Quinn (the Mighty)...

is a major cutie. His fur coat is grey with some brownish highlights and sort of fluffy so that he looks a little scruffy even when he isn't. Quinn's name was inspired by the Manfred Mann song "Quinn the Eskimo" which was written by the genius Bob Dylan.

Quinn came to Heartland Rabbit Rescue back in August as a result of a call from a local municipal shelter. It seems that Quinn's time had run out and he was at risk of execution because no human family wanted him. The Heartland Director squeezed and squoshed and managed to find a place for Quinn even though Heartland is way over capacity.

Quinn (the Mighty Quinn)

 He was picked up running the streets and we don't know how or why...no one claimed him at the municipal facility and a kind, caring worker there gave Heartland a call and made a plea for him. His is just a baby, maybe a couple of months old.

At first he didn't much want anything to do with humans, but has now figured out that human animals can act pretty decently and he is becoming one of those rare bunnies that endures being carried around, even seeming to actually enjoy it. His personality is maybe 5 or 6 times larger than his physical being (he's a fairly small guy, only a couple of pounds right now) with energy to burn.

At the time of this writing he is having to stay inside his enclosure for a few days because his recent surgery (neutering). Once recovery is far enough along, he'll be going everywhere again with all the life and joy anyone could wish for. Quinn is a real treat to be around, one of those folks that makes you smile when you see him. It is astonishing how much niftiness mother nature can pack into a small package.

I'm writing about Quinn because he is a pleasure worth sharing and because Quinn represents all the many millions of "domesticated" Earthlings that are without a human family to call their own. Quinn could be a poster child for adopting, never ever ever purchasing from a "breeder". Too too many of our brother and sister Earthlings don't have homes.

I helped out with an adoption event recently for a local cat rescue group, Hands Helping Paws, and 28 lucky kittens and cats found homes. Hooray!

Bunnies are a little bit different. They are a little more vulnerable, a little more requiring of some education for proper care and a little more needful of a particular mindset if a good fit is going to be made between a family or human and a bunny. Maybe part of the problem is that the stereotypes of popular culture (for instance, the Easter Bunny) and the reality of rabbit behavior don't match up too well. Suffice it to say that most of us (me included) have to put in some time, effort, attention and learning in order to be in a position to be able to offer adequate care to a rabbit.

This means an adoption event like the one for the kittens would probably not work for the bunnies...oh you might get a number of bunnies into homes, the cute factor for a bunny is off the charts...but the likelihood is high that bunnies would be placed at risk for inadequate care and humans placed at risk for disappointment and upset and failure. These factors mean that bunnies finding a home that works is a fairly intricate and involved operation. Compared to a cat or a dog, a bunny is more 'high maintenance'...not too difficult once you get used to it and care becomes routinized...but definitely different than most humans are familiar with or used to. Which means that learning and change has to happen and that is sometimes tough for humans to accomplish.

Quinn is now safe, Quinn is now loved and Quinn will grow and develop. That's pretty good.

You can do your part in helping make all animals safer and more likely to grow and develop if you live as an ethical vegan. And, for goodness sake, adopt one of the Earthlings without a human family from a shelter...if you can....if you can't then volunteer or donate and help out a shelter or a rescue operation...remember...they are trying to repair or stop the damage we have done to the animals. They are trying to clean up and rectify part of the mess the rest of us have made for living beings on our planet...that's a pretty good thing to do.

Rescued young ones.............

Saturday, October the 2nd was a gorgeous day weather-wise and Veronica was not the only bunny  to get to be featured in "film". The first video is of the brother of "Fast Eddie", these 2 brothers were born at Heartland Rabbit Rescue after their mother was found running through a neighborhood in Edmond, OK.

This video has only about 30 seconds of footage but enough to allow you to see that the "baby" has grown into a very good-looking youngster. They are bunny "adolescents" now and anytime they are allowed running free privileges inside the warren you can be sure they elicit upset and irritation from everyone they get near (sound familiar?).

It is remarkable how most (if not all) of us mammals follow the same trajectory of development and decline. Young...increasing physical abilities, need lots of care and attention, adolescent...can look out for self but reckless and irritating, adult....fending for self (mostly), healthy, elderly....decreasing physical abilities, increasing needs for care.

This dependent, independent, dependent path is followed by human animals, rabbit animals, dog animals, cat animals, rat animals, ad infinitum. We all start out relatively helpless and dependent, then proceed to relative independence and.....if we are lucky to live that long.....begin a period of decreasing physical abilities and waning independence. For those of you that continue to cling to the delusion that we humans are not animals, well........

Here is a brief view of a bunny version of a middle school kiddo.

The next video is of Gwendolyn. Gwendolyn was running the streets of Noble, OK when she was about 7 weeks old. She was emaciated and in poor shape. Luckily for her she ended up at Heartland instead of being a predator's meal.

Gwendolyn is a real sweetie, she is very social and often seeks out strokes and petting from humans that happen to be around. She knows that humans call her Gwendolyn and will respond to that name. In the video we can see her finding some tasty bits by digging in the earth and....using her special ears and eyes to listen and watch for danger.

Gwendolyn belongs to a group of animal people that do not attack or hurt other animal people for food. She is a vegan, a live and let live individual, a prey animal, unlike the more usual companion animals cats (obligate carnivore) and dogs (omnivore)....who are both predator and prey animals.

Gwendolyn has a different approach to life.....she is quiet for the most part and rarely vocalizes (the better to avoid drawing attention to herself), she (along with all bunnies) has very little odor......if you sniff a healthy bunny what you get is a very faint smell of fresh bread. At least that's what they smell like to me. Take a good whiff of a dog or a cat and you will likely get a much stronger smell (not a fresh bread smell, for sure)......they do not need to be as invisible to their environment. Cat and dog animals also make lots more noise than do rabbit animals.

Can we generalize? Vegans.....quiet, little odor, live and let live. Predators.....noisy, stinky, hurt others.

Here is Gwendolyn enjoying the outdoors.

 Most of us humans have been exposed to cat and dog animals. A much smaller number of humans have been exposed to rabbit animals (or other non-omnivore or non-carnivore animals).

Rabbit animals and cow animals and horse animals and sheep animals and chicken animals all share an approach to living that can be called vegan. They do not typically use other living (sentient) beings for food or clothing or entertainment, etc. (note: chickens will eat insects, worms and sometimes carrion)

None of the previously named animal people eat sentient beings for food. They do not hunt or stalk or ambush or kill other (sentient) living beings (except accidentally or in self-defense).  Notice what we human animals do with vegan animals.....we exploit them, enslave them, kill them. (Hell, we exploit and kill all other animals, but numerically by far the largest number of our victims are vegan animals)

We tend to ridicule human animals that emulate the vegan animals and try to live a life of not harming others. Readers that practice a vegan lifestyle are familiar with this. Readers that follow other approaches to living almost invariably think (or have thought) vegan folks are extremists, weird, odd or peculiar.

Average folks believe enslaving, exploiting and killing just for convenience, pleasure, entertainment or taste is 'normal'......avoiding harm to others is, well, 'weird'.

Curious, isn't it?

Notes for August 20th, 2010....

Tomorrow, August 21st, is International Homeless Animal's Day.  The Oklahoma Alliance for Animals is sponsoring an adoption event in conjunction with this day of acknowledgment.  The notion of honoring homeless animals was created by the International Society for Animal Rights. 

If you think about it, the concept of homelessness for animals covers quite an area.  Those animal people we call "wild", whose home is presumably the natural world.....human animals are destroying the natural world at a fearsome rate....hence depriving those "wild" animal people of a home. 

We human animals are executing about 4 million animal people annually in the United States because they don't have a home.  We call them "strays".  Oh, and we try to soften up the hard reality of what we are doing by calling it "euthanize" instead of execution or killing.  Euthanasia is defined as a "painless" death to end the life of someone suffering from a terminal illness or incurable condition.  For these millions of animal people, homelessness is...I guess...an incurable condition.  Usually we think only of dogs and cats when we think of animal shelters, actually all different species of animal people end up in shelters.....rabbits, horses, iguanas....you name it. 

How about this, go visit your local animal person shelter, if you can, adopt a homeless animal person...you will likely be saving a life.  If you can't adopt, volunteer and help make those homeless animal persons more comfortable.  If you can't adopt or volunteer, search around and find a local animal rescue or shelter that provides permanent sanctuary for animal people....then sponsor one of the animals residing there.  Sanctuaries that provide permanent residence for those animal people that have no other options are always in need of whatever assistance you can provide.

In central Oklahoma, Heartland Rabbit Rescue, Second Chance, Wildcare, Hand Helping Paws, Blue Hawk, and Free To Live are all organizations dedicated to providing shelter and care for animal people.......and they do not engage in the killing of their residents in order to make room for others...........This may not be a complete list for this area so search on your own too.  If you are not located here, find out about the resources for homeless animals in your area and help out.........Please.

Remember, most animal homelessness is directly or indirectly caused by human animals.  Hence it is our responsibility to rectify it. 

Free movie....Home, an excellent full-length documentary about our planet is available online for free viewing.  The photography is superlative and Glenn Close narrates.  Increase your knowledge base about the place you live and where the other animal people live.

1,000 Canadian Rabbits to move to Texas

I ran across this story in the Victoria and Vancouver Island newspaper about feral rabbits overrunning the University of Victoria campus.  These bunnies were going to be killed unless placement could be found for them.  Voila, apparently a rescue shelter in East Texas is going to take 1,000 of the rabbits.  Wild Rose Rescue Ranch is going to provide them with a sheltered, protected area after they are trapped, spayed and neutered and then transported to Texas.  The link to Wild Rose will take you to a story on their website about Noah the one-legged pigeon that nurtures baby bunnies (among other species).

An organization called Fur-Bearer Defenders is donating $50,000 to help pay for the spaying and neutering.  Their mission is to end all forms of trapping used by the commercial fur industry.

Excellent........

Kiara being groomed.

Closer to home, back at Heartland Rabbit Rescue a couple of  hard-working young volunteers spent some time grooming Kiara and Sophie.

Sophie at the outdoor spa.