Rabbit Rescue

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That’s how Amie Brockman, an animal caretaker at the Great Lakes Rabbit Sanctuary, reacts when asked about a letter to the editor in the Ann Arbor News. Instead of caring for abandoned pet rabbits, the writer suggested, why not cook them and feed them to the homeless?

That person may have been channeling Jonathan Swift, but other writers were equally disdainful. One suggested euthanizing sick animals instead of paying for veterinary treatment, while another described the sanctuary’s mission as “pointless.”

Brockman acknowledges that people eat wild rabbits but firmly maintains that these bunnies are different: “These are not cottontails. They are not wild animals. They’re not a food source. They’re pets.” GLRS board chair Tim Patino points out that the average domesticated rabbit released into the wild survives about two weeks.

GLRS is a no-kill shelter that takes in pet rabbits abandoned or surrendered by families that can no longer care for them. It’s been around in various forms since 1995 but first hopped onto the national stage three years ago, when the Utah-based Best Friends Animal Society rescued 800 rabbits from a Reno, Nevada, property.