The Truth About Baby Bunnies and Toddlers

I was elbow-deep in a basket of mismatched toddler socks last night when a post in my local county Facebook group made me drop my phone right into the laundry basket. Some sweet, incredibly naive mom had posted, "Looking for a cute baby bunny for sale for my two-year-old's Easter basket! Must be cheap and cuddly!" I physically cringed so hard I think I pulled a muscle in my neck.

Look, I get it. We've all seen those perfectly curated Instagram reels of a barefoot toddler in linen overalls gently feeding a dandelion to a fluffy little rabbit in a sunlit meadow. It makes you want to immediately drive to the nearest feed store and buy a whole litter. But I'm just gonna be real with you here—putting a live exotic prey animal in the hands of a human toddler who's currently learning how to control their emotions by throwing wooden blocks at the wall is a recipe for an absolute disaster.

My mom, bless her heart, completely disagrees with me on this. She grew up on a farm and firmly believes that taking care of small animals "builds character" in children, completely ignoring the fact that she also used to tell me that rubbing whiskey on my gums was a valid medical treatment for teething. But she keeps trying to convince me to get a rabbit for the kids, and every time she brings it up, I've to remind her about my oldest.

My oldest son, Beau, is my permanent cautionary tale for basically everything, but especially with animals. When he was two, I watched him try to carry our barn cat by her back legs like she was a sack of flour, and the resulting scratches looked like he’d gone ten rounds with a rosebush. And cats are tough. Rabbits? Not so much.

Why their bones are basically made of dry saltines

Here's the terrifying thing about rabbits that nobody tells you when you're looking at them through the wire cage at the pet store. From what our local rural vet told me—and keeping in mind I was wrangling three screaming kids at the time so I might have missed some of the scientific nuances—their skeletons are insanely fragile compared to how strong their back legs are.

If your two-year-old picks up a struggling rabbit and gets scared and drops it, or if the rabbit kicks too hard while being squeezed by a toddler who just wants to "love it," the rabbit's own kicking force can apparently snap its own spine. Just hearing that gave me full-body chills. I can barely keep my kids from breaking the plastic toys they own, let alone an animal with a spine made of glass. You don't want to be the parent explaining to your wailing preschooler why their new best friend is suddenly paralyzed because they hugged it too hard.

And let's talk about the lifespan and the money, because I'm nothing if not budget-conscious. People think rabbits live for like three years, right? Wrong. The rescue lady I talked to once at a tractor supply event said they live for eight to twelve years. Twelve years! That means if you buy one for your toddler now, you'll be the one cleaning its litter box while your kid is asking for the keys to your car. And because they're considered "exotic" pets, an vet visit out here in rural Texas costs roughly the same as a mortgage payment.

My mom’s farm logic versus actual reality

If you absolutely insist on getting one because your grandmother is guilting you about building character, you basically have to act like a prison warden, setting up militant boundaries where your kid is only allowed to touch the animal with an open, flat hand while sitting flat on the floor, and you better be prepared to tackle your toddler if they ever try to go near the rabbit's litter box because to a two-year-old, rabbit droppings look exactly like Cocoa Puffs.

I guess there are rules about never picking them up and leaving them alone when they hop away, but try explaining the concept of "respecting personal space" to a three-year-old who regularly follows you into the bathroom to ask you what color a dinosaur's tongue was. It's just not going to happen without you hovering over them every single second of the day.

So you found a nest in the yard and now you're panicking

Springtime in Texas means we basically spend three months playing a high-stakes game of "Don't Run Over The Nest With The Riding Mower." My kids are always finding wild baby bunnies in the yard, and it's a whole dramatic production every single time.

Usually, the mom isn't anywhere around, which immediately sends my middle child into hysterics thinking the babies are orphans. But from the frantic 2 AM Google searches I've done, I think the wildlife rehab folks say the mom only comes back like twice a day, usually when it's dark, so she doesn't accidentally lead coyotes right to her babies. So if you find a nest, just back away slowly and tell your kids it's a pile of dirty leaves or something because if you try to bring wild infant rabbits into your house to bottle feed them while also trying to keep human children alive, you're going to lose your mind entirely.

The toys that won't bite your kid or cost you vet bills

Instead of bringing another living, pooping creature into your house that you've to keep alive for a decade, I'm begging you to just buy a toy. Your toddler literally won't know the difference in the long run, and a toy won't chew through your iPhone charger cable.

When my youngest was going through that horrific teething phase where everything in the house was covered in a layer of drool, I stumbled onto the Bunny Teething Rattle Wooden Ring Sensory Toy and it was legitimately the best money I spent that month. I'm picky about what my kids shove in their mouths, but this thing is just untreated beechwood and cotton yarn, so I don't have to stress about weird chemical coatings.

It's got this sweet little blue bow tie, and the combination of the hard wood and the soft crochet head gave her enough sensory input that she actually stopped trying to gnaw on the edges of our coffee table. Plus, it's cheap enough that when we inevitably lost it under the front seat of the minivan for three weeks, I didn't cry about it. It’s simple, it works, and nobody has to clean a cage.

Now, we also have the Organic Cotton Baby Blanket with Bunny Print. I'm just gonna be completely honest with you—it's a very nice blanket, and the organic cotton is super soft, but honestly, it's still a blanket that's going to get dragged through the dirt and covered in spit-up. My middle child insisted on wearing it like a superhero cape for six months straight. I'll give it credit though, the yellow background with the little white rabbits is ridiculously cute and somehow manages to hide mysterious stains way better than any of our plain white blankets ever did.

If you're drowning in the teething phase and just need something that works without breaking the bank or bringing live animals into the mix, you should probably check out Kianao's whole teething collection here.

What if you actually already bought the rabbit

If you're reading this and thinking, "Jess, I already bought the rabbit at the county fair last week, what do I do now?" well, buckle up. You're gonna need some heavy-duty baby gates.

You have to keep the toddler and the rabbit completely separated unless you're sitting right there on the floor with them. And apparently, when these rabbits hit like six months old, their hormones go absolutely wild and they can get super aggressive and territorial, which means you've to spend even more money to get them spayed or neutered.

Also, the diet thing is insane. My vet was lecturing me once about how baby rabbits need unlimited alfalfa hay for calcium, but then when they get older you've to switch them to timothy hay, otherwise their stomach just completely stops working in this fatal shutdown thing called GI stasis. It sounds incredibly stressful. I can barely remember to switch my kids from whole milk to 2% when they turn two, let alone manage the complex digestive needs of a lagomorph.

Keeping the teething monsters happy without the hassle

I can't stress enough how much easier your life will be if you lean into the bunny aesthetic with accessories instead of actual livestock. For the diaper bag, I highly suggest throwing in the Bunny Silicone & Wood Teether.

I keep this one shoved in the cup holder of my car because the silicone part is so easy to just wipe down when it gets covered in cracker crumbs. It's got the wooden ring on one side and the soft silicone on the other, which is great because my youngest would alternate between wanting something rock-hard and something squishy depending on which tooth was currently making our lives miserable. And yes, you can throw the silicone part in the dishwasher, which is a massive win because I absolutely refuse to hand-wash anything past 8 PM.

Look, motherhood is chaotic enough. We're all just out here trying to keep our kids fed, moderately clean, and mostly emotionally stable. You don't need to add a fragile, ten-year focus on your plate just because it would look cute in an Easter photo. Stick to the wooden toys, leave the wild nests alone, and give yourself some grace.

Ready to save your sanity and your baseboards? Grab one of those wooden teething rattles before your kid decides the television remote looks delicious.

Answers to the questions you're probably furiously googling right now

How do I know if the wild baby bunnies in my yard actually need my help?

Honestly, 99% of the time, they don't. Unless you physically see that the baby is bleeding or the nest was completely shredded by a lawnmower, leave them alone. If they've their ears standing up and they're hopping around, they're basically teenagers in the rabbit world, even if they look like they fit in a teacup. Don't touch them. Just let nature do its thing while you watch from the window.

What's the best way to clean these wooden teething toys without ruining the wood?

Whatever you do, don't boil the wooden parts or leave them soaking in the sink with your dirty coffee mugs. I did that once and the wood split right down the middle. Just take a damp cloth with a tiny bit of whatever mild dish soap you use for baby bottles, wipe the wooden ring down, and let it air dry on the counter. The crochet parts I just hand wash in the sink and wring them out real good before laying them in the sun.

If my kid begs for a rabbit, what age is honestly appropriate?

Every vet and rescue person I've ever talked to says absolutely no younger than seven or eight years old. And even then, it's not the kid's pet, it's your pet. You will be the one paying for the hay, cleaning up the cocoa puffs, and dealing with the vet bills. So the real question is, what age are YOU ready to take on a high-maintenance exotic pet? Because for me, the answer is literally never.

Are silicone teethers better than the wooden ones?

It completely depends on the day and the tooth. That's why I like the ones that have both. Sometimes my kids wanted the give of the silicone, and sometimes they wanted to aggressively gnaw on the hard beechwood like a little beaver. Having a toy that combines both just saves you from having to dig through the diaper bag looking for three different options while your kid is screaming in the Target checkout line.