Can a rabbit die of stress a week after the event?

[BarnyardBlast]

A friend of mine raises rabbits and is on vacation for a month. When she left, she had four adult females, one male, and six babies. I raise rabbits as well, but only for about a year. She left another person house-sitting who would feed, water the rabbits and she asked me to be on stand-by if anything went wrong and also to go over weekly to clean the cages.

Less than a week after she left, a pack of dogs attacked the rabbit hutch (there is a gate, but it was knocked over by the dogs, according to the house-sitter). Two adults and two babies were killed. The remaining babies sustained injuries to ears and paws but were otherwise okay. The other adults were okay (as far as I could tell) although there did appear to be some missing fur and scratches. I went out there to look them over, but the house-sitter had already contacted a neighbor who had cleaned up the dead rabbits.

To prevent another attack, the cages were moved into the garage which was a bit more secure. My friend asked me to see what I could do to repair the rabbit hutch and move some of them back to the upper portion. I am supposed to go out tomorrow.

The house-sitter just called me to tell me that another adult rabbit has died. Could this be due to stress? (Or maybe an injury wasn't noticed and became infected?). The attack happened a week ago.

 

[Pastor Dave]

Sure, any of it is possible. How warm is the area they are now in? It doesn't take much to stress them. Even the move into the garage can top off the already high stress level from the attack.

 

[Baymule]

does the garage heat up during the day? heat will flat out kill them.

 

[BarnyardBlast]

The weather has been mostly rainy here (Alabama) so it's been warm (but not hot) and humid. Yesterday, though, was fairly cool. It was in the upper 70's. Their garage is in the shade so I doubt it was hot enough to kill (or even cause stress from heat). They didn't leave any ice bottles or plates, but I'll look into it (just in case) and see how hot it's getting and take some ice bottles over.

One thing that did occur to me this morning when I woke up - they also have a cat and I'm wondering if the house-sitter is keeping the cat in the garage as well due to the dogs. It's a large garage, with more than one room, but the cages were placed on cement blocks on the ground (the rabbit hutch was basically a frame that held the cages but it's been damaged. I'm going over today with my husband to see if we can fix it so we can put at least two of them back in place). If the cat is being allowed in the garage, even if she's not messing with the rabbits, that could definitely stress out a rabbit.

Any other suggestions, let me know. My friend has lost her colored rabbits (which she had only purchased a few months ago) and the mother rabbit. She has left a breeding pair and four little ones. She raises rabbits to eat, but she also enjoys them and loves them. I feel so sorry for her.

 

[BarnyardBlast]

The cat has been in the garage with the rabbits. The house-sitter said that the cat has always been allowed around the rabbits and things have been fine. The rabbit who died, however, was new (about two months here). Even if the cat was fine around the rabbit, the rabbit might have become stressed due to the cat.