There were rabbits, rabbits everywhere, at the Western Pennsylvania Humane Society in June, and no room in the inn for any more. Worse yet, workers feared they were going to have to do something they had not done in five years. They probably were going to have to euthanize some of them.

Word went out in news releases. Bunny owners and bunny lovers spread the word to their friends, neighbors and families. They were looking for permanent homes and temporary foster homes.

When Alison Everett heard the news, she knew exactly what she had to do. She got in her car and drove for four hours from Harrisburg to Pittsburgh.

"Thanks for the bunny stories," she wrote in an e-mail to me. "We adopted one and she's wonderful."

There were 36 rabbits in the North Side shelter when the appeal went out. They all got homes, and 40 families stepped forward to volunteer their services as foster families.

Local rabbit lovers are taking the next step. They are banding together to form a club to help teach the public how to care for rabbits.

The new group, Greater Pittsburgh House Rabbit Club, met for the first time last week. They'll try to get the word out that, while rabbits are wonderful, lovely, lovable pets, they're not for everyone. They need a lot of care and attention, and they need to live in the house.

Rabbits are readily available at pet stores, especially before Easter. They don't cost very much, and they're especially cute when they're babies, and that makes them ripe for impulse buying.

When they're too much work, they are dumped at shelters, or, worse yet, set free. That's a death sentence for domestic rabbits, which quickly will fall prey to wild animals, including hawks, and pet cats and dogs that are allowed to roam.

But back to the nice lady who drove all the way from Harrisburg to pluck a rabbit from death row. Her husband couldn't make the trip that day, so she recruited a friend.

The eight-hour car trip was "well worth it," Everett says. "Not only did we get Hannah, but we also stopped in the Strip District for a pastrami Primanti Brothers sandwich.

"Some bunnies have a bit of attitude and don't like to be held, but Hannah is so gentle and sweet. I work at home on Fridays, and sometimes, she'll sit on my lap for an hour while I write and make calls. We adore her."

She is also very good about using her litter box, which is what house rabbits can be trained to do.

Hannah is dark gray with a speck of white on her nose and two white paws. She's about 6 years old, and rabbits live about eight to 12 years, according to the release from the new Pittsburgh rabbit club. Hannah had been turned in to the Humane Society by a breeder.

Hannah's arrival at the Everett home fills a void left by the death of a rabbit the couple had been fostering for a Harrisburg shelter. He had recurring abscesses from the pasteurella virus. Neither surgery nor medication worked, and he had to be euthanized.

Everett misses him, even though, she said, he had "a terrible attitude. He growled, snarled, thumped and lunged whenever we reached into his cage, but never actually bit. Most people were afraid of him, but we found him to be quite entertaining."

The first meeting of the Greater Pittsburgh House Rabbit Club was held last week at the Western Pennsylvania Humane Society Education Center, though the club is independent of the shelter. For further information, calls are being handled by Jan McKeag at the shelter, 412-321-4625, ext. 224.

A past Pet Tales column had a recipe for getting the smell out of dogs that have run afoul of skunks. The people who passed that recipe along say it is absolutely the best way to deskunk a dog.

Well, here in tradition-bound Pittsburgh, I got a lot of calls and e-mail from people who said they had a much better remedy:

You get a big can of tomato juice and you bathe your dog in that.

The tomato juice remedy has been around for decades, and it does work, to some degree. Some of the callers said they used one can of juice, and the dog was back to normal.

I think it depends on how bad the dog got hit with skunk spray.

A hunting dog named Bridget got absolutely doused by a skunk when I was in high school. Though Bridget was a Brittany spaniel who was supposed to be hunting birds, she apparently got up really close to a skunk.

Bridget reeked and so did the car she came home in and so did the entire neighborhood when she stepped out of the car. My recollection is that it took many cans of tomato juice to reduce, but not eliminate, the smell.

Bridget was normally white with orange spots and freckles. After the tomato juice bath she was pink and orange for quite some time.

The other recipe is one quart of hydrogen peroxide, one-quarter cup of baking soda and one teaspoon of liquid Ivory soap. Do not put any leftovers in a covered container, because that would cause an explosion.