Talk:House rabbit

Longer Lifespan claim

The claim that a rabbit living indoors lives longer than one living outdoors needs a scientific citation. This kind of overly broad statement is not a neutral point of view as it uses a citation from the House Rabbit Society website who has an (understandable) bias toward indoor rabbits. This claim could be credible if true but it needs a scientific source with supporting data to be encyclopedic. Truthsleuther (talk) 00:51, 13 September 2011 (UTC)

Citation for redirect

I'm not sure how to indicate the citation for a redirect, to show that the name is common, so for now, I'm putting them in the talk page. Here are a couple high-profile web sites that use the name "House Rabbit": [1] [2]. --Ed Brey 22:01, 25 February 2007 (UTC)

Split from Domestic Rabbit

While it makes sense for this article to redirect to Domestic rabbit, since all house rabbits are domestic and since the domestic rabbit article contains a lot of info for house rabbits, IMHO it would be even better to split off the content specific to house rabbits and put it on this page. For more discussion of this, see Talk:Domestic_rabbit#House_rabbit?. --Ed Brey 22:25, 26 February 2007 (UTC)

vaccinations

the statement that rabbits do not need vaccinations is entirely false and should be removed. There are a variety of illnesses which rabbits need to be vaccinated against, including indoor rabbits, as many diseases are carried by fleas.

Additionally rabbits should be spayed or neutered, especially females which start to become prone to ovarian cancer after 4 years of age. —The preceding unsigned comment was added by 208.137.151.22 (talk) 09:37, 13 May 2007 (UTC). Spaying males can affect their interaction with humans and make them docile and less playful. —Preceding unsigned comment added by Smarkpearson (talk • contribs) 19:09, 16 June 2009 (UTC)

Vaccines addressed, including regional variation of availability, necessity and legality.Kerani (talk) 22:27, 21 August 2011 (UTC)

I agree with Kerani. There are no vaccines available or required in the USA whereas the UK and other regions have them. One should tread lightly making overreaching statements (as in the first unsigned post above) about things with regional variability.. Truthsleuther (talk) 20:05, 3 September 2011 (UTC)

Moving content from Rabbit

The Rabbit page had a big and rambling section on pet rabbits. I've taken pretty much all of the content and moved it to the relevant sections here, trying to make sure that it doesn't clash with the existing material. Well, I think it's partly successful, but I invite house rabbit experts to fine tune it. Arikk 07:35, 26 July 2007 (UTC)

Pronoun usage

A mixture of pronouns had crept into the rabbit page. I cleaned it up to use exclusively the gender male pronoun. This better captures owners' affections than "it" and avoids the wordiness of he/she, ambiguity of unnecessary plural phrasing, and inconsistency of plural pronouns without plural phrasing. I'm pretty sure that no one will get confused such that he thinks the article only describes male rabbits, since the gender male pronoun construct is very well known. --Ed Brey 17:43, 14 August 2007 (UTC)

I'd actually much prefer 'it' being used. 'He' just doesn't seem right, since rabbits have two genders. The purpose of the article shouldn't really focus on capturing owners' affections. Even so, I could find 'it' used affectionately. Kutera Genesis 20:39, 24 August 2007 (UTC)

He in this context is gender inclusive, thereby accounting for both male and female rabbits. I agree owner affections isn't a focus per se, but rather an aspect of the article. The biggest issue I see in using he is whether it is awkward because, unlike in a home situation, the individual pet is unknown. Thoughts on this? We do have to be careful with it because most people I know are offended if I refer to their pets as "it", even though I'm sure some aren't (hence why you could find one or more references to an affectionate use of it). The key isn't the offense itself, but rather the reason for the offense: those same people don't think that it correctly expresses the value of the pet, similar to how it doesn't express the value of a human. We wouldn't want an article on house rabbits to inaccurately connote their value. --Ed Brey 18:25, 27 August 2007 (UTC)

As a point of reference, the primary source for the article, Rabbit for Dummies, uses the gender-inclusive he; random example: the first paragraph of the "Barbering" section on page 179. --Ed Brey 17:28, 28 August 2007 (UTC)

The problem I see is that it isn't terribly encyclopaedic. I just changed the pronouns on the Rabbit#Rabbits as pets section to be neutral before I realised this entire article was written that way. The problem is that the grammar currently used describes a single rabbit, and, in some cases, a single owner. As an encyclopaedia, we should be describing house rabbits in general, and therefore using neutral and impersonal terminology. Thus, gender neutral pronouns (like "it" and "they"). Again, as Kutera said, we don't need to capture the owners' affections. This isn't a guidebook to rabbit ownership like Rabbit for Dummies, and it isn't here to cater to the owners of house rabbits. We don't need to be affectionate; it's actually better to be somewhat dispassionate. It helps to ensure we maintain a neutral point of view. More to the point, the article on Humans doesn't use "he" to refer to a generic member of the entire species. I imagine that more people would be offended to hear a human referred to as "it" than a rabbit ;)

All this talk of political correctness and being dispassionate aside, the male pronoun is preferred over "it" when speaking of living creatures as opposed to inanimate objects. Perhaps this is not universally accepted, but nothing is. It is, however, overwhelmingly accepted as a feature of the English language. Rabbits aren't "its," they are Hes and shes. The standard English pronoun usage rules must prevail in this as in all other English language wikipedia entries. Gender neutral pronouns removed.Jimmy Hammerfist (talk) 14:59, 28 November 2007 (UTC)

I ran a simple Google Books count to get a feel for the frequency of how often each type of pronoun used in literature for animals kept as pets (compare [3] and [4]). In the comparison, the non-neuter pronouns came out ahead of the neuter one. I'm open to following a clear standard, but I haven't seen one demonstrated. Do you have any good sources? --Ed Brey (talk) 18:47, 29 November 2007 (UTC)

As for "he" being gender neutral, remember that that is not universally accepted. It's being more and more widely agreed that using "he" as a gender-neutral pronoun is politically incorrect at best. Again, it's better to use "it" and "they" because nobody is going to be offended by them (even though different members of the rather factious English scholarly community prefer different gender-neutral pronouns). --BMKane 13:04, 26 September 2007 (UTC)

Singular phrasing often more clearly expresses encyclopedic generalities than plural phrasing. For instance, consider “Rabbits are easy to litter train, especially if they have been spayed or neutered.” Is this referring to multiple rabbits in a single pen and their interaction? Or would this apply just as well to an isolated rabbit? The singular construction avoids the ambiguity: “A rabbit are easy to litter train, especially if he has been spayed or neutered.” Within singular forms, “he” better suits a pet than “it” for the same reason as it does a human (albeit to a lesser degree). According to meta:Quest for gender-neutral pronouns, this thinking came after the Victorian era (granted, there is no citation). As for the acceptance of the gender inclusive “he”, if the publisher of the Dummies book is using it rather than alternatives such sentence recasting or singular “they”, that’s enough acceptance for me. --Ed Brey 18:14, 2 October 2007 (UTC)

I'm disappointed that this seems to have become a smouldering edit war. I vote for "it", "they", "them", &c. As a carer-for-bunnies myself, this just sounds more correct to me than "he". --Stroller (talk) 05:33, 1 November 2010 (UTC)

It could be just that people are unaware of the issues involved. None of the edits have corresponding rationale on the talk page. This may be part of the “learning by surprise” that Wikipedia is known for - where you go to an article expecting to learn one thing, but come away learning something else. I’m sure some people are used to animate pronouns in this domain and others inanimate. When visiting the article, those expecting inanimate learn about the other approach; however, the article doesn’t specifically mention language. Perhaps it should: the article’s discussion of the social aspects of house rabbits apparently isn’t sufficient to prevent a few people who may not know to visit the talk page from assuming that the pronouns are in need of editing. --Ed Brey (talk) 19:11, 10 November 2010 (UTC)

Since the sex of the rabbit is irrelevant the gender neutral pronouns "it", "they" & "them" should be used throughout. _wjemather^bigissue 21:06, 10 November 2010 (UTC)

For an unknown unspecified animal.He is plain wrong, He/She is unnecessarily cumbersome, It is fine, this article should be using it, itself etc. Mighty mickey (talk) 15:08, 11 November 2010 (UTC)

Responding to the last two posts, I agree that almost all of the article applies equally to house rabbits of equal sex. However, that doesn't necessitate using inanimate pronouns. The pronouns he, him, and his have two senses, a masculine sense and a gender-inclusive sense. Is there any question that the context makes it clear that the gender-inclusive is intended? This provides the best of all worlds: captures owners' affections, applies equally to both sexes, and non-cumbersome language. --Ed Brey (talk) 18:09, 11 November 2010 (UTC)

Sorry, but no. This is an encyclopaedia not a friendly childrens book, if we want to say anything about the affection owners have for their pets, we simply state it clearly without using flowery language. "He" in no way can be said to represent the female sex. I think there is clear consensus to use "it", "they" & "them". Lets just get it done and move on, there are bigger problems with the article (see below). _wjemather^bigissue 18:22, 11 November 2010 (UTC)

"This is an encyclopaedia not a friendly childrens book": Your comment seems to ignore the Pavia source and the Google Books analysis from earlier in this thread. Could you expand on your comment in light of that data? --Ed Brey (talk) 02:21, 12 November 2010 (UTC)

"'He' in no way can be said to represent the female sex.": Dictionary.com, he, definition 2: "anyone (without reference to sex); that person: He who hesitates is lost."[5] What source are you using for your definition? --Ed Brey (talk) 02:21, 12 November 2010 (UTC)

There had been consensus for three years to use animate pronouns, which was the case from the inception of the article. Additionally, within Wiley, the publisher of the article's primary RS, there seems to be a the same consensus. Could you elaborate on how you ascertain that the opposite consensus has suddenly been reached? It seems that a consensus is hopefully in process of being developed based on the merits of the issue. I agree with you that there are more pressing areas for attention; with that in mind, I'd ask you be careful to not jump to any conclusions about consensus prematurely. --Ed Brey (talk) 02:21, 12 November 2010 (UTC)

You are a lone voice here. As pointed out at WT:MOS, reputable mainstream sources use gender neutral pronouns for animals. For example Reuters. _wjemather^bigissue 08:11, 12 November 2010 (UTC)

And here is the first sentence from the animal entry in the AP Stylebook: "Do not apply a personal pronoun to an animal unless its sex has been established or the animal has a name".

Anyway, the claim that "he" is gender neutral is incorrect from a linguistic POV. E.g., there are only about 5% male nurses in the US. We can't express this as follows: "Take a random nurse. If you examine his gender, what you will find in most cases is: female." Whereas in languages that do have a gender neutral pronoun you can of course use it in this way. Now English does have gender neutral pronoun for animals: "it". Which is precisely why we can say: "Take a random pregnant rabbit. If you examine its sex, what you will find in all cases is: female." Hans Adler 09:04, 13 November 2010 (UTC)

Now I see Ed Brey claimed "he" is gender inclusive, not gender neutral. That's closer to the truth. But one should only use gender-specific pronouns in a gender-inclusive way if one of the genders is much more common. If most house rabbits were male (seems unlikely, actually) there could be a case, although that still doesn't invalidate professional style advice which clearly applies here. Hans Adler 09:11, 13 November 2010 (UTC)

"It" would be the correct usage here. There is no way to tell from the photos what the sex of the rabbit is, and who cares anyway? Owners refer to their pets as "he" and "she", but that has no particular relevance to the general subject of house rabbits. ←Baseball Bugs ^{What's up, Doc?} carrots→ 09:34, 13 November 2010 (UTC)

Hans, where do you get the rule to only use gender-inclusive animate pronouns if one of the genders is much more common? The example from dictionary.com indicates otherwise: "He who hesitates is lost."[6]. --Ed Brey (talk) 12:22, 16 November 2010 (UTC)

That's just plain old-fashioned sexist language. Or alternatively you can explain it by assuming that women spend most of their time in the kitchen or organising the household (depending on social class), and therefore never have any interesting or important decisions to take. And of course if any important decisions do crop up they will ask their husbands, who will hopefully not hesitate to decide. It's the same reasons why the bible uses "brother" in a gender-inclusive way. It's also clearly not gender-neutral. Hans Adler 13:08, 16 November 2010 (UTC)

You may be right that the cause of masculine pronouns being inclusive is related to women being keepers of the home. That role is a practical outcropping from their nurturing role, including childbirth and nursing. Men have greater availability for duties outside the home and act as head of household, and it wouldn’t surprise me that the masculine pronoun can represents females as a husband can represent his wife. However, there is no need to assume anything sexist or that women make no interesting or important decisions. Biology focuses men and women to have different roles, but it doesn’t force either sex to be of less worth or make their decisions less important. Even in ancient times this was known. You mentioned how “brother” is often used inclusively; another example is that women were expected to engage in major real estate transactions (Proverbs 31:16). --Ed Brey (talk) 18:44, 16 November 2010is (UTC)

Regardless of the origins, in today's society it's sexist language. And for animals it's not even common to be sexist in one's use of pronouns. After all, sexists are usually also speciesists and see nothing wrong with referring to an animal as "it". And if you really want to use sexist language in relation to house rabbits you may have a hard time figuring out which sex you actually want to prefer. Hans Adler 19:45, 16 November 2010 (UTC)

Gender-inclusive pronouns are not automatically sexist in today's society; they are still used by mainstream sources (e.g. the Pavia RS for this article). The problem is that some people see gender-inclusive pronouns and errantly assume sexist intent, but that is just political correctness run amuck. --Ed Brey (talk) 12:08, 18 November 2010 (UTC)

We don't actually have to agree on this minor point. The most important thing for this article is that there is no such thing as sex-inclusive "he" for animals, except in situations where most of them are actually male. All style guides agree about this, and they generally go even further and discourage using "he" or "she" even when the sex is known. By the way, gender is a bit of a funny concept in relation to animals, so it seems best to stick to sex to prevent confusion with grammatical gender (which for animals is normally neuter and only in exceptional cases can be masculine or feminine). Hans Adler 12:28, 18 November 2010 (UTC)

I'm not convinced that it's sexist language, but it's certainly dated. We would not define the rules of shotgun by saying "he who cries shotgun first sits in the front" but instead by saying "the first person to cry shotgun gets to ride in the front seat" (as one of our references for shotgun does almost verbatim, in fact). I may have just hoisted myself by my own petard there, because we would probably add "On long journeys, he or she is obliged to read the map and be responsible for navigation", but on that I would revert to the AP Stylebook citation pointed out by Hans Adler elsewhere in this thread. Honestly, I think this is being over-thunk - it's a rabbit. I love 'em as much as the next person, and probably more, but wikipedia is supposed to be a reference work, not a fluffy-wuffy feel-good fest.--Stroller (talk) 12:05, 17 November 2010 (UTC)--Stroller (talk) 12:05, 17 November 2010 (UTC)

It would make sense to refer to a rabbit as "he" or "she" when a topic is being discussed that's sex-related, such as reproduction, or possibly different behaviors between the male and female of a species (for example, male cats tend to be somewhat larger and more aggressive than female cats). Otherwise, unless someone is planning on marrying one, it's an "it". ←Baseball Bugs ^{What's up, Doc?} carrots→ 12:15, 17 November 2010 (UTC)

Binky article

I undid an edit that made the term binky a link to a page not yet created. I contemplated this when introducing the term early in this page's history. It seemed unlikely that there would be enough content to make a worthwhile wikipedia article for binky, to I used elected not the make the broken link. I believe that still stands, but if someone wants to present a vision of a binky article, I'd certainly be interested. --Ed Brey 17:07, 27 August 2007 (UTC)

Citation holes?

This article was flagged as needing additional citations for verification; however, there aren't any specific fact tags in the article. Does anyone know of anything in the article that isn't backed by one or more of the references? --Ed Brey 01:51, 7 November 2007 (UTC)

Pocket-sized house rabbit

This article was tagged as falling within the scope of the Pocket pets work group. However, I've never heard of anyone putting a rabbit in his pocket. Has anyone else? I think rabbits may have been lumped over-broadly in with other lagomorphs. --Ed Brey 01:50, 7 November 2007 (UTC)

Inclusion of fly strike in health concerns

I removed the reference to fly strike from the "Health" section. I agree that it is an important problem, and indeed gets good treatment in Domestic rabbit. The problem is that listing all the possible health problems in the beginning of the health section would overwhelm a reader with too much technical info, and just listing just the one root cause obscures the others (unless fly strike is especially common; if so, please say so). More useful is to list symptoms that the reader would readily recognize. Perhaps there should be a better reference to the list of heath problem causes. One possibility would be to fork the list in Domestic rabbit into its own article, which could be readily linked from the "Health" section of House rabbit. Thoughts on that? --Ed Brey (talk) 15:21, 2 May 2008 (UTC)

Fly strike is one of the most common reasons for emergency presentation of rabbits. The In Practice article (Pract. Cousquer 28 (6): 342.) referenced details the rapid time scale of progression of the condition without treatment, and the consequent deterioration of the prognosis. This section starts with a list of symptoms that require urgent veterinary attention. Many rabbits live happily with a head tilt for years, not to say that if a rabbit suddenly develops a head tilt it doesn't need to go to the vets, but it depends on the cirucmstances so it seems unbalanced to have that on the list rather than fly strike where every hour counts. As you say it is a list of symptoms so maybe it should say maggots, rather than fly strike. Maybe the list should be removed as it is not complete and therefore not particularly helpful. I tried to put a reference up to Vet Help Direct http://www.vethelpdirect.com which basically provides an automated triage service. Its free to use, all the content is by vets and I felt it fulfilled Wiki's criterea ie 'Sites that contain neutral and accurate material that cannot be integrated into the Wikipedia article due to amount of detail' 86.157.97.79 (talk) 21:15, 2 May 2008 (UTC)

Thanks for the info, especially on the prevalence of fly strike. I wasn't away it was one of the most common reasons. Given that, I agree that it has a place in the house rabbit page health section. Inclusion in the first paragraph list would be OK, but I think that a richer inclusion would be ever better, one that gives an owner enough information to identify the symptom. This might involve some restructuring of the paragraph. Feel free to be bold. The vethelpdirect web site had the major downfall that its disclaimer said that it should be not be used by anyone outside the EU (seems over-restrictive to me, but that's what they say). That made it less than ideal for linking by Wikipedia. What do you think? --Ed Brey (talk) 01:21, 3 May 2008 (UTC)

Main picture

I'd like to find a really good main picture for the article. Following are the features I'd like to see in the picture. I'm interested in suggestions on the features and specific picture suggestions.

• Distinguishes house rabbits from outdoor rabbits (e.g. a picture without a cage is preferable)
• Some element of the picture is quickly recognizable as being in a house or part of a house
• Representative of a typical day in the life of a house rabbit (so a rabbit wearing clothes wouldn't be the first choice)
• Rabbit takes up 75%+ of the frame
• Cute

--Ed Brey (talk) 17:51, 15 August 2008 (UTC)

"Willow with keys.jpg" covers the all the features well. "Domesticrabbit.jpg" is lacking regarding the first two (not surprising given the file name). --Ed Brey (talk) 17:22, 15 September 2008 (UTC)

Another requirement I would add is "Entire rabbit is in frame". Willow with keys fails that one. Ideally someone should just take a better picture, since neither image is especially good. A photo with decent ambient light rather than taken with a flash would be a start. siℓℓy rabbit (talk) 19:25, 15 September 2008 (UTC)

Image size

The lead image looks awkward compared to the rest of the article at the default size. The guidance on lead image size is confusing. I posted a question about it here: Wikipedia_talk:Manual_of_Style#Lead_image_size. For now, I'd like to use a size similar to the other images, but a bit bigger to avoid a stacked look. --Ed Brey (talk) 17:41, 15 September 2008 (UTC)

Just to comment: with my own browsing preferences and screen resolution, 400px is far too big and renders the lead text nearly unreadable. I can live with 350px, although I generally prefer 300px or leaving the image size to user preferences. siℓℓy rabbit (talk) 19:23, 15 September 2008 (UTC)

Emergency care

I moved the emergency care section here, since it largely duplicates the beginning of the Health section. Are there any points that should be added to Health? Is there enough to warrant its own section? If so, how would Health be updated accordingly? --Ed Brey (talk) 17:41, 10 September 2008 (UTC)

A rabbit's health can deteriorate extremely quickly. It is important to seek urgent veterinary attention if a rabbit has any of the following symptoms: dramatic or sudden loss of appetite, severe depression, breathing problems, sudden onset of head tilt, diarrhea, signs of maggot infestation , or not passing stools. You should also take your rabbit to the vets urgently if it has consumed something poisonous, been involved in an accident, fallen from a height or been exposed to smoke.

Cecotropes and wire cages

I removed a sentence "In addition, if a grid is used with no litter box, it will prevent rabbits from ingesting their cecotropes, an essential part of their digestive process." because, AFAIK, rabbits reinject their cecotropes before they hit the ground. Please correct me if I'm wrong on this. --Ed Brey (talk) 17:51, 10 September 2008 (UTC)

Merger with Domestic rabbit article

I think this article should be merged with Domestic rabbit. All it is is a series of poorly written paragraphs just so the owners can post pictures of their 'cute' pets. There's no article for house dogs. If you need tips on how to train your pet rabbit, then I'm sure there are plenty of websites catered for that. Such an article like this is just redundant. Much of the encyclopedia worthy information can just be included in the domestic rabbit article. -Depor23 (talk) 06:36, 31 July 2009 (UTC)

It is important to keep this site active. If you don't like the personal pics, then remove them. The term house rabbits is vital to not only the definition of a proper domesticated rabbit with rights (eliminate domestic rabbit if anything) but the name is vital to a variety of non-profit groups. To delete this is to not understand the importance of the rabbit movement and the thousands of people and hundreds of groups trying to educate people. This is a valid site and term. If you think it's poorly written, then fix it, don't delete it. -dgoodberg (talk) 13:37, 12 August 2009 (UTC)

House rabbit movement? Mate, there's a couple of links down the bottom of the page about such organisations. Surely they can be included in the domestic rabbit article. It may be a valid term but there's a big enough section set aside to pet rabbits in the domestic page. Depor23 (talk) 04:58, 2 September 2009 (UTC)

It would be highly inappropriate to merge the House Rabbit article with the Domestic Rabbit article. The Domestic Rabbit article discusses meat rabbits and wool rabbits. It would be offensive to combine the two. This article is an expanded topic that is alluded to on the Domestic Rabbit article page, but should have its own entry separate from the Domestic Rabbit page. —Preceding unsigned comment added by Leporidae (talk • contribs) 01:07, 18 August 2009 (UTC)

It wouldn't be 'offensive'. Basically all the important information in the house rabbit article is contained in the 'rabbtis as pets' section in the domesitc rabbits article. Almost 1,000 words are dedicated to this section in the article. More than enough for an encyclopaedia in my opinion. Depor23 (talk) 04:53, 2 September 2009 (UTC)

Most readers of this article will benefit from it being independent of the Domestic Rabbit article. To your point, Depor23, "House cat" is a common term and "House rabbit" is beginning to gain prevalence, especially because of the advocacy of the House Rabbit Society. The term is a distinction between pet rabbits and rabbits that are bread specifically for fur or meat. Though meat and fur rabbits are bred to be very docile (and make excellent pets) the majority of rabbits that live as companion animals with people are bred as pets -- intentionally or accidentally. Dogs are common enough as to not warrant the distinction, but cats, as with rabbits, are often found feral in many urban areas. House rabbits are the third most common animal surrendered to shelters in the United States[7], so the House Rabbit as distinct from other domestic rabbits warrants a separate article. If there is a problem with the writing style I can volunteer to do edits. As for the "cute pets" I agree. The motivation is certainly there to put a cute House Rabbit photo up, since any rabbit outside of a pet owners home would be contradictory to the core of this article. Rhinokitty (talk) 05:10, 22 August 2009 (UTC)

So what's your argument? That house rabbits should be distinguished from domestic rabbits because they are not as common as dogs? But you're also saying that house rabbits are gaining prevalence. As it becomes more common, then shouldn't a merger between domestic and house rabbits take place? Also, I'm quite sure there are a lot more feral dogs found in urban areas than 'feral' rabbits. Further, in semantics, I would think that people would think of house rabbits more than anything else when the term 'domestic rabbit' is mentioned. Depor23 (talk) 04:49, 2 September 2009 (UTC)

I think this article should stand as it is. The popularity of cats and dogs as pets is much more then that of rabbits and thus they do not need separate articles talking about their "house" status. If this was to be merged with domestic then it should stay the same length, contain the same images, and not change one bit. n420p69 —Preceding undated comment added 10:31, 4 September 2009 (UTC).

It's just stupid though. Much of the information is not encyclopaedia worthy. I feel like I'm reading a 'how to look after your new rabbit' book. Depor23 (talk) 11:51, 6 September 2009 (UTC)

This is a very useful article and definitely encyclopaedia worthy. Its scope is very different than that of the domestic rabbits article. Hence there is no reason to merge the two. Rcomplexity (talk) 21:20, 24 September 2009 (UTC)

There are two main distinction between house rabbits and other domestic rabbits. One is that they are for companionship vs. commercial purposes. They other is that they reside inside a human home, vs. outside. People who have a rabbit inside their homes for companionship are faced with different issues (e.g. rabbit proofing) than other rabbit owners. These unique circumstances are the core of the article and justify its existence as a separate article. For completeness, the article fills in other aspects of how owners care for the rabbit, some of which overlap with Domestic rabbit, but not excessively. If the articles were meged, it would be more difficult for a reader to quickly understand what it is like to own a house rabbit. Therefore, I believe House rabbit should remain separate. --Ed Brey (talk) 17:33, 6 October 2009 (UTC)

The tone and aim of the two articles are quite different; there is little doubt in my mind that they should be separate. However, it would benefit both pages if certain sections were taken from Domestic rabbit to House rabbit. I'm thinking particularly about Socialization, Acquiring, Training, etc. That way, Domestic rabbit remains an overview of the different contexts in which domesticated rabbits live, whereas House rabbit gives details of the specifics of keeping a rabbit at home. Under that system, there should really be a section on Commercial rabbit, although I don't volunteer to write it... Arikk (talk) 20:59, 7 October 2009 (UTC)

I did this once when I created House rabbit, and you raise a good question, whether it is time for another pass. The tricky part is that you can't move over the stuff that applies to outdoor pet rabbits. Even though it may apply to house rabbits, a reader looking for info on outdoor rabbits wouldn't expect to go to House rabbit to find more detail about them. Arikk, do you think there is enough content specific to house rabbits in Domestic rabbit to move it over, or have any other ideas? --Ed Brey (talk) 17:35, 12 October 2009 (UTC)

Looking over the Domestic rabbit page again, it's true that there's not a lot of House rabbit material that shouldn't be there; just that it stands out because it's not written very authoritatively. So I've stripped down Rabbits as pets, moved the worthwhile parts to House rabbit and cut out some of the fluff from both articles. Everyone is welcome to flame me and undo everything; goodness knows I don't really have time for this anyway as I'm trying to rewrite Rock hyrax at the moment. Arikk (talk) 22:08, 12 October 2009 (UTC)

The integration looks good. I thought the paragraph on children and fragile rabbits was worth keeping, although in a different section, given the new additions. Given this work and the preceding discussion, does anyone still think the two articles should be merged? --Ed Brey (talk) 02:58, 14 October 2009 (UTC)

Hearing nothing, I removed the merge suggestion tag. --Ed Brey (talk) 17:39, 20 October 2009 (UTC)

Merger with "rabbit"

Forgive me if my formatting is off...first time doing this. I would highly advise NOT merging the ‘rabbit’ and ‘house rabbit’. While this discussion is on domestic vs house, the article says a merger between rabbit and domestic rabbit. I would advise against merging ‘house rabbit’ and ‘domestic rabbit’ but ONLY if the lines are better drawn. Let’s make a stronger differentiation from domestic v. house so people understand a house rabbit is always a type of domestic rabbit, but a domestic rabbit is not always a house rabbit.

The reasons for not merging domestic/house with ‘rabbit’ are because, 1) house rabbits are almost all exclusively in the European rabbit gene line (few exceptions) which comprises only a small portion of rabbits, 2) people looking for information on pet rabbits may have zero desire to see discussions about eating them, 3) the context in learning about "a rabbit" and "a pet rabbit as a companion" are completely different and the intent on information is likely distinct enough to not merge, 4) the information on a house rabbit in the general thread would make it longer and more difficult to navigate, and most importantly, 5) the difference in a 'house rabbit' versus a rabbit is as dramatic as a wolf versus a dog. While genetically-speaking they may be very similar, the behavioral differences are so dramatic it becomes an apple v. oranges sort of thing.

If anything, I think further differentiating rabbits as wild vs. domestic vs. house is worthwhile.

Now for house v. domestic…Another issue is how to classify domesticated rabbits used for meat, fur, and research...these rabbits are domesticated in a fashion to allow humans to breed them, but they generally do not have personalities that bear resemblance to wild rabbits nor house rabbits, putting them somewhere in the middle. People seeking information on this likely are not seeking general information on rabbits nor general information on house rabbits. I think the best solution here is to have DOMESTIC=meat/fur/research/etc. with a link to ‘house rabbits’ and a blurb that says “one kind of domesticated rabbit kept solely for companionship is the [link]house rabbit[link] followed by a definition.

One issue would be left…how do you classify rabbits kept outside for companionship? They technically are not ‘house rabbits’ by pure definition, but they also aren’t quite fitting the bill for ‘domestic’. We would need to classify these one way or another.--user NickZac (talk) 17:19, 4 December 2013 (UTC)NickZac

This is an old discussion about merging with the "domestic rabbit" article. The proposal was rejected. The current proposal is to merge it with "rabbit" and it has no section on the talk page: you are the first one to discuss it. Since it has been proposed for two years and you oppose the merger, I think it is safe to remove the "merge" template.

And by the way, your formatting is all right. TheMillionRabbit 06:31, 6 January 2014 (UTC)

Original research tag

There was a tag claiming that the article contained original research. There were a lot of recent edits for which I couldn't find support in the article's citations. I removed the tag and the material that needs to be sourced, which I am listing below. If anyone has a source for these, please re-introduce with a citation. Keep in mind, too, that the article should describe common practice, but not be a "how to" guide (e.g. don't use "you" when writing).

• "The complete MAIN thing a rabbit needs in it's diet is medow hay. The diet can insist of other foods but you MUST have medow hay all the time. Lettuce has little nutritional value, you can feed it to your pet rabbit, but don't use it instead of other foods."
• "By rubbing soap on electrical cords and wooden furniture/items, your rabbit should stop chewing them as they do not like the smell of the soap, however you need to maintain this as it wears off and you will find your rabbit chewing once again. Providing them with apple tree sticks/cuttings (without the leaves) will give your rabbit something else to chew on that is good for them."
• "Many rabbits enjoy watching TV or computer screens, especially when bright, active scenes like cartoons are on."
• "oat hay" [as a food]
• "Many bunnies find the buttons on a TV remote control irresistible, and will chew them off. This issue is easily addressed by leaving the remote in the upside down position (buttons down) or out of reach of the bunny."
• "fur prevents intestinal blocking and fatal choking "
• "When done brushing, a pet owner can additionally wet their hands and wipe the rabbit down to remove any loose fur."

Also, I removed two sections, "Problems" and "Reproduction" because there were redundant with other info in House rabbit and Rabbit.

Finally, there is this blurb, which has some value, but needs to the right context. It should be folded into the section on organizations:

• "Most house rabbit problems have simple solutions, such as neutering the aforementioned male rabbit. When issues occur, it is a good idea to consult a local rabbit shelter for advice. Typically shelter volunteers will have encountered similar situations and will know how to deal with them."

--Ed Brey (talk) 17:31, 12 October 2009 (UTC)

One more removed unsourced assertion, which came over from Domestic rabbit: "they can also be trained to recognize different patterns of the voice. Rabbits can be taught their names, although they recognize the pattern of the noises more than the words." --Ed Brey (talk) 03:00, 14 October 2009 (UTC)

It would be really good to find a citation for this. One place to look is the Journal of Applied Animal Welfare Science http://www.psyeta.org/jaaws/jaawstoc.shtml which is a peer reviewed scientific journal that focuses on issues such as the welfare of companion animals. In fact, I recommend anyone really interested in pet behaviour to browse the articles (free online). Arikk (talk) 16:13, 15 October 2009 (UTC)

This is an encyclopedia...

Alot of lines in the current revision as of Oct 10th 2007 are very iffy.

"They are a very cute pet to have and they are a good companion." I don't remember cuteness being a measurable value. "The complete MAIN thing a rabbit needs in it's diet is medow hay. The diet can insist of other foods but you MUST have medow hay all the time. Lettuce has little nutritional value, you can feed it to your pet rabbit, but don't use it instead of other foods.House rabbits are..." - Fully capitalized words, bad spacing, and most of all: Wikipedia:NotHowTo. • ∈nigma • (talk) 13:04, 10 October 2009 (UTC)

Cute compared with, say, a wolverine. ←Baseball Bugs ^{What's up, Doc?} carrots→ 09:35, 13 November 2010 (UTC)

Life Span?

Don't you think the average life span of a house rabbit is a bit important? I couldn't find life span info in the house rabbit OR rabbit page. C'mon you guys, that seems pretty rudimentary for an animal article. I'd post it myself if I knew but that's why I came to this page! Sixthcrusifix (talk) 05:03, 15 November 2009 (UTC)

Thanks for the feedback. I agree is would be a prominent question. I added the life expectancy to the intro paragraph. Ed Brey (talk) 18:34, 2 December 2009 (UTC)

Socialization with strangers

I removed the following text, because it isn't supported by the cited source or any source that I could find. If anyone has a good source, please put the text back in: "When a stranger approaches slowly with an outstretched hand, a rabbit will often respond positively by sniffing and pushing the hand with his nose.[8]" --Ed Brey (talk) 02:04, 2 May 2010 (UTC)

How to guide

The article as it stands is mostly an instruction guide on how to take care of pet rabbits. I wonder how much content would actually be left once all the non-encyclopaedic stuff has been removed. Perhaps this WP:CFORK would be best merged back into domestic rabbit. _wjemather^bigissue 21:10, 10 November 2010 (UTC)

The article describes the behavior of house rabbit owners, which is encyclopedic as far as I know. A description of common practice does serve as instruction new owners, but I don't see how that poses any problem. Is there any specific section you see that is a problem? --Ed Brey (talk) 18:14, 11 November 2010 (UTC)

It is mostly down to the way it is written. For a start, the first sentence of the acquiring a rabbit section reads "It is important to consider the time commitment, space requirements, lifestyle changes, and cost before acquiring a house rabbit, as well as how it will interact with kids and pets." That is instructional. _wjemather^bigissue 18:29, 11 November 2010 (UTC)

He he :) We're thinking along the same lines. I had just seen that section and was editing it and updating my response when I encounted an edit conflict because of your post. Here is what I was going to update my response to:

The article describes the behavior of house rabbit owners and best practices in the field presented by experts. This is encyclopedic as far as I know and is common practice. For example, Cat, a B-Class-rated article, has similar treatment of owner’s behaviors. A description of common practice does serve as instruction for new owners, but I don't see how that poses any problem. I have noticed over time that some well-meaning editors have incorporated material in a purely how-to fashion, but I think that has been replaced with encyclopedic material on the same topic. I did find and correct one area that remained. Is there any specific section you see that is a problem? --Ed Brey (talk) 18:42, 11 November 2010 (UTC)

I think the link to the condo building instructions should remain. This is a good example of a how-to guide, which should not be - and is not - part of the page. However, it is still valuable to readers to have it be linked. It is not required to be a WP:RS, since it is not supporting facts in the article; it's just an external link. Ideally, the how-to would be a Wikibook or Wikiversity article, but until someone volunteers, having an external link to a decently pageranked how-to page is better than nothing. --Ed Brey (talk) 02:43, 12 November 2010 (UTC)

It is not an RS, nor does it qualify as an acceptable external link. you have a clear conflict of interest here, what with it being your personal website and all, so it would be best if you stepped away from this one. _wjemather^bigissue 08:07, 12 November 2010 (UTC)

Are you arguing against a link to that particular bunny condo building instruction page or against any link to any such page? What makes that link unacceptable to you as an external link? I very much want to respect COI here. Just to be clear, there is no commercial interest at stake; additionally, I'm being diligent not to have a bias toward any one link and am looking for community input. What is the best way to lead article readers who want to own a house rabbit to a how-to on building a staple of house rabbit ownership? I'd like to link to the best article out there. Whether it is on breyfamily.net or not doesn't matter. --Ed Brey (talk) 12:36, 16 November 2010 (UTC)

Read through the policies and guidelines. The article is about rabbits not hutches or cardboard mini-condos, and especially not how to build you own. I cannot see any circumstances that your website, or any other similar one, would be acceptable in this article. _wjemather^bigissue 20:13, 16 November 2010 (UTC)

Agreed. WP:ELNO highlights a number of reasons why it shouldn't be added. The recommended solution for articles that become magnets for inappropriate links is to introduce a DMOZ Open Directory link which gives the article reader to a whole host of external sites related to the topic of the article. That is exactly what I will do here. --Simple Bob (talk) 21:07, 16 November 2010 (UTC)

The closest point I see that applies from WP:ELNO that applies to general linking of a how-to for housing is point 13, to avoid "Sites that are only indirectly related to the article's subject". What are the other points you think apply? Regarding point 13, there is an article section specifically on housing; a link about housing would be directly related. --Ed Brey (talk) 12:22, 18 November 2010 (UTC)

Using wikipedia to promote your own website is not appropriate. ←Baseball Bugs ^{What's up, Doc?} carrots→ 18:50, 18 November 2010 (UTC)

To answer the earlier question "What is the best way to lead article readers who want to own a house rabbit to a how-to on building a staple of house rabbit ownership?" - it shouldn't be necessary. Automobile or motorcycle or aircraft articles on Wikipedia don't links to external websites with workshop manuals on how to maintain your vehicle. The C (programming language) doesn't have external links to manuals on how to write C programs. And the house rabbit articles shouldn't have links to anything which tells you how to breed, maintain or cook house rabbits (although I have some great recipes if you want them). Where these how-to links do belong is in DMOZ, which is linked in the article. Otherwise how-to information belongs in Wikibooks - which you will find on both the house rabbits page and the C programming language page. --Simple Bob (talk) 21:55, 18 November 2010 (UTC)

Could you possibly knock off the cooking jokes, please, guys? They're not actually that offensive, but if you had a house rabbit as a pet you'd've heard them all a thousand times yourself. Seriously, that's the first thing many people (mostly guys?) will say, if the matter comes up in conversation. It's not very original, and it's not very funny.--Stroller (talk) 06:27, 19 November 2010 (UTC)

If that's the way you feel then I'll be happy to knock off the jokes. It was not my intention to cause offence and I apologise if I did. For the record though I do eat rabbit (both wild and domestic, but never to my knowledge one raised as a pet) and I do have some good recipes. --Simple Bob (talk) 09:41, 19 November 2010 (UTC)

Aside from the omission of "how to cook", there is also the more sober matter of how to deal with them when they die. I don't recall that the article has anything about that. But I would think there would be laws relating to the disposal of dead animals. If you live in a city, I doubt it's legal to bury them in your backhard. ←Baseball Bugs ^{What's up, Doc?} carrots→ 09:55, 19 November 2010 (UTC)

It is legal to bury any pet on your property in the UK (link).

I'm not sure that's true in the USA, although I know people do it. But then the dilemma gets to be, what if you don't have a yard? I googled the subject, and many items came up. This one[9] oddly enough discusses cooking the dead critter, but I certainly would not recommend cooking an animal that died of natural causes as opposed to being properly slaughtered. ←Baseball Bugs ^{What's up, Doc?} carrots→ 10:22, 19 November 2010 (UTC)

Yeuch. I'm not sure I would eat an animal that died of natural causes either - not least because of diseases like Myxomatosis which are still prevalent in the UK. My weapon of choice for rabbits is a .17 HMR, but I'm very careful to check before and after shooting for signs of the disease - in which case dispatching the animal is justified even though you don't eat it, because you end its suffering. Myxomatosis does occur in pet rabbits in the UK, although house rabbits will be at lower risk because of the reduced exposure to fleas/mites. I shot a friend's pet rabbit which had Myxomatosis and he had the body incinerated so as not to spread the disease. --Simple Bob (talk) 10:50, 19 November 2010 (UTC)

FWIW bunnies should be inoculated against Myxomatosis and VHD - VHD annually and myxie twice per year. Until recently my vet suggested only inoculating against myxomatosis once per year, in the spring, but he has seen more cases of myxie in pet rabbits the last couple of years. It is a dreadful disease, and I don't think there's much he can do for them. :( The European wild rabbit population is developing increased immunity to myxomatosis, and in time it will become endemic - they'll no longer suffer from carrying it, as has always been the situation with Peruvian bunnies. Sadly, domestic bunnies will remain forever in need of vaccinations. :( --Stroller (talk) 17:32, 19 November 2010 (UTC)

Image of rabbit with keys

Despite the description on the image page, there is nothing in the picture to suggest the rabbit is dashing anywhere, let alone under a couch. Caption changed to reflect what can actually be seen – a rabbit with some keys. _wjemather^bigissue 18:48, 11 November 2010 (UTC)

To corroborate the photo's metadata, the pose of the rabbit is in, stretched out as it is, would be unusual for a stationary rabbit. I see no reason to doubt the veracity of the metadata. Having the picture and the full caption is helpful in capturing the spirit of owning a house rabbit - i.e., it interacts with your life in very personal (and sometimes annoying) ways. That said, I'd rather not focus on the caption so much, but rather find a better picture. See #Main picture. It would be nice to have a picture without such a harsh flash. --Ed Brey (talk) 02:28, 12 November 2010 (UTC)

What was uploaded with the image is irrelevant. This is an encyclopaedia not a story book that needs embelishments. _wjemather^bigissue 07:54, 12 November 2010 (UTC)

I agree with you that we don't have to use what was uploaded with the image. It's just a pool of info to draw from. The question is what will most help a reader understand house rabbits? Saying "A house rabbit dashing under the couch with her keys" tells you more in a snippet about what house rabbit ownership is like than just "a house rabbit with keys". The former helps the article educate. Why would you want to take that away? The latter caption could be removed altogether, since it adds nothing not already in the picture. --Ed Brey (talk) 12:55, 16 November 2010 (UTC)

We are not here to promote rabbits as house pets or tell a story. _wjemather^bigissue 20:10, 16 November 2010 (UTC)

Agreed. But we are here to describe as richly as possible what house rabbits are like and what house rabbit ownership is like. What do you think is the best way to do that in the caption of the main image? --Ed Brey (talk) 11:46, 18 November 2010 (UTC)

How about "rabbit carrying keys in its mouth"? ←Baseball Bugs ^{What's up, Doc?} carrots→ 18:48, 18 November 2010 (UTC)

I'm wondering about going with more details. What differentiates a house rabbit from other domestic rabbits? One difference is they commonly have names. We could work that in. The reader doesn't care about the specific name, but the concept is valuable, and the specific example helps articulate the concept. Another difference is the strength of interaction between rabbit and owner. Meat rabbits aren't to likely to get hold of their owners keys because they don't hop freely through the house. Not so with house rabbits. So another good detail is to indicate that these are not the rabbit's keys (an assigned toy). I'm not sure how best to word it, perhaps something like, "Willow, a house rabbit, carrying her owners' keys in her mouth". We could go into where she is going with the keys, but I agree that feels a bit abstract given what's in the photo. It would exemplify another house rabbit differentiator, but a less interesting one. --Ed Brey (talk) 18:56, 23 November 2010 (UTC)

The picture of a rabbit and its owner eating an apple is a better photo aesthetically, more interesting, conveys the concept of a "house rabbit" better, and has a matter-of-fact caption. I moved it up to the main photo spot, and got rid of the photo of the rabbit with the keys. Lisieski (talk) 02:41, 19 December 2010 (UTC)

How to get rid of the how to

This article is a terrible example of a how-to guide. I'm going to have a go at cleaning it up but would appreciate the support of others - especially in identifying the stuff to be pruned. --Simple Bob (talk) 11:52, 13 November 2010 (UTC)

I found all the detail interesting, and other readers might also. That doesn't rule out the possibility that it could be made more concise. ←Baseball Bugs ^{What's up, Doc?} carrots→ 15:47, 13 November 2010 (UTC)

Removing all unsourced material would probably be the first step. --Morn (talk) 17:42, 13 November 2010 (UTC)

A significant amount of it does seem to be someone relating their personal experiences with rabbits. For one thing, I've always heard that rabbits cannot be housebroken. But I don't have a source for that. I figure one major advantage of having a rabbit as a pet is that if you get tired of it, you could always cook it. Tastes kinda like chicken. ←Baseball Bugs ^{What's up, Doc?} carrots→ 17:47, 13 November 2010 (UTC)

As I touched on above, once the article has been stripped of the how-to stuff, and all the original research, there may well not be enough content to justify this fork of domestic rabbit and merging may be the best option. _wjemather^bigissue 17:50, 13 November 2010 (UTC)

Just as owners of a pet dog probably don't want to read about the culinary aspects of dog meat, rabbit breeders and rabbit pet owners are usually quite distinct. Also, house rabbits are usually smaller breeds that would not yield much meat. "House rabbit" is an established term that does deserve its own article, except with better sources and not as a how-to. --Morn (talk) 18:01, 13 November 2010 (UTC)

Let's just see whats left first. I'm only saying there may not be sufficient content distinct from domestic rabbit to warrant this fork. After all we do not have separate articles for pet dogs or cats. At this point I really do not see why rabbits should be any different. _wjemather^bigissue 18:16, 13 November 2010 (UTC)

This article was started nearly 4 years ago, not surprisingly by a guy who's been quite defensive about it. As you say, see what's left when the OR is gone. ←Baseball Bugs ^{What's up, Doc?} carrots→ 18:23, 13 November 2010 (UTC)

Morn, I believe a lot of the material you removed is actually sourced in Pavia and Harriman. Could you please put it back and add tags where you find the material doubtful or not covered by those sources? This would make it much easier to clean up. It would also be more consistent with WP:CITE#Dealing with unsourced material. --Ed Brey (talk) 12:49, 16 November 2010 (UTC)

Ed, you've been working for about four years on this article and yet haven't managed to do proper inline citations. It's your job to properly source material you put on WP. If it takes years to resolve the fact template, it's better to remove the material. --Morn (talk) 21:26, 18 November 2010 (UTC)

I'm happy to volunteer, but have limited time for this project. You would make it more efficient for me if you were OK with restoring your deletions and tagging instead. I don't see why issues can't be addressed in a timely fashion; this article has never had a stale fact template. Additionally, please remember this is a team effort. We can all pitch in to improve the article, including with inline citations. That said, it is important to remember that while desirable, inline citations are not required except for material challenged or likely to be challenged (WP:V). Do you see any reason that WP:CITE#Dealing with unsourced material would not apply to this article? --Ed Brey (talk) 18:42, 23 November 2010 (UTC)

There is a big difference between unsourced claims and original research, which appeared to be rife in this article prior to the cull. _wjemather^bigissue 18:51, 23 November 2010 (UTC)

I completely agree with the distinction. I'm pretty sure quite a bit too much was removed. I'm looking for an efficient way to separate the wheat from the chaff. I'd like to follow the standard process if possible. --Ed Brey (talk) 19:00, 23 November 2010 (UTC)

So it looks like there are a group of us who agree that the article needs cleaning up. Wikipedia is built on such consensus being reached, so have at it then! --Simple Bob (talk) 22:09, 13 November 2010 (UTC) Made a sort of big edit, removed a lot of POV and How-to information. I'm sure there's more to go, though. I elected to delete things rather than tag them, because (for the most part) they said things like "rabbit owners should" or "x is better for house rabbits" etc. I don't want to go through the trouble of a merge, but it seems like it might be in order. Lisieski (talk) 01:18, 12 December 2010 (UTC)

Nice one! Arikk (talk) 21:10, 12 December 2010 (UTC)

Good job! In the meantime I have removed a bunch of stuff added/reinstated by Jeepday (talk · contribs). I suggest you keep an eye on the article should it be reinstated again. --Simple Bob (talk) 22:05, 12 December 2010 (UTC)

Be careful not to turn this into an edit war. Although removing junk is good, you cannot assume that the edits of a particular user are necessarily junk. For instance, I replaced the external link to the House Rabbit Society, which is probably the only site on the web for reliable information on the subject (except this page of course...). Arikk (talk) 06:10, 13 December 2010 (UTC)

You are right, I don't want to start an edit war. I also agree that the House Rabbit Society is a reasonable site w.r.t. house rabbits - that's why it is used as a reference. However, I don't see why an organisation for a single country should be linked in the external links section over and above any of the 330 other rabbit-related websites that can be found via the DMOZ link. --Simple Bob (talk) 07:20, 13 December 2010 (UTC)

Because that site is specifically about house rabbits (as opposed to just rabbits) and because they publish a fairly authoritative book on the subject, the House Rabbit Handbook, which is used as a reference. I don't think you can say the same thing for those "330 other rabbit-related websites that can be found via the DMOZ link"! --Morn (talk) 10:24, 13 December 2010 (UTC)

The DMOZ link yielded very little information on house rabbits or their care/keeping - and that, only after many clicks. It's not the most relevant link for this article. Lisieski (talk) 23:41, 17 December 2010 (UTC)

The recent short-lived addition, about having a rabbit "wake" when one of them croaks, was not intended to be funny, I'm sure. But it was. ←Baseball Bugs ^{What's up, Doc?} carrots→ 00:38, 18 December 2010 (UTC)

Dude, it was sad. Clearly you have no soul. I cried. :( --Stroller (talk) 14:20, 18 December 2010 (UTC)

Oh, come on. It's not a human, it's a freakin' rabbit. Ask the average Australian farmer how they feel about rabbits. ←Baseball Bugs ^{What's up, Doc?} carrots→ 14:36, 18 December 2010 (UTC)

Ok, I was kidding when I said you had no soul, and I was kidding when I said I cried, but ... hmmmn ... look, yes, this is slightly serious. I'm not saying that that was appropriate content for an encyclopaedia (I'm not judging that), but seriously, I expect that one day I myself will have to help one of my pets assimilate that his or her mate has died. Would you be laughing about someone crying when their dog died? Seriously, comments like yours are massively frustrating to those who work in rabbit rescue and to house-rabbit owners in general. We don't give a monkey's what an Aussie farmer thinks about rabbits as vermin - that is completely different to the status of rabbits as pets. Apparently the problem is that you're not asking the average pet owner what they think of their companions. Domesticated rabbits are the 3rd most popular pet in the UK and yet they're the most abused and neglected (RSPCA figures) - that is a massive over-representation. And the reason that rabbits are so frikkin' neglected is that people don't give a toss about them, don't bother to think or learn about their welfare or their needs, and don't treat them with the respect or decency that nearly everyone gives to cats and dogs as a matter of course. Now I hope you're not reading this wrong - I'm not really offended right now, I'm just trying to explain. I'm not that sensitive about this issue - but you should be. Because there may very well be rabbit-lovers reading this page who are far more easily upset than I am, who have perhaps lost their pet this week, and IMO you should be sensitive to not making things harder for them. I don't really know what you found funny about that comment - don't bother to explain; I actually found it a little funny myself, but probably for quite different reasons - but there was no need for you to make the comment you did on this page. Wikipedia is not a chatroom nor a messageboard and your comment served no purpose. I think there's a real risk that if this page were left only to rabbit-lovers then it could become a new-age fluff-fest, so I guess it's useful to wikipedia that folks with no interest in rabbits are contributing. But on the other hand I kinda don't know what you're doing with this page on your watchlist, if you don't want to treat the subject in a mature manner, if all you want to do is laugh at people.--Stroller (talk) 19:11, 18 December 2010 (UTC)

I thought it was funny at first too, but also interesting (and I keep rabbits - house rabbits, if you will.) Also, Strolls, if you're going to call people our for misusing the talk-page for off-hand comments, it would strengthen your position to refrain from them yourself. More topically, I think the edit (in some form) should stick, as I've detailed in the next section.Lisieski (talk) 21:52, 18 December 2010 (UTC)

Social housing and "viewing" of deceased rabbits

My recent edit containing this text:

"House rabbits are often kept in pairs, trios, or larger groups, to help cater to their social needs, which may not be fully met by their keepers. Pairs or groups of rabbits that live together will bond with each other, exhibiting an increase in affiliative behaviors such as mutual grooming, physical contact, and eating together and a decrease in aggressive and defensive behaviors. Some house rabbit keepers claim that rabbits are aware of the absence of their bonded peers after they have died, exhibiting abnormal behavior; proponents of this idea advocate that the surviving rabbit(s) be allowed to "view" the body of the deceased rabbit in order to "accept" its death. "

was quickly reverted. I want to defend it (or at least its spirit, if not the exact text) and see what people think before editing it again.

I think it's fair documentation of common practices (in fact, many references can be found citing the behavioral effects of housing rabbits socially.) I'll work on getting some scholarly sources about the effects of pair housing on social behavior, which I'm sure exist in abundance - social behavior in mammals is well-studied.

The "viewing" thing is a bit off-the-wall, but it seems to be mentioned on most online resources that deal with pet rabbits dying. I don't think it's POV, although it certainly hasn't been investigated in any scientific way - though there is at least one peer-reviewed article mentioning it ( http://www.ingentaconnect.com/content/brill/wov/2005/00000009/00000002/art00003 ). I think it's an important practice among people who identify as house rabbit keepers specifically, and so should be included in the article.Lisieski (talk) 21:47, 18 December 2010 (UTC)

"Some house rabbit keepers claim..." constitutes weasel words and certainly has no place in an encyclopedic entry. OTOH, I had a look at your reference and although it seems quite off the wall, this peculiar journal is published by a mainstream publishing house, and so has to be given the benefit of the doubt. If you REALLY think this belongs in the entry, and can phrase it in an appropriate way, I guess it would be hard to reject. Although as a professional, I personally find the idea rampant and heinous pseudoscience. Arikk (talk) 23:00, 19 December 2010 (UTC)

I think this would fall under WP:FRINGE and would have to be virtually invisible to avoid lending the idea WP:UNDUEWEIGHT. _wjemather^bigissue 23:06, 19 December 2010 (UTC)

So one sentence, no weasel words, citing that source, with a caveat that no behavioral research has been published? BTW, I also think it's a questionable practice, psychologically (who knows what it actually "means" to the surviving rabbit, or if it affects their behavior) but noticed it several times while reading about house rabbits, and think it's one of the subcultural practices that might differentiate the way "house rabbits" are kept from the way other rabbits are kept. Lisieski (talk) 18:42, 20 December 2010 (UTC)

Language of Lagomorphs external link

The person who removed this link specified that it contravened the WP:NOTHOWTO rule. This is simply not the case! The page provides a wealth of information for house rabbit owners to interpret the body language of their pets. It is not a 'how to' guide in any way, other than allowing you to understand what your rabbit is telling you so you may respond accordingly. To interpret this page as a 'how to guide', simply due to the semantics of its title, is being pedantic to the extreme. CrackDragon (talk) 12:50, 13 May 2011 (UTC)