rehabilitator I’m licensed here with the
state of New Jersey what a wildlife
rehabilitator is and a home
rehabilitator like I am we’re volunteers
and we do a service to the community we
take in orphaned and injured wildlife my
specialty although I do have Chipmunks
flying squirrels and other animals are
rabbits when is an animal orphaned or
injured it’s very obvious when you find
an injured animal by the side of the
road if it’s been hit by a car there’s
usually not a lot of hope sometimes
there is that’s when you would call a
wildlife rehabilitator the other time to
call to call rehabilitator is if you
feel that the nest of rabbits in this
case what I’m speaking about has been
abandoned of the probably 200 rabbits I
get every year that people think have
been abandoned and orphaned I’d say
maybe ten actually have been there’s a
real disconnect between when an animal
needs to be rescued when a nest of
rabbits is found and they need to be
taken to a rehabber
and when they should honestly just be
left alone so how does this happen
sometimes people find the nest when
they’re landscaping it’s on their
property and they don’t want them there
they’re afraid of wildlife they don’t
know what though if there might be
diseases if they carry Lyme disease they
have ticks and so they’ll call and ask
you to remove them this is actually
illegal the rabbits have the right to
your property more than you do
you need to leave them where they are
unless they are a nuisance rabbits are
never a nuisance squirrels can get into
your house they can possibly or raccoon
visiting can climb in your attics and
chew up the wires this is considered a
nuisance but rabbits are never a
nuisance so you can’t just take them
away give them to an exterminator
or have a wildlife rehabber take care of
them that’s actually kidnapping and
there’s a mother that’s going to be
looking for them and it’s a nursing
mother and she needs to be with them so
how else might you think they need to be
rescued your kids find them there are
cute little bunnies it’s Easter they
think they have them free presents free
little Easter bunnies again illegal you
can’t keep them as pets but here’s the
biggest misconception that we’ve heard
there’s a myth going around that if you
touch
the animal baby the mother will not take
it back it’s not true people say this
mostly about birds birds don’t even have
a sense of smell they don’t have noses
when people tell me this that their kids
have touched the baby animal and the
baby bunny and now they can’t put it
back in the nest I say if your kid was
out in the woods and a wild animal came
up and licks them would you take them
back most of the time they say yes so
that’s true with mother rabbits and most
other wild mothers they’re not going to
abandon their babies because of how they
smell so put the bunnies back in the
nest now another problem is your dog
finds them brings you a baby bunny first
examine it for injuries if it is indeed
injured if it’s bleeding it looks like
it has a broken leg something’s wrong
with it absolutely call a rehabilitator
however if it looks like it’s fine see
if you can get the dog to show you where
the nest is sometimes it’s difficult to
locate the nest they’re usually in the
middle of a yard you can look for a
piece of dead grass the nest is about
the size of your hand it’s a very
shallow nest feel around it will have
the mothers fur inside and you will
other feel the other warm squirming
babies put the baby that was with the
dog back in the nest mother doesn’t care
about the dogs smell either however
let’s say your cat and it could be your
house cat a feral cat brings you as a
lovely gift this little bunny that has
to get to a rehabber or vet in fact cats
if they’re domestic or feral have a lot
of isn’t really harmful bacteria in
their claws and in their mouths and a
baby animal absolutely we’ll need to get
an antibiotic in it to counteract that
within the first 24 hours so if it’s a
cat that brought you the baby bunny call
the wildlife rehabilitator now the other
problem that happens is people will put
the baby bunnies back in the nest as
instructed
then they’ll watch the nest from the
window or nearby and the mother doesn’t
come back they call me again it’s been
two hours we put cameras on the nest the
mother hasn’t been back we’ve been
watching it all day
the mothers may not have been very smart
about where they put the nest in your
flowerpot your front yard the middle of
your yard schoolyards but they’re pretty
clever about not calling attention to
the nest during the day so you’re not
going to see the mother at the nest you
shouldn’t see her ever really she might
be around the
sort of in the vicinity it might not
even be heard could be a male rabbit
that happens to be around but she’s only
going to come and feed them when it’s
completely dark out and there’s no
chance of predators or humans seeing her
so she’ll come at dusk and at dawn to
feed them and you won’t see her now if
you’re really really worried there’s a
way to tell if the mother has been back
most of the stuff on the internet that
you read is not true pouring baby powder
around to see if she leaves little
footprints baking soda flour putting
string or dental floss over the nest
it’s not gonna make a difference she’s
not gonna disturb that the mother
actually stands over the nest of the
babies come up and nurse
the really true way to tell if the
mother has been back or not is to get
four sticks about the size of chopsticks
or pick up sticks natural ones that are
around and make a tic-tac-toe pattern on
top of the nest when the mother comes
back the next morning you will be able
to tell because at least one of the
sticks will be disturbed in that case
again leave the bunnies alone now if
you’re still worried and you want to
keep checking on the bunnies every
morning to see if they’re okay as long
as they just look like normal little
bunnies and they grow pretty quickly
that’s fine if they start to look like
their skin is super wrinkly they may be
dehydrated so keep an eye on them if you
go and one bunny is dead in the nest
remove it and check again the next day
if another bunny said call a wildlife
rehabber
the other very important thing to look
for is if you take the bunnies out of
the nest and their stomachs look really
full like almost like a bright red water
balloon this means the mother has
definitely not been back because it
means that they have filled up with
gases because when their eyes are still
closed the baby bunnies and parent
mother has to actually ingest all their
feces and urine so that the scent of it
will not attract predators so if the
mother is not doing this they get bloat
and their stomachs become very distended
that’s when you call a wildlife wildlife
rehabilitator now let’s say you don’t
want to put them back because you’re
doing construction or you find them and
it’s just absolutely impossible to keep
them there you do have the option of
moving the nest relocating it but for
that you would need again the advice of
a wildlife rehabilitator how far away
you can move the nest what probably you
can’t move it from like the backyard to
the front yard someone will be able to
help you with that but the bunnies grow
really fast so the good news is
they’re gonna be out of your yard pretty
quickly she may make another nest in the
exact same spot again in the season or
next year but what you can do to keep
traffic away from it or the lawnmower or
your kids is to put a lawn chair over
where the nest is make people aware the
mother then can get in and out now let’s
say you have a dog that after they
discover the nest and they have to go
out because you don’t like to walk them
in the front yard so they have to be in
the back yard and the dog keeps going
back to the nest and bringing you back
baby bunnies we recommend then that you
would take some kind of either a little
tykes playground or even better a big
ceramic flowerpot and put it over the
nest during the day it has to be vented
at the top so that they can breathe and
then make sure that you take it off at
night as soon as it starts getting dark
out and then replace it again in the
morning so that the mother can feed the
babies now you may find that suddenly
the babies disappear in the middle of
the night and you’re all worried what
happened in that case is most likely
that the mother has decided that there’s
just too much activity going on around
the nest and she herself has relocated
them so still there okay so when else
should you call a wildlife rehabilitator
if you see flies around the nest call a
rehabilitator if you find one dead
rabbit as I said before and then another
the next day call the wildlife
rehabilitator if you see the bunnies
with their eyes still closed coming out
of the nest and not staying in it call a
wildlife rehabilitator and again
absolutely do it when it’s been with a
cat or it has any visible signs of
injury now remember when you call the
wildlife rehabilitators especially here
in new jersey there very few of us left
most of us work one or two or three
other jobs in my case I work for to help
support my rabbit habit so we don’t
always get back to you right away
texting is always a good thing please
don’t call us in the middle of the night
or at 6:00 in the morning and say get
these bunnies out of my yard we’re not
an exterminator service where here is a
per to provide a service to the
community and we’re all working really
hard to do it as I said before there’s a
shortage of us so there any people that
are all interested kids upcoming and
want to help a rehabilitator or want to
learn how to do it it’s a very rewarding
job you get to save animal lives you get
to do
service to the public and frankly they’re adorable thank you