Rabbit with badly injured leg - help please

[WomblingWriggles]

After 3 days of (unintentional) freedom, our rabbit has finally been tracked down and returned to us.

One of his legs seems badly injured - the horizontal paw bit doesn't seem to be connected to the rest of his leg. I mean obviously its still there, and there is no outward sign of damage, but clearly it has been dislocated or worse.

I have an appointment at the vets booked for late tonight. Does it sound like a dislocation? Are they easy to put back [hopeful emotiocon]. Can rabbits get by on only one working leg? If it is badly damaged will them amputate?

What can I expect? I am going to have to take the children so I would like to prepare them first, if you see what I mean.

Forgot to add, he is eating fine and drinking, and otherwise quite happy .... [extremely hopeful emoticon]

If he were in such great pain he wouldn't be eating as normal. I don't know about dislocation but a friend had a rabbit whose front leg was torn off by a visiting fox (who had somehow grabbed the leg through the bars of the hutch), and they had it put down on advice of the vet. Hope this won't be necessary for yours, but maybe you'd better prepare the kids for the worst.

Thanks. Oh dear.

I know someone with a 3 legged rabbit.

The vet's verdict is a broken leg. It will cost £300 to amputate. DH thinks we should have it amputated. I think we should have it put to sleep.

Oh dear.

Personally I think a 3-legged rabbit is unkind. Dogs and cats cope but they have more going on in their lives, iyswim - they enjoy human contact more, looking at things etc. Rabbits enjoy hopping, running and grooming themselves, and all those activies would be a bit compromised at least. And I'd be worried about flystrike if it couldn't clean its bottom properly. Personally I'd have him put to sleep. Poor thing

When one of ours broke her leg the vet said it would heal on it's own and keep her in the hutch for a while. She's perfectly fine now, it must just depend on where the break is

my friend had her rabbit's leg amputated due to an accident and the rabbit is absolutely fine. Hard decision though OP.

dont' put it to sleep!! my gp broke it's back leg - yadda yadda pay lots for surgery or amputate yadda yadda. we gave it painkillers, let it heal. it healed perfectly and it can use it perfectly well and run around on it fine. what would you rather if you broke your leg and you couldn't put it in a cast? a crooked leg? no leg? or death?

(erm, gp = guinea pig not grandparent )

also - you give yourself time to make a further decision later on - let it heal if it's not healed well you can amputate or pts - if it's got pain relief in the meantime it's not suffering so why not?

merci - you can hardly compare a rabbit to a human, so that argument is a bit of a non-starter. And even with pain relief, a broken limb is not going to heal without any pain at all (I speak from experience here - I broke my elbow in a way that meant they couldn't put a cast on it, so it was just in a sling while it healed. I was on strong drugs but trust me, it was not a pain-free experience). Part of being a responsible pet owner is weighing up pros and cons and ensuring that animals are not in pain and have good quality of life. It is impossible to know how much pain a rabbit is in, as they are prey animals which naturally hide pain as they don't want predators to know they are weakened. But it's safe to assume a broken leg is going to hurt. Letting it heal naturally is inhumane, and amputation is a hard one to call. Personally I think the resulting impact on the rabbit's natural behaviours makes it an inhumane option, but others will disagree. It's a very difficult decision and I feel very sorry for the OP.

Of course it's not inhumane to leave it to heal naturally with pain relief! the vet wanted gp to have pain relief for 3 weeks which was the length of time it takes for a gp break to heal - don't know about a rabbit sorry. So 3 weeks of slight pain is hardly a big deal. I expect it to live another 4 years or so now fingers crossed. We were also told the break was v high up, would not heal, would never be able to use leg, blah blah blah blah. All a load of complete rubbish.

If it has problems later on we can always reconsider and go for amputation. I suggest the op considers doing the same. Also shopping round for a cheaper deal on amputation as that seems very expensive.
I don't buy the 'prey animals don't show pain' argument completely either tbh, they say the same about gp but if you know your pet and they know you then they do show you when they are in pain and you can tell when they are depressed. I know what you mean as well, but I'm just saying, if you know your pet well enough it will trust you enough to show you it is in pain. Or maybe I'm just a gp whisperer

Thankyou for all the posts. unfortunately later that evening and the next morning bunny started to look extremely unhappy. After a visit to a second vet we decided to pts. The leg was broken completely in two places, with severe nerve damage, so self healing was not an option.
A difficult decision to make.

hope you and kids are ok - I'm sure he was a much loved pet