What Rabbits Do You Have? Show Off Your Rabbits Here!

[PrimroseMom1]

Chirpchickens, some rabbits LOVE chicken feed and will leave their own feed alone to eat the chicken feed. That can result in a done, dead bunny. The most common problems would be kidney failure from too much calcium and protein, or GI stasis from nowhere near enough fiber. Even in small quantities it can be damaging over time. So how much rabbit feed does she eat in a day? She could eat that much chicken feed in a day and if she kept that up for a couple weeks she could keel over, because it's not about "how much" but really "what percentage" of her diet is chicken feed. A few pellets because they're there and she's bored won't cause any real issues... If it becomes a significant part of her diet, it can be serious.

A good brand of pet rabbit food that I feed to my pet buns has 0.80% calcium and 12% protein. Given a good %14 hay that's equally low in calcium that's more than enough for a non-breeding rabbit (breeders need more, tends to be up to 2% but not over, just for milk production and growing kit bones, nothing else). My chicken feed has 4% calcium and one of the feeds I have has 20% protein. Imagine if you ate five times the amount of calcium in a day than your body could absorb and nearly two times the protein you needed? And then it all came out crystalized in your urine. And then those crystals get stuck in your kidneys and the kidneys shut down from it and you need a kidney transplant. That's what happens in rabbits, but there's no rabbit organ donors out there... So the rabbit just dies.
Alternately, rabbits need LOTS of fiber (20%-30%) to have good digestive function. If they don't have it, their digestive tract just stops moving completely and it's pretty much impossible to start back up. Chicken feed has VERY little fiber in it. Less that half what they need to survive.

That's just one of a dozen reasons why chickens and rabbits don't mix. It's by far the biggest one though.

Amen!!! Perfectly said. If you want to have your bunny for a long time, don't ignore what Chocolate is saying. It is very good advice.

 

[RS rabbitry]

Hi everyone this is my favorite rabbit

 

[kacklinkelly]

OK - so my first meat rabbits (breeders) are turning into my pet rabbits. They have snuggled their way into my heart. Now what? They are starting to trust me more every day. I have been letting them out of their hutch into an exercise area. When they stop running and jumping, I open the door and one will hop out. We snuggle for a while, I talk and they pretend to listen. we do a little trust exercise. Sometimes they agree. They go back into their hutch. Then it's the next one's turn. We are starting to get a routine in place. I am definitely going to have to get some NZ whites with the haunting red eyes. Maybe that will break the spell.

 

[PrimroseMom1]

OK - so my first meat rabbits (breeders) are turning into my pet rabbits. They have snuggled their way into my heart. Now what?  They are starting to trust me more every day.  I have been letting them out of their hutch into an exercise area.  When they stop running and jumping, I open the door and one will hop out.  We snuggle for a while, I talk and they pretend to listen. we do a little trust exercise.  Sometimes they agree. They go back into their hutch.  Then it's the next one's turn.  We are starting to get a routine in place.  I am definitely going to have to get some NZ whites with the haunting red eyes.  Maybe that will break the spell. 

Oh oh. I hope you haven't named them. We all are kind to all animals including meaties, but you sound in love.

 

[PoultryPower]

My petite Liohead doe just had a litter of 5 healthy kits last night. Super proud of her as this is her first litter and my biggest litter of Lionheads yet. AND this is my first litter of Lionheads to not have a single peanut! The only way I could be happier is if she didn't have so many Siamese Sables.

 

[PrimroseMom1]

My petite Liohead doe just had a litter of 5 healthy kits last night. Super proud of her as this is her first litter and my biggest litter of Lionheads yet. AND this is my first litter of Lionheads to not have a single peanut! The only way I could be happier is if she didn't have so many Siamese Sables.

Congratulations. No peanut!! Woohoo. I had a peanut once. So sad.

 

[ChocolateMouse]

Kelly, I have trouble with my breeders too. I work with them so they're nice and I can handle them easy and I get attached to many of them. I still feel these rabbits need to have a place in the food chain though, simply because they aren't my pets and they're part of a food cycle. It feels like I wouldn't be honoring their hard years of sacrifice to feed me if I didn't end it before they got old, or if I buried them and let their carcass go to waste. So all my rabbits are named after dog food, are slated to become such, and have a three strikes rule. If you produce failed litters litters three times in a row, you're probably too old to be healthy and fully functioning much longer anyhow... Because I'm not just keeping them through their peak, I am keeping them past their peak. Some people only keep rabbits for 2-3 years... Some of mine are going on four, even though litter sized have dropped from 10-12 down to 6-8 and they'll stay until that drops down to less than 5 regularly. I tan their hides, feed the rest to my animals, burry the offal to become part of the earth again.

Some people keep their breeders on as pets forever, but often find that they can only do that for like one generation. After that the rabbit hobby becomes quite excessive because the breeders can live twice their breeding lifespan (not necessarily while being healthy) if you give them lots of extra care, etc. Kind of like keeping around production egg layers. After about 3-4 years they're not laying hardly any eggs, they start getting health problems, stuff like that.

Ultimately it's up to you what you do with them. Just know if you end up keeping all the breeders you will have a LOT of spare rabbits and it won't be a very cost-efficient food source any more... I did start with the NZW rabbits because they're a little easier to get rid of. Aside from the red eyes, many of them have QUITE the temper. But I would process my sweet Rex or my CG mix if I had to, due to age.

 

[Lynzi777]

My new addition: A Chocolate Mini Satin buck.

 

[abserbean]

He's beautiful! Congrats!

 

[Lynzi777]

Thank you, this is my first satin rabbit ever, really excited. I had read they were soft but had never even felt the fur of one before. And his color just caught my eye, knew I had to have him. Eventually is like to find a nice a red doe but for now he'll just be an indoor pet bunny. He's got a lot of red in his background.