Rabbits, chickens and everyone else

Small animals get forgotten in most pet sitting, and they should not be. A rabbit left for a week with a full bowl and nobody looking at it can go downhill frighteningly fast. Hens still need shutting in at dusk whether you are home or not.

I have kept rabbits, guinea pigs, mice and rats of my own over the years, as well as dogs, cats and horses. Small animals are not an afterthought here.

Who I look after

Rabbits and guinea pigs · chickens and ducks · ferrets · rats, hamsters and gerbils · birds · fish · reptiles and amphibians

What a visit includes

• Fresh food, clean water, hay topped right up
• Hutches, cages and runs cleaned out properly
• Runs moved to fresh grass and checked secure, with the local fox in mind
• Hens let out in the morning and shut in at dusk
• Eggs collected
• A real health check, not just a glance through the wire
• Handling and company for the ones who want it, and peace for the ones who do not

Chickens

Shutting in at dusk is the job most people cannot cover, because dusk does not care what time you get home from work. I will do the morning let-out and the evening lock-up, check the run and the fencing, collect the eggs and keep the water clean.

In winter that means two short visits at either end of a very short day. In June it means a late one. Either way it is the difference between a secure run and a fox finding out you are away.

Rabbits

Rabbits hide illness until it is serious. Every visit includes a check on eating, droppings, back ends and behaviour: the four things that will tell you something is wrong long before the rabbit does.

In summer that back-end check matters more than anything else on the list. A dirty rabbit in warm weather is a genuine emergency, and it is the single most common reason I would be ringing your vet rather than you.

Guinea pigs, ferrets and the rest

Same principle: fed, watered, cleaned, and actually looked at. Ferrets get handled if they are used to it. Guinea pigs get their vegetables and their hay, and somebody to talk at them, which they mind about more than people expect.