worming bunnies

[BlackBunny]

I recently had to move, I cut down my herd to just 5 bunnies to start over, this month has been crazy stressfull but the bunnies are home finally.
Issue is I put everyone together for about two weeks through the move, everyone looks fine, eating/drinking/pooping fine but my husband picked one up and believes he saw small white worms coming out her bum, pin worms I'm thinking.
My bunnies do run and much the lawn so I wanted to give them a wormer anyways, piperazine was what I had in mind. It seems that the vets in my area want me to bring each bunny in, 75$ each, & give them a full check up, $$?, before they will sell me the drug or talk about selling me any kind of wormer.
I don't mind paying the bill but I wonder if I'm getting charged for a vet to confirm what I know, my bunnies have worms and I should go ahead and treat everyone.
How harmful can a wormer be?

Your thoughts?

 

[MaggieJ]

Get it from the feed store and do it yourself. Get someone here who has used it help you with dosing. The vet is being overly scrupulous (or overly greedy)... Take your choice.

 

[MamaSheepdog]

By law in California, a vet is required to have a doctor-patient relationship before prescribing drugs. They are not allowed to act as a pharmacy and dispense medicine to patients they have not seen.

I have found that depending on the vet, some are more flexible than others. My vet knows we have a lot of barn cats and will sell medications for them without insisting on examining them all, and has dispensed enough mite medicine and/or wormer to treat "the herd" sight unseen. I have a well established relationship with my vet though, and would not expect that type of leeway as a new client.

MaggieJ, you have mentioned pumpkin seeds as a natural wormer in the past, but I can't recall any other natural remedies other than diatomaceous earth, which I feed to all of our animals. And myself too, periodically!

 

[MaggieJ]

Yes, pumpkin seeds contain a substance that paralyses parasites and allows the host animal to expel them. A good natural means of controlling parasites routinely, since they are also an extremely nutritious and safe food.

Some plants, including many of the introduced, invasive weeds also help to kill parasites. I speculate that this is one reason my rabbits have never had any sign of worms. The information is contained in this pdf file:
http://www.google.ca/url?sa=t&rct=j&q=w ... 4Q&cad=rja

Feed stores carry a number of dewormers, some of which can be used for rabbits. Here is a dosage calculator that may be useful. I have no first-hand experience with chemical dewormers for rabbits.
http://homepage.mac.com/mattocks/morfz/rx/drugcalc.html