Unhappy ending for spaced-out drugs bunny

It is a cautionary anti-drugs story for our time. Bonkers the cannabis-munching rabbit died when he was too stoned to escape the clutches of a Staffordshire bull terrier.

The RSPCA investigated whether it was cruel to get the six-month-old bunny high. But it was straightforward drugs charges which landed his owner Gillian Brown before magistrates in Bridgwater, Somerset.

The court was told that unemployed Brown, 32, grew cannabis alongside the M5 in Huntworth near Bridgwater. But she claimed it was of poor quality and fed it to the rabbit.

Brown explained after the hearing. "Bonkers was a lovely, gentle creature - a bit like Dillon out of the Magic Roundabout.

"He would eat it like grass, get high, crash out for a while, then come back for more. He didn't like resin, but would happily munch away on cannabis bush. He would have cannabis for every meal from breakfast at 7am to an evening meal.

He didn't seem to like carrots and would leave them - but he loved his cannabis ... and did not show any signs of being hurt by it."

Robin Walker, a member of the Royal College of Veterinary Surgeons, said it would have done him no harm.

"It could have affected his memory - but rabbits aren't too hot on poetry anyway."

He said he had not met a doped-up rabbit before but had once seen an Italian whippet on LSD.

In court, Brown admitted possessing cannabis worth pounds 350 and a small amount of amphetamines and was ordered to do 50 hours' community service and pay pounds 40 costs.