Today we had a little bit, I mean a lot, of drama at our house. And it was all over baby bunnies.
It was later this afternoon and the girls were outside playing with Dell. Christian and I were hanging out in the kitchen and Megan runs in and says, "Dell is eating another animal." I thought it wasn't a big deal and let it be. I didn't really worry about it until about two minutes later. Courtney runs in all frantic and in tears, "Mom, Dell is eating a baby animal!!!" I ran out there just in time to see Dell picking up a baby animal and putting it in her mouth. Poor Courtney was ready to come unglued! I went over to Dell and told in a very serious manner to get in the house!! I swear I saw her swallow a poor thing on the way from the door to the lawn and as I got there, she dropped whatever she had and ran inside I put her in the bathroom right away because she tends to get sick when she eats something bad.
Now that she is put away, I have to go back outside and see what this thing was. Dell had obviously dug these things up because there was grass and animal hair right by the hole. I determined to myself that they were moles. They were little and they looked like moles and we have had them in our yard before. I saw one alive by the hole yet, so I let it be. I had to deal with Courtney. I took her inside and just sat and held her while she cried. "Why did Dell have to eat the babies?? I don't like Dell anymore. I even heard them squeaking as Dell was eating them" (sob, sob, sob!!) The poor thing had seen Dell eat the baby moles just like I did. If you don't know Courtney, she has a HUGE heart, especially for animals lately. It just breaks my heart to see her so distraught!!
We sat down to eat supper because we had Bible school tonight and Courtney refused to eat, she said she wasn't hungry. We talked about the moles the whole meal while Courtney still cried. Soon, Matt came home. We explained to him what had happened and he went outside to check out the hole. I told him I had saw one by the hole, but I swear Dell had dropped one quite a ways away from the hole. Matt went outside and looked down at the hole and there was a baby rabbit!! They weren't moles, they were rabbits! He picked that one up and came and showed Courtney. Now she was happy that they weren't dead and started to cheer up, even though she is still convinced that Dell ate one, or two.
Matt them decided that we were going to take care of this rabbit. We told Courtney that while she was at Bible school, we would go to the pet store and see what baby rabbits eat and how to take care of them. She went into the garage and found a shoe box, so we got an old towel and put the baby rabbit in there.
Matt went back outside then and when he came in, he had the other baby rabbit in a cup. He had found this one in the grass, this must've been the one Dell dropped. It didn't look good at all, but he added it to the shoe box and we left for Bible school.
Two hours later, we came and didn't know what we would find. Two dead rabbits, one dead, one alive, Dell puked a rabbit up, we didn't know! Well, both rabbits were alive and doing well. The hurt one had actually moved and burrowed into the towel like the other one had. We got the milk out that we had bought at the pet store and tried to feed them, but they didn't take the milk. Their eyes are not even open yet! They looked like they just wanted to sleep.
We know that these rabbits might not make it. The man at the pets store told us that if the mama came back and realized that her babies smelled like something else, she would kill them. (We didn't tell Courtney this.) We were also reading online that professionals even have a hard time keeping baby wild rabbits alive, but we'll do this for Courtney.
In the end, we aren't sure if Dell ate a rabbit or not, she's been fine all night. Now the rabbits are in her house, I wonder what she would do if she knew they were in the shoe box on the counter!!
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