Need bunny advice! Plz! Thanks in advance :)

[Teresaann24]

So yesterday I got two bunnies for my girls one is a blue lion head and the other is a little white bunny with red eyes little bit of gray on its nose and tail. not sure on breed of the white one.

So I am good on the feed got it from my local feed store who has been selling the same name brand of rabbit chow for some 12 odd years. I got the water bottles hung perfectly on the temp cage.

Its been along time since I have raised bunnies maybe almost 10 or more years. I know they have to stay dry/clean/cold free. oh and hot temps are bad on them.

Now what I need to know:

what fresh foods can I give them? I know NO GREEN GRASS or lettuce or cabbage and some others.

carrots are ok right?

Also for winter temps coming soon would hay be ok for them?
Also will they do outside in the winter? if they have a clean/dry and windy free home?
Should I think about an inside home? if so what kind of home?

are they stinky inside? what kind of cleaning should I do?

Also any information i need would be great! Oh and both are suppose to be female

but we know how that goes.


Oop's forgot the pictures

 

[Willow's Meadow]

Hi! Congrats on your new rabbits!!!!!!!!!!!! Rabbits are a lot of fun and make great pets!

Now what I need to know:

what fresh foods can I give them? I know NO GREEN GRASS or lettuce or cabbage and some others.

Actually you can give them lettuce, cucumber, carrots etc.!!!!!! They love lots of veggies!!!!!

Here is a list I go by to feed my rabbit:

Alfalfa, radish & clover sprouts
Basil
Beet greens (tops)*
Bok choy
Broccoli (mostly leaves/stems)*
Brussels sprouts
Carrot & carrot tops*
Celery
Cilantro
Clover
Collard greens*
Dandelion greens and flowers (no pesticides)*
Endive*
Escarole
Green peppers
Kale (!)*
Mint
Mustard greens*
Parsley*
Pea pods (the flat edible kind)*
Peppermint leaves
Raddichio
Radish tops
Raspberry leaves
Romaine lettuce (no iceberg or light colored leaf)*
Spinach (!)*
Watercress*
Wheat grass

(!)=Use sparingly. High in either oxalates or goitrogens and may be toxic in accumulated quantities over a period of time

* = good source of vitamin A.....feed only one type a day.


carrots are ok right?

yep!

Oh and treats for rabbits(in small quantities):

strawberries, blackberries, blueberries, rasberries, apples, pears oh and apple tree twigs and blackberry leaves. And bananas!!!!!! But only a little at a time!

Also for winter temps coming soon would hay be ok for them?

Hay should be fed unlimitly it helps their digestive system. Different kinds you can feed are timothy, grass hay, oat hay and bermuda hay. Don't feed alfalfa hay it is to high in calories. Here is another good link: http://www.rabbit.org/faq/sections/diet.html It is about feeding rabbits. If you are talking about bedding I use wood shavings(don't use pine shavings) and my rabbit is litter boxed trained.

Should I think about an inside home? if so what kind of home?

I keep my rabbit in a hutch in a barn.....I think it is to cruel to just keep them in a wire cage outside....because of the weather dangers.

are they stinky inside? what kind of cleaning should I do?

Rabbits are not usually stinky.....as long as you keep their cage clean.

Good Luck with your rabbits!!!!! By the way what genders are your rabbits?

 

[Teresaann24]

thanks for the info willow! I was told both female a very nice BYC messaged me a link on how to sex them I looked for myself with an untrained eyes and it does look like they are both female.

 

[chickenwhisperer]

My rabbits all eat fresh green grass from my lawn when they get their out-of-cage playtime.
I have a patch of my yard that is oozing with dandelions, I make sure to water them always, and as soon as the flower starts to wither, I pick it and feed to the rabbits, fresh from the ground.

I only give my rabbits carrots sparingly, the bulk of their food is quality pellet(using purina but switching to manna for next bag) and the best grass hay I can find.
Sometimes I do buy greens like parsley and radish and mustard, but they get plenty of good food always.
I have a bag of dried mango also, itsa treat but one that helps, helps keep hair impactions from happening(so I been told).

From what I understand, rabbits are not veggie/fruit eaters, they are mainly grass/greens foragers.

Anyways, even the thinner underweight rabbits that I have rescued have filled out on the basic diet I provide.

 

[Akane]

Greens are fine but introduce slowly. The people who say not to give fresh greens to herbivorous animals generally only know of the problems that can happen if you feed too much too fast. Give a small amount of one new food for several days to a week until you know that it will not upset their digestive tract before you move on. Eventually you can have an animal that can eat a wide variety of many fresh foods daily or even have most of it's diet in fresh greens without a problem. Lots of people raise rabbits or guinea pigs pellet free by feeding a good portion of the diet in fresh grass, forages, and vegetables.

Carrots are ok but they are high in sugar and vitamin A. Too much can actually be unhealthy. I'm not sure the limit for a rabbit but for guinea pigs it suggested not to feed more than 1 baby carrot per day per animal. Also avoid iceberg lettuce, other types of lettuce are quite healthy, and don't overfeed cruciferous vegetables (cabbage, broccoli, etc..).

They should have unlimited hay. Legume hay (alfalfa or clover) for growing or pregnant animals and grass or grain hay (early cut with no grain heads) for adults.

Rabbits handle the cold quite well and are kept outside in even very cold climates. Most people here keep them outdoors year round and it gets well in to the negatives F for several weeks to a month every year. Breed does matter when discussing temps.

If you do want to keep them inside rabbits are pretty easy to keep clean. They can be litter box trained and many people have house rabbits running loose throughout part or all of their homes. I've found rabbits much easier to look after than guinea pigs which poop and pee nonstop everywhere and actually like to poop where they lay. Rabbits will choose a litter area and do not usually sleep in their waste or spread it around too much.

 

[PamelaJaye]

Hi

I'm going to have to look up cruciferous now!

I'm Pam, I don't get to BYC a lot - unless someone tries to ban Muscovies.

I have one, half-Muscovy female who is 3 years old, one bunny adopted a couple of weeks ago, and asthma, occasional hay fever, and occasion eczema. Whee!

My bunny has been missing the litter box on and off for about a week. Ideas?
She gets close. I think she is sitting inside and has her butt too far back. I can't tell, cause I don't watch her. There's a drop on the edge now and then and there's a nice puddle underneath. The litter box is as close to the wall as I can get it. If I relocate it, she just pees there anyway, so I've given up on that idea.

I'm no expert on food (I can tell you, though, the bunny pee doesn't smell half as awful when you are cleaning it up, as duck poo does) but let's see what I was told.

Rabbits don't like to be hot.

Rabbits pee in a litter box if you give them one (but don't use clay litter or... um.. that other kind the bunny experts mentioned). My bunny's foster mom was using Exquisicat (sp) Pine pellets, so I just started with those. I figured I'd start with everything the way she had it. Oh and then put hay on top of the litter or at least near it, cause they like to eat while they... go.

Unlike my duck, who, like Mikey, hates everything, the bunny will eat anything - even if it's not good for her (sigh)

Like ducks, won't show signs of sickness till she's REALLY sick (so far, so good) and apparently cannot expel gas. They need lots of hay (someone gave me a bunny food pyramid - the first two levels are BOTH hay) - someone pointed out that ONE of the reasons for hay is that it takes a lot of chewing and keeps their teeth ground down. Mine also has a toy toilet paper roll which she chews on a lot (did someone mention that if you keep them inside you should a. beware of chewing - they love furniture and electric and computer cables and b. get them spayed cause they will chew less/be less aggressive/not get cancer (was it uterine or ovarian?) Two days ago I made her a house out of a cardboard box - she's been running in and out of it and chewing on it, but she does still sleep under the toilet. The box is just to play with.

So they tell me -

not a lot of spinach as it has oxylates (?) it seems to have calcium, which would be the reason why my duck only wants to eats it when she is laying (she hates oyster shell, but is good with chicken egg shell

only a tiny amount of fruit or anything that has sugar or can turn into sugar (starches can turn into sugar? I should have paid attention, rather than dropping Bio)

Alfalfa is fattening and yup, bunnies can get fat.
Pellets were neat the top of the pyramid, right before treats...

not things that can give bunny gas. I don't know what gives bunnies gas but with me, broccoli and cauliflower...

This morning, I think my duck - who hates almost everything green - must have gotten jealous: she tried the dandelion greens and actually swallowed some!! she tried the bunny pellets and then dropped them out of her mouth. Yup, that's my girl.

Duck lives in my tub - in a litter box filled with bedding, and the bunny sleeps under the toilet, if she ever actually sleeps. I run in and out and try not to carry dander with me. The duck gets to wander the house in her diaper cause I'm not allergic to her. And now I have to go visit with bunny.

 

[Akane]

not things that can give bunny gas. I don't know what gives bunnies gas but with me, broccoli and cauliflower...

That would be the reason not to feed too much cruciferous vegetables. They cause gas which can get stuck in the intestines of small herbivores and cause problems. Usually not serious problems but the potential is there and it's just plain uncomfortable for them.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cruciferous_vegetables
Some is fine. I feed kale and about half a radish per bunny when I have them on hand. The rabbits are kind of my vegetable garbage disposals. I just make sure to feed some things out slower than others.

A bag of cranberries makes great treats. They stay good for a long long time in the fridge and are lower sugar than many fruits.​

 

[PamelaJaye]

Akane,

thanks for the link, and the cranberries right now we are doing (for treats) raisins and a bit of banana. She really is a little garbage disposal - she likes the peels as much as the bananas. Sadly, she is just one bunny, so I assume that she won't be able to eat our cast-offs as fast as we cast them without getting sick. oh well. Every time I put a partially eaten banana back into the fridge, it vanishes. I think the roomie is throwing them out - even though they still seem good enough to me.

When makes me think of a question or two:

are banana peels as bad* for bunny as banana fruit? (*use sparingly, as a treat, due to the sugar) or are they less bad? (seeing as, unlike my duck, she can't figure out what is and is not good to eat)

are ripe bananas worse, or they the same?

 

[Akane]

It's hard to find any nutritional info about things that humans don't regularly eat like the peels so it's hard to say for certain. Technically it should at least be as safe as the rest of the banana but even the regular peels of fruit are often treated and coated in stuff. I have to scrub and scrub any non organic apples I buy in the store because I can taste all the crap they spray on them and as a kid I would never eat the peel. I can only imagine what they might do to a peel which would not be eaten by humans. Personally I'd make sure it was washed very well.

 

[PamelaJaye]

good point.
thanks!