Who We Are
Honey Bunnies OC is a small, private rabbitry based in Orange County, California. Our rabbits are much-loved pets which we play and interact with every day. Each bunny born at Honey Bunnies OC is gently hand-reared alongside of its mother and siblings.
We offer our bunnies ample time and space to roam and play, including them in our day-to-day lives, and ensure social interaction that primes them for the most common environmental factors that rabbits experience as pets. This includes general care and handling, such as being picked up and carried, having their nails trimmed, and exposure to both indoor and back yard environments.
Our bunnies are socialized alongside of children, adult friends and family, other bunnies, dogs, and cats so that appropriate and safe contact with the members of their future families will not cause them undue stress, no matter who they share their forever home with.
Our Mission
At Honey Bunnies OC, we are eager to share with others what fantastic pets and companions rabbits make. They are highly intelligent animals that form strong bonds with their owners and have the potential to bring joy to people in all sorts of living arrangements. We aim educate others about rabbit ownership and the type of care needed to your bunny happy and healthy.
We chose to begin producing rabbits after having several disappointing early experiences in rabbit ownership. As new adopters, many of these pitfalls caught us off guard and were only recognized in hindsight. From rabbits being offered to us before weaning age, to those arriving in extremely poor health, and even those being sold as completely different breeds than they were claimed to be, we realized that it was unfortunately very common for rabbits, especially young ones, to be forced into health and living situations they would have trouble surviving.
We learned it was also all too common for families to be subjected to the tragic loss of a new pet, or to be faced with unexpected veterinary costs or growth outcomes, potentially leading to emotionally devastating financial and rehoming decisions. Welcoming a pet into one’s family should be a rewarding experience for both, not a coin toss. With a background in animal care, training, and husbandry, we felt that there was a way for us both to help and to enjoy our lives with our bunnies centerstage.
For this reason, health is our primary concern in every single crossing. While producing strong rabbits typed for exhibition does much to further the breed, it is our belief that an emphasis on temperament is essential to further the benefit to rabbits themselves; to enhance their relationships with their owners and ensure they find themselves forever homes. We offer transparency and our experience in adopting out both purebred and cross-bred rabbits, and do our best to educate owners on the benefits of each so that they can choose a pet who will be an excellent fit for their family. Our ultimate goal is to ensure that once one of our bunnies finds their home, they get to live out the entirety of their long and happy life there.
Have You Considered Adopting From A Shelter?
While adopting a baby bunny is an excellent choice to become a rabbit owner, there are other pathways to become a bunny owner as well. We encourage you to check your local shelter listings for available bunnies, as well as those of your local rabbit rescue, where you may find bunnies of all breeds and colors waiting for their forever homes. Honey Bunnies OC offers a home for all of the rabbits it produces and when available, also offers adult bunnies, strays, and rescues for rehoming to hopeful forever families.
Rabbits are incredibly bright and very social creatures. Many people don’t realize that owning one is similar to the care commitment of owning a cat or dog, but they also don’t realize that the relationship they can enjoy with their rabbit is similar to level of interaction and bonding many pet owners share with their dogs and cats. This misunderstanding is perhaps the most common reason that bunnies end up in shelters, and in fact in 2024 the most commonly stated reason for surrendering their rabbit was due to “an inability to care for the rabbit, or the lack of interest in doing so”.
There are considerably less rabbits in shelters than dogs and cats, and rabbits enjoy a much higher readoption rate as well. While there were roughly 11,000 rabbits that were surrendered to shelters in 2024, over 9,000 rabbits were adopted in 2024. (Source: Shelter Animals Count Annual Reporting)
Meanwhile, roughly 2.9 million dogs and 2.9 million cats entered shelters in 2024 with about 2 million dogs and 2.2 million cats being adopted into homes. Additionally, roughly 550,000 dogs were reuinted with their original owners rather than being adopted, as well as roughly 360,000 cats. (Source: ASPCA 2024 U.S. Animal Shelter Statistics)
There are numerous rabbit rescues and organizations working hard to ensure that fewer bunnies end up in shelters each year, and that more of those that do find their way back out of the shelter and into loving forever homes. If you think adoption could be a good fit for you, we encourage you to pursue this path. If you would like to adopt and are having trouble finding available bunnies or adoption services in your area, please don’t hesitate to reach out and ask for help on our contact form.
Community Outreach
While Honey Bunnies OC does not currently host community outreach events, it is a future interest of ours. Currently, we are happy to consider donating rabbits to causes such that serve their community, with considerations ultimately based on the suitability of the proposed environment for the bunny itself.
Examples of organizations and businesses that we would be interested in connecting with include 4-H programs, educational programs, low-stress petting zoo environments, therapeutic and volunteer programs, classroom and after-school settings, retirement facilities and programs serving the elderly, childcare programs, programs serving low-income, disabled, and rehabilitative communities. This is by no means an exhaustive list; if you believe your program or facility could provide a safe and happy home for one of our bunnies, please don’t hesitate to enquire regarding your specific situation.
We are selective about the environments we donate or release rabbits into and it is with the welfare of our bunnies as our foremost concern. We must be sure that a bunny will have an appreciable quality of life and access to proper nutrition and veterinary care. Please inform us of how you can ensure the happiness, safety, shelter, and longevity of a bunny within your program, and we will be very happy to help as much as we can.
Why do we enage in this sort of outreach?
The founder of Honey Bunnies OC has dedicated several years to volunteering in programs that enrich the lives of those that are physically and/or mentally disabled. Animals are a wonderful and unimitable source of therapy who have profound and measureable effects on our mental and physical well-being. At times, they are even capable of bringing about therapeutic results that human efforts cannot always deliver on their own. This is why Honey Bunnies OC is happy to work with people programs that serve the disabled, disadvantaged, and communities with lessened access to animal interaction. If our bunnies can help you to help others, please reach out by sending us an email.
We have a special interest in opportunities that allow children to be responsibly educated about proper care of animals and that seek to inspire interest and empathy toward animals. This is because we feel that when a child’s love for animals is nurtured and cultivated, there’s a strong chance they grow up to be an adult who is concerned with animals and animal welfare. Adults who are concerned with animal welfare often make responsible pet-parents and tend to value and promote the ethical and empathetic treatment of animals, whether pet, commercial, or wild. These are community goals we believe in reaching for– not just for the wellbeing of pets, but for all animal lives. If you are aware of a program that will nurture the needs of a bunny while also allowing children the chance to connect and bond, please reach out by sending us an email.
Useful Links
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