cinteza explains how to choose the right rabbit for you and your family, and gives detailed information on proper care—including feeding and watering, grooming, housing, handling, exercise, litter training, and visits to the vet.

She also provides advice about the most popular and friendly bunny breeds, and shares bonding and socialization techniques that she has developed from years of experience hand-raising rabbits and hosting her popular bunny therapy sessions with Blue Clover Rabbitry.

Adriana Cinteza is the owner of Blue Clover Rabbitry, an Auburn, Washington-based rabbit breeder that specializes in hand-raised rare blue-eyed Holland lops registered by the American Rabbit Breeder Association.

Preface: Introduction to the author and book
Why Rabbits? How to become life-long friends and make them a part of your family
Chapter 1: What are the Best Rabbit Breeds?
10-15 friendly breeds that make the best pets: notes on size, appearance, personality, compatibility with children, ease of care, health, and lifespan.
Parts of a rabbit
Common rabbit terms
How to choose the right rabbit for you and your family. What age rabbit do you want? A doe or buck? Is it ok to have just one rabbit?
Chapter 2: Where Should You Get Your Pet Rabbit?
Breeders vs. shelters vs. pet stores vs. online ads
Discuss differences in health and socialization when buying from any of the four options
Question: are you ok with rescuing a rabbit that may not have been socialized? I’ll go in-depth with ways to approach rabbits that may not like being picked up due to lack of socialization or trauma. They are not a lost cause!
How to find a responsible breeder and what to look for when you visit a rabbitry (check references?)
Recognizing a healthy rabbit
Making your selection and final purchase details (pedigree, guarantee, etc.)
What do you need before bringing your rabbit home?
How to bunny proof
How to help your rabbit make the transition
Chapter 3: Why Does a Rabbit Do That?
Rabbit Behaviors 101 a.k.a. How to Speak Rabbit
Rabbits have unique personalities.
Chapter 4: What Does a Rabbit Eat?
Feeding and watering
What to feed your pet rabbit: pellets, hay, fresh greens, treats, etc.
How often to feed and how much
Foods rabbits should never eat.
Chapter 5: Rabbit Housing
Rabbit setups indoors and outdoors
Explain different products and why they are or aren’t recommended: pens, cages, water bottles or bowls, feeders, litter boxes, litter, treats, toys, etc.
Where to buy supplies
Discuss appropriate pen or cage sizes and how much daily excercise they need outside of their cage. (Bunnies get bored.)
Talk about benefits of keeping rabbits indoors and/or outdoors
Housekeeping guidelines and cleaning tools
How to litter train your rabbit
Chapter 6: Grooming
Should you bathe your pet rabbit?
Do they smell bad?
Fur types
Discuss how to groom different breeds and how often. This can be a low maintenance to high maintenance job depending on the type of rabbit.
Trimming nails
How to make wool from angora rabbits
Chapter 7: Proper Handling
This chapter will cover different situations of properly handling bunnies that come from all different backgrounds. (Backyard breeders that don’t socialize, reputable breeders that do socialize, getting bunnies from shelters.)
Step-by-step instructions (detailed photos would be very beneficial in this section) of how to pick up your rabbit and make them feel secure. What to do AND what not to do
Discuss how to help children handle them correctly and an appropriate age.
What to do if your bunny bites
Chapter 8: Taking Care of Your Rabbit’s Health (What’s Up, Doc?)
Common and uncommon health issues such as GI stasis, malocclusion (overgrowing teeth), liver lobe torsion
Behaviors for each of the illnesses (you should look at your rabbit every day to see how they’re feeling; healthy bunny checklist)
The right vet for your rabbit
Health insurance options and if it’s worth buying
Spay and/or Neuter
Should you spay or neuter your rabbit and when?
 Pros and cons (boys spray urine and both genders can get hormonal and stop using their litter boxes. Explain how getting them fixed with correct litter box habits.)
Costs of spaying/neutering
Chapter 9: Socialization and Bonding
How to properly handle/pickup your rabbit
Tips and tricks to get them social with their new home and owners such as hand feeding, spending floor time with them, etc.
How to bond two rabbits together from different stages of life such as two litter mates going home together, one older and one younger, two older buns, etc.
How to bond multiple rabbits
It’s more complicated to bond three or more buns, so it’s important to help families to understand it’s much easier to get three babies near the same time. Adding a third bun to a bonded pair that’s already over four-months-old can be very tricky, but leading them through several different bonding methods may be very helpful to the success of having more than two. (Or it will bring the harsh reality that three may not be a good idea.)
How to introduce your rabbit to other household pets like dogs