Losing rabbits

[chinbunny]

Ive got some sort of mociod entrapathy going on with my herd. I am sure whereits coming from. My rabbits haven't been exposed to any others for over two months. The last was the second week of july, and I wasn't seeing the problems then that I have in the last couple of weeks. So thi sis what I am seeing. Some of my younger rabbits are bloating up like balloons. They either have dihrea, or constipation. Had a non rabbit savy vet do a fecal float, wich turned up nothing. But we still went and head and treated for coccidia anyhow. Well, ever since I put everyone on albon, I have had two more get the same symptoms. Ive treated them for ME, Ive pushed anti gas down, and nothing seems to be working. Ivwe already euthanized two babies, and I don't want to do any more. They are bloating to the point where they can't eat. The only thing that is different is that I am no longer feeding them manna pro. they are on kent feeds, which is one that is not supposed to cause problems. They also get a handful of timothy every night, to every other night. Ive started adding a little alfalfa over th past couple of days to get more fiber into them. Kent feeds is a little bit lower in fiber then manna pro is. But still, I shouldn't be seeing problems, should I? I am switching back to manna pro to see what happens. But I almost suspect I might have picked up something viral somehow, since there seems to be people on the yahoo groups seeing the same thing. I am starting to suspect it may be something like septecemia.

The bad thing is the only rabbit savy vet in the area charges over $100 for the office visit, and I just don't have it. Don't have the $500 it would cost to have a neocropsy one. And I certainly don't have the guts, nor knowledge to open them up myself.

I did have a litter of babies start randomly dying off at four weeks old three weeks ago. The problem seemed to correct itself at the time when I took the mom away and treated them for coccidia.

Anyone have any ideas that could help me out? I don't want to end up euthanizing a bunch of my rabbits. But I have a feeling I may end up having to do so.

BTW this is chinbunny1. Can't get into my old account so I created a new one.

 

[bargain]

Okay....A few things.....First off......Try some naturals here

Take away all the feed today from the babies (commercial that is)

Put in regular oatmeal, fresh water bottles with either city water or boiled and cooled well water.... It could be the liquids as well.

Give them plaintain, free choice, privet hedge and also horse quality hay....check to be sure not moldy please and also berry shrubbery from blackberry plants, raspberry plants and let them graze on these feeds.

Check teeth to make sure they are aligned.

You may need to worm them, but does diarrhea follow the bloat?

PM me as you need.

Be Blessed and be a blessing!

 

[chinbunny]

Bargain, I am getting both dirhea and constipation with this. They aren't eating anything, and actually oatmeal can make something like that worse since it can retain water and swell. They get timothy hay, which is the same thing as horse hay. It doesn't matter what I give them now anyhow because they are not going to be able to eat it. They are bloating that bad.

Ive got the two remaining infected rabbits in isolation. They all get city water. They are also allowed to graze in my yard in a pen now and then. The babies that were infected have already been put down.

Their teeth are fine. I breed and show rabbits, so they have to have healthy teeth.

I don't usually worm them unless I have to. I can give it a try, but it may not work. the thing is, is this stuff sees to have jumped from one animal the next in my barn, and is only effecting the younger ones.

 

[chinbunny]

ass far as the oatmeal goes, I have a cousin that triggered some severe ME in two of her rabbits by over feeding them the instant stuff. I was able to save one, but not the other. The second rabbit was one I sold to a local farm store as a pet quality rabbit. I was there there the same day when she went in and purchase it. The rabbit was healthy. I got a phone call from her later on asking if that rabbit would be good to crossbreed to a standard chinchilla. I told her NO! And tried to discourage them from buying it. Her mother gave in to her 'wants' and got it for her with intensions of cross breeding and selling the babies for profit. Needless to say they got it home, it started having problems. She overfed it oatmeal, and it ended up killing it. That poor rabbits stomache swelled up three times its size.

 

[chinbunny]

OK I looked up worms. Seems to be the same symptoms as the ME that I am seeing. So I am asking the meat rabbits list for the peperizine dosage, since there is a discussion going on there about it anyhow.

 

[bantamsrus]

Since you're describing enteritis/enterotoxemia--I would guess one of these two as a start-- clostridium or coccidia.

Could be coccidia since it's spreading through your barn, the young are the most susceptible, and the rabbits would have been subclinical in the beginning (thus allowing you to unknowingly spread it around). It should be confirmed by a fecal float. I believe Sulfaquinoxaline is the current recommended treatment? Depending on how dehydrated the rabbit is it might need some SQ fluids also--do you have access to this stuff? Maybe call a vet and bring one in and let them know you'll be treating a "herd"?

But then again young rabbits are also more susceptible to enterotoxemia because of their inability to digest and absorb starches--makes it way to the cecum, acts as a bacterial substrate-->clostridium overgrowth (you may be seeing as the "gas"). This has a much poorer outcome even with treatment. Treatment requires fluids, metronidazol, antibiotics.

Sorry--I know this probably isn't encouraging but the best of luck to you and your bunnies!

 

[chinbunny]

They are hydrated, they are bloated to where they are retaining water. Sadly sulfaquaxaline hasn't been on the market for years. Used to be my drug of chioce for treating it. Now all we have is albon, corid, and sulmet. They are on albon right now. Some of them have responded to it well, and are gaining weight. Others haven't.

Repeating that the fecal float the vet did turned up nothing. I *did* take one to the vet to have it done. Most of the vets around here aren't rabbit savy. The one that is charges an arm and a leg for the office visit.

 

[chinbunny]

Ok looked up colustridium, and yeah that seems to be fitting what I am seeing too. And IF that is what is causing the problems, I am going to have to cull. But going to use my other options first. that could explain why I have had the kids just randomly up and die.

The kits that I put down yesterday had intestines that felt as hard as rocks.

 

[chinbunny]

also the kent feed I had them on has 4% fat. Would that have anything to do with it? The manna pro they were on was only 3.5%

 

[bantamsrus]

That's a small % in the change in fat--plus you have to be careful about reading food lables. It's not the % of the the nutrients that's important but the ingredients that makes up your feed that contributes towards those percentages (some animals can digest some feeds and some can't--making the food basically waste; your feed label tells you what's in it, not what your rabbit is utilizing--this is where you need to know that your rabbit is a hindgut fermenter and feed it accordingly)

Are you going with the clostridium treatment? Can you get ahold of metronidazol?--Maybe call the vet you took the rabbit to, tell them it's not getting better and suggest this treatment? Warning--No animal likes Metro even with the sweatner in it!