How much alfalfa is too much?

[Rhian]

So both of my rabbits are still pretty young, they were born in July and August of the past year so neither are one yet. I’ve been feeding them some super nice and fluffy grass hay that I got in the fall and they’ve just been eating me out of house and home. So I went looking for a few more bales and came across an ad that had some that looked nice and green, but had about 15% alfalfa in it. I figured that would be fine, I could pick a bit out here or there to lessen it, and they offered to deliver me what I wanted, so, why not?

As with most things, it was too good to be true. This stuff has to be close to half alfalfa, there’s so much that I feel like I’m throwing most of it away (I have guinea pigs as well, which can’t eat anything calcium rich as they are super prone to stones) and I am about ready to just toss these bales and keep using the leftovers from the fall and pray something better comes along soon. It’s also full of prickle weeds (I have no idea what they’re actually called, but they all deserve to die), which I am so happy to pick through and then get a million tiny slivers in my fingers (I need to invest in some gloves).

Anyway, I kind of need these bales to last me a bit. I’m hoping at least until early summer when more local farmers are selling fresh hay. I have probably 15-20 pounds of my old stuff that I have been mixing in and have been trying to pick out as much alfalfa as possible. Will this be okay to feed them the next couple of months?

I should’ve wrote down the number of the people I originally got hay from. Almost no weeds, so green and leafy. Ugh. I’ll never see hay that good again!

[Azerane]

I would think they should be alright for a few months, given that you’re picking out excess alfalfa and also mixing it in with your other hay. I would just be mindful to also not feed any leafy greens that are high in calcium during this time. Your rabbits are still reasonably young though so still have a little bit of growing to do so the extra calcium may not be as it would be for an adult bun. Are they on an adult timothy-based pellet? If they’re still on an alfalfa pellet I would look to transition to a timothy based one during this time to cut back on the calcium.

Just keep a really close eye on their pee.

[Author]

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