{"id":701,"date":"2008-08-19T02:25:00","date_gmt":"2008-08-19T02:25:00","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.somewhereinnj.com\/?p=701"},"modified":"2014-10-01T03:19:07","modified_gmt":"2014-10-01T03:19:07","slug":"how-to-bliss-out-a-bunny","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.somewhereinnj.com\/?p=701","title":{"rendered":"How to bliss-out a bunny"},"content":{"rendered":"

I had planned a photo session this afternoon with Freckles the bunny so I could do a post about her turning 7 years old this month, but in the midst of trimming her nails and brushing her coat out, this happened and these photos are way cuter than any I took in the back yard.<\/p>\n

Freckles has always been a very laid-back bunny and at 7 she is even more so. Nothing bothers her, nothing freaks her out and that probably explains why she’s always been so healthy. (Knock wood!) Bunnies are prone to stress, of course, and that stress leads to all sorts of health problems.<\/p>\n

Anyway… trimming her nails is easy; I just roll her into an almost ball on my lap, facing away from me, and trim away.<\/p>\n

<\/span>\"\"<\/span><\/a>After the nail trimming was done, I turned her around in my lap to face me and worked the magic of the bunny whisperer. This mostly consists of rubbing the fur on her belly.<\/p>\n

<\/span>\"\"<\/span><\/a>As she relaxes, I gently run my hand over her face and draw her ears behind her. This really, really relaxes her and I don’t have to hold her at all.<\/p>\n

<\/span>\"\"<\/span><\/a>Her front paws go up in the air with her back legs in a perfect imitation of a dead bunny. She’ll stay like this forever too, so long as I stroke her face every now and again.<\/p>\n

<\/span>\"\"<\/span><\/a>Freckles also likes to sleep this way sometimes, causing untold numbers of near heart-attacks in those not familiar with the *dead-lop-flop*.<\/p>\n

Rabbit experts will tell you that there is no magic in this gentling of a bunny. We call it *trancing* and it’s probably based on an instinctual response to being grabbed by a predator. Some people use this trick to trim nails or give meds, but I don’t trust it enough because the bunny can wake up in a flash and twist off your lap and hurt itself. Freckles is the only bunny here I’m able to trance, even though I never need to.<\/p>\n

What about your buns? Can you hypnotize them – do you need to? <\/span><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

I had planned a photo session this afternoon with Freckles the bunny so I could do a post about her turning 7 years old this month, but in the midst of trimming her nails and brushing her coat out, this happened and these photos are way cuter than any I took in the back yard. … Continue reading How to bliss-out a bunny<\/span> →<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":2949,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":[],"categories":[18],"tags":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.somewhereinnj.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/701"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.somewhereinnj.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.somewhereinnj.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.somewhereinnj.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.somewhereinnj.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=701"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.somewhereinnj.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/701\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.somewhereinnj.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/2949"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.somewhereinnj.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=701"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.somewhereinnj.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=701"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.somewhereinnj.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=701"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}