Well, grrrr, pasteurella? where did this come from?

[coffeenutdesigns]

I'm going to have to cull my favorite buck tomorrow. He had some sneezing while I was gone and today he had a fit of sneezing and is showing white **** in his eyes. Ugh. I've had this guy from the beginning with no problems. Even though he's technically my "backup" buck, he has actually sired more litters than my other bucks have. He is my broken black who throws such pretty broken kits. I did add new stock back in the early spring but they are well past quarantine and they've been housed in the regular rabbit shed for several months now with no problems. I guess it could be heat stress from the ungodly temperatures the past few days, but man I hate to see it. I've had to deal with so many issues I'm not taking any chances. I do have 2 litters of kits out of him right now and one broken black doe that is his daughter I've had for a little over a year, so I won't be losing the line, but he has been my favorite guy.

On the plus side, I'll go ahead and dispatch the doe I've put off sending to freezer camp because I didn't want to go through all the trouble of dispatching just one rabbit.

 

[akane]

Aside from various viruses that can cause respiratory symptoms there are different strains. Some tests have shown as many as 80% of rabbits carry some strain of pasturella without symptoms. It's possible despite no symptoms that your new rabbits were carrying a strain your buck could not keep dormant when stressed. Healthy rabbits are not sterile rabbits. They are rabbits who don't get sick even when exposed.

 

[squidpop]

:yeahthat:
I think medirabbit lists about 7 different bacteria besides pasteurella that cause snuffles symptoms, I think it can even be something like a staph infection in the sinuses. One of my rabbits had really bad snuffles and sneezed lots of white snot, and after I treated with azithromycin it cleared right up, never came back, didn't spread to other rabbits. I think the reason it cleared up is because it wasn't really pasteurella at all.

 

[coffeenutdesigns]

Yeah, it's the whole 'could not keep dormant when stressed' that is the problem. I have high temps. It is what it is. I had hoped since all the rabbits have been housed together this long with no problems I would be clear, but 100+ degree temps tends to show you where your problems are. It's okay. At one point I had planned to cull all but the new trio, but I never had the chance. Really having a broken black makes my job harder because the colored bunnies are just prettier and therefore harder to want to dispatch. He has been a really good buck, but now he'll be a really good jar of canned rabbit.

 

[Miss M]

You can develop your own line so that it is hardy to your location, and that's what you'll be working toward by culling him.

I know about the brokens and all... Shortly, I will have eliminated broken from my herd. Not colored, but broken. Not because of sickness, but because of growth -- all the brokens are descended from a minilop, and they don't tend to grow quickly. I'll have to get it back somehow, because we love brokens as well as solids.