[Mist]

Hello! Sorry if this topic has been brought up before, but I'm a new user here so if it has been discussed before, I haven't seen it yet.

Anyway, I was just wondering if anyone has had any experiences successfully (or not) in introducing and socializing a rabbit with their yorkie. I know yorkies were meant to be a rodenting breed, and it depends on how much of those predatory instincts are still in your yorkie, but I'd like to hear some of your experiences, or thoughts and suggestions.

I'll give a little bit of info on my yorkie, first of all. Her name's Mocha, and she is 11 this year. When we take her out on walks, she does tend to try and chase small animals, like squirrels and crows, so I'm thinking this might be a bad sign if I want to bring a rabbit home, however, she is a little older now and has mellowed out a bit. She has always been very territorial, and when other dogs enter our home, she becomes very upset and agitated, however, she is indifferent to cats, and seems more curious than angry or jealous when she sees one around. She has never been around small animals like rabbits or guinea pigs before (not counting the squirrels and crows), so I don't know how she would react to one.

I have another question that might be a little related; Mocha, in the past few months, has completely abandoned her toys and is uninterested when we try to engage her in games that involve her squeaky toys, like fetch. We have a lot of theories about this, from "maybe she is just getting old and does not want to play anymore", to "maybe her teeth hurts when she tries to pick up toys", because when I squeak her toy, sometimes she does perk up and look like she wants to play, but when I throw it (near or far), she either doesn't chase it, or she chases it and does not pick it up. About a week ago, though, she initiated a game of fetch with me and my dad for a few minutes, so I'm baffled by this. Perhaps she wants new toys? And she'll play with me without toys, too, she still loves to play chase with me, or just rolling around on the carpet, and she's just generally quite active still, but she used to come running when her toys are squeaked, and now, she doesn't react much.

The reason I say the toy issue might be related to my rabbit question is that I hear the reason dogs and cats like to play with squeaky toys and other noisy toys is because the sound they make is like the sound of a prey animal dying, and being natural predators, they are drawn to toys like that. So now that she doesn't react to her squeaky toys, would that possibly mean she no longer feels a desire to hunt and kill small animals? I don't know, that theory might be a little far-fetched.

So anyway, I'd love to hear some of your thoughts and/or experiences regarding yorkies and rabbits. If you do have a rabbit and a yorkie living peacefully together, could you also describe the temperament of your yorkie? Thanks for reading, and I look forward to your replies!