So what's happened to all the Wild Things Cottontails??? Well if that's the question you're interested in, this is the post for you!
Sadly, as previously discussed, bunnies are some of the hardest baby animals to raise in wildlife rehabilitation. They have particular dietary and digestive issues which it is almost impossible to replicate as a human! However, WTS has had about half of all its bunny patients survive. All of the bunnies that were 12+ days did really well and have been released, but as you all know, I got so many tiny babies, and those have a less favourable statistic of survival.
An exception to this high mortality rate was Silver Blaze & her sibling Sparkles. If you go back to the posts in May, you can see that they arrived at about 5 days old, and Sparkles (or Catattack as she was previously known) had a giant gash along one arm. Amazingly not only did they survive the injuries, but they survived their rehabilitation and are doing great! To the right is a picture of Silver Blaze in the release hutch.
Here is the lovely Silver Blaze, about 3 weeks after her release, in the overgrown grasses of WTS. She is about 12 weeks old in this picture. The release cage is to the right, and she often goes in and out of it, looking for oats and other goodies.
She has been joined by another long-term WTS resident: Pale Pink! Pale Pink's nose finally healed, and here he is in the release cage 6 weeks ago (below) at about 11 weeks old. He left but returned 4 weeks later- perhaps he's taken a fancy to the lovely Silver Blaze! Though they were both here for a couple of months each, they never met....until they were released. And now they are together all the time. Of course, he also may have returned because he has what appears to be some ugly botfly larvae in his neck (see pictures below)!
And guess what??? The 4th wave of baby bunnies has just begun! There are about 4 "waves" of litters throughout the spring & summer. So that means that there may well be more babies at WTS very soon!! Just like this little Bunchalicious who was part of the 3rd wave!
