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Why BUNS Spays and Neuters
This year is the 25th anniversary of BUNS! We're celebrating by sharing stories about our history.
In 1992, when BUNS began, there were only a few bunnies at the shelter. But with BUNS the quality of care increased and rabbits were not routinely euthanized. People became more comfortable bringing rabbits to the shelter. By 1994, it was clear that rabbits were entering the shelter faster than they were leaving. Some of the rabbits delivered litters at the shelter. So we were very aware of how quickly rabbits could breed.
At first we handled the increased population by adding more housing. Outdoor hutches at first and then we built the rabbit building. The building housed 18 cages, which we thought would be sufficient. But no. The rabbits kept coming in and not enough were going out.
One of our volunteers, Vickie Ward, had worked with other non profit animal rescue groups. She advocated for spaying and neutering rabbits from the begining. At that time, the County, on adoption of an un-neutered dog, collected a refundable spay neuter fee. The money would be refunded to the adopter upon presentation of proof that the dog had been neutered. Not everyone reclaimed their money, so the money in the fund grew. The County used the unclaimed money to spay or neuter dogs and cats. BUNS asked for some of the money for rabbit spay and neuters. We did get one grant, but it did not last long.
Vickie made arrangements with Dr. Westheimer to spay and neuter rabbits for a reduced price. She, very generously, agreed to donate the cost of spay and neuter from her own pocket. Vickie continued to pay for spays and neuters until she stopped volunteering at BUNS. By that time we were committed to spay neuter. To this day, BUNS spays and neuters all the rabbits although the cost is often over $200 per animal.
BUNS also tried neutering male guinea pigs, but sadly the guinea pigs we neutered died shortly afterwards. After four deaths, we had to give up.
It took a long time and a lot of hard work to develop our current spay neuter program, but there were two excellent outcomes.
First, Animal Services decided to spay and neuter the rabbits at the Santa Maria and Lompoc shelters prior to adoption. They did not want residents of those towns to have less service than BUNS was providing.
Second, over the years intake at BUNS has reduced and our rabbit population, while it varies, has stopped growing. Still, every year BUNS gets calls from families whose rabbits gave birth unexpectedly. Today, we are better able to help them and we are glad to be of assistance.
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