A bunny seems like a good pet for the cramped New Yorker. But bunnies have a lot of babies. Because of this—and in honor of Easter—on a recent Saturday, the Humane Society of New York was offering free neutering and spaying for rabbits. As bunnies have become more popular, their numbers in shelters have grown so high that, in December, the City Council made it illegal for pet stores to sell them.
In the lobby of the Humane Society, on East Fifty-Ninth Street, the blue walls were painted with life-sized pictures of cats and dogs—Chihuahuas, Siamese, a cat lying prone and suckling five kittens. No rabbits.
A young woman in a fleece, with her brown hair in a ponytail, compared bunny photos with a man in glasses and a black jacket. She was the owner of Turbo, a light-brown bunny with large eyes. The man, with his girlfriend, had a white-and-brown rabbit named Sir Hossenfeffer III. In the photos, Sir Hossenfeffer had been posed in a variety of holiday scenes: in a green hat, in front of a rainbow, for St. Patrick’s Day; in rainbow “2015” glasses for New Year’s; and in a Santa suit with a matching red sack of presents for Christmas.
Turbo’s owner encouraged Sir Hossenfeffer’s owner to join the Facebook group “Bunny Rabbit World.” (A recent post, with photos: “So my bunny took himself for a bath!!! Running round the house then he went and put himself in !!! Crazy rabbit !!!!!”)
Upstairs in the examination room, Dr. Shachar Malka, a wide-shouldered veterinarian with big hands, who looked like he owned several large dogs, was speaking to the humans and their pets about proper bunny care.
“Everyone loves kale, they think it’s healthy,” Dr. Malka said. “But when you feed it just kale, we see problems.” Handouts provided additional rabbit-care advice. (“Poor housing may lead to arthritis, boredom and depression.”)
A gloved assistant took Turbo out of his carrier and placed him on top of a purple towel on the examination table.
“He has a little bit of crustiness in his ear,” Dr. Malka said.
“WHAT?!” Turbo’s owner said.
“He has a little mites,” Dr. Malka said.
“Ew!”
“So dramatic!” Dr. Malka said. “It’s nothing that you did wrong. It probably came like that from the store.”
Dr. Malka held Turbo upright to look at his underside. The bunny’s nose twitched, and he made a blank-eyed, arms-forward Frankenstein pose.
Dr. Malka put the rabbit down and delivered more serious news: Turbo had an undescended testicle, putting him at risk for cancer. Dr. Malka said that he would to try to find the testicle, but the bunny might need more surgery.
Lola, a salt-and-pepper Lop rabbit (the floppy-eared breed), wouldn’t remain still for her exam. Her owner, a boy in an orange sweatshirt, watched as she tried to hop away from Dr. Malka and his assistant. “Mine was like that before she got spayed,” another owner, a young woman with many ear piercings, said. “She was a total bitch before she got spayed.”
The young woman found her bunny Checkers, a large albino rabbit, hopping around the drive-through at a fast food restaurant in Long Island. She chased him for about 45 minutes before she caught him.
Fifi was examined last. Fifi was mostly white, with black spots around her face, a long black mark down her back that looks like a spine, and several white-and-black hair filaments around her head, evoking feathers from a Mardi Gras mask. Rabbits are usually good groomers, so her soiled underside was a sign of obesity—she can’t reach it.
Dr. Malka asked the group, “What was the one thing I said to remember, when you first came in? What was the one thing?”
“Umm . . . gastrointestinal?” one of Fifi’s owners guessed.
“They’re prey?” Lola’s owner’s mother tried.
“Don’t get chubby?” Fifi’s other owner guessed.
“Yearly exam!” Dr. Malka said.
After the surgery, the rabbits would likely be in pain. Dr. Malka demonstrated to the group how to administer the medication the Humane Society would give them.
“The towel is your best friend,” he said, folding the purple towel over Lola’s back, so just her head was peeking out. “You make a rabbit burrito.”
“That’s what me and my mom call it!” one of the bunny owners said.
“You need to be assertive,” Dr. Malka said, holding a syringe. “You need to be confident. You need to put the syringe in the mouth, deep in the mouth, twice a day. If you approach like, ‘Oh, I’m hurting him! I’m killing him!’ No. It’s not going to work.”
The surgery would take about an hour. The owners planned to pick up their bunnies later that afternoon.
Checkers’s owner was nervous about the procedure. “Can they call us just as soon as he’s out, to say he’s O.K.?”
A representative of the Humane Society assured her that Checkers would be fine. “If they don’t call you, that’s a good sign,” she said.
