Measure Food for a Rabbit Who Weighs Almost Nothing
A Netherland Dwarf may weigh less than a bag of sugar, so packing her food is an exercise in precision rather than volume. Send her usual hay in a generous bag, because hay remains most of her diet whatever her size, but pre-measure her pellets into daily portions or mark the tub with her exact small measure, since a well-meaning sitter's handful can be several days' worth of pellets for a dwarf and will fill her up before she eats enough hay. Her greens should be the familiar ones, in two fresh batches, with a note naming the portion in handful terms the sitter can picture. Include only her usual treat, in a tiny labelled pot.
Water and Litter She Can Actually Reach
Pack her own bowl and bottle and check the heights she is used to: a bottle spout mounted for a larger rabbit can sit too high for a Netherland Dwarf, and a deep, heavy bowl she cannot comfortably drink from is its own problem. Send the light bowl she uses at home plus her bottle as backup, and ask the sitter to confirm on the first evening that she has seen her drink. Her litter tray should be the low-sided one she hops into easily, with a week's supply of her usual litter, because a high-sided tray borrowed from a bigger rabbit can quietly put a small rabbit off toileting where she should.
Hide, Chews and the Smell of Home
Include her hide house, a fleece from her pen, a tunnel if she has one, and small chews scaled to her: willow balls, applewood sticks and cardboard. Netherland Dwarfs are often bright, busy and easily startled, and in a strange room the difference between a rabbit who eats on day one and one who hides for two days is usually familiar shelter and scent. Pack a spare fleece, and ask that her pen sit in the quietest corner available, away from a television's noise and any resident dog's patrol route.
Handling Notes: The Most Important Page
Write plainly that this breed is not picked up for affection during the stay. If she must be moved, the sitter should herd her gently into her carrier, or scoop her with both hands fully supporting her body, keep her low over a soft surface, and set her down promptly, because a fall from arm height can seriously injure a rabbit this small and a startled dwarf can bite and twist. Note that children in the sitter's home watch her through the pen bars rather than holding her. This single page prevents most sitter-week injuries in tiny rabbits.
Vet Details and Dwarf-Specific Watch Points
Leave your vet's number, the emergency clinic, your contacts and written consent for urgent care. Her watch list: not eating for half a day, droppings becoming tiny or stopping, a hunched posture with teeth grinding, sneezing fits or a wet nose, and any fall, however short, after which she moves oddly or stops eating. Because her reserves are small, the instruction is always to call sooner rather than later; a dwarf rabbit has far less margin than a giant breed.
A Small Brief That Still Needs Writing Down
Portion marks, bottle height, the no-picking-up rule and the sooner-rather-than-later vet threshold are exactly the details that get lost between packing and day five. KinsLe's Care Pass keeps your Netherland Dwarf's whole routine in one place, giving her sitter temporary, clear access until you collect her.