Rabbit Syph...maybe

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I had a doe that lost her hair above her tail. I wondered what was up with her and picked her up and Oh my....Looked like she had a heavy duty yeast infection. She had lost all sorts of hair and had white spots on rather irritated skin. I searched through Show Bunny and the 4H list I'm on...kind of like going back to school, but they know lots about rabbits, and determined that it was either hutch burn or syph. I gave her probios and a shot of the Procaine and Ben "something" penicillin....and she died within a few hours. I have checked all of my other rabbits and they show none of these outward symptoms. Has anyone had this in their rabbit raising experience? I'm really afraid of administering the antibiotic to my other rabbits after this happened. It was reccommended to do a 1/15th of 1 cc per pound injection, I even used a calculator. Thanks for any help at all.

-- Doreen (animalwaitress@yahoo.com), July 27, 2001

Answers

Hi Doreen, I just did some research, and found one site that stated any penicillin based medication could be extremely dangerous to rabbits. Now, I'm sure I gave penicillin to rabbits on occasion when I still raised them, but what one rabbit may tolerate, another may not. I think I would be cautious about giving any more.

-- Lenette (kigervixen@webtv.net), July 28, 2001.

I keep everything clean, wipe the floors once a week with a weak bleach solution, dump the doo twice a day, clean the boards once a week and leave them setting in the sun for several hours. I never had these problems when I was a kid!! Waaaa! I guess I will have to call some other vets and see what I need to do to check them for syph. I won't be taking any chances with using the penicillin without knowing for sure. This doe definitely had an infection. Whether or not it was syphylis isn't certain. I saw one thing that said the massive kill off of the bacteria could cause shock and possibly death, but she was in trouble, so I took the chance. Lost on this one. Bummer.

-- Doreen (bisquit@here.com), July 28, 2001.

today i pick up my rabbit and her hair star to come off and i dont no why it doing that what should i do it just like falling off of her she very hot she was never this hot before i hope nothing wroge with her why is her hair keep comeing off plese write me back to tell me what is wroge with her

-- krystal michell cardwell (kathy911@pacbell.net), March 31, 2003.

I am in 4-H also, and I just researched penicillin and rabbits because one of the questions I had to answer was, "Why are penicillin type drugs not good to use on rabbits?". According to what I have found, giving rabbits penicillin often causes rabbits to develop a serious and usually fatal gastrointestinal upset. Some rabbits may not be harmed by penicillin type drugs but most will be harmed.

-- James Hutchinson (redhawks04@hotmail.com), June 24, 2003.

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