Food

[Rachel]

This is my first rabbit and I have just been kind of guessing how much to feed.  I have done research online but literally ever website has a different answer.  I feed him pellets that contain 17% crude protein.  The breeder suggested no less that 16% protein.  I feed him at least 1/4 cup but no more than 1/2 cup a day and I try to keep hay in his cage at all times.  And when I have it, I give him about 3-4 leaves of romaine lettuce a day. I’m scared I may be starving him, but I don’t want to overfeed him and give him health issues.

[Mikey]

He has unlimited hay, correct? All rabbits need unlimited Timothy hay, or similar hays Im not sure on protein needed in pellets, but i know pellets need atleast 18% minimum fiber. According to a rabbit website off of google, rabbits need 10% or less protein in pellets as the higher protein can cause stomach upset. However, the bag of timothy pellets recommended by my vet has 15% protein so im not really sure. Hopefully someone else will pop in and correct me if what ive read is wrong

[Bam]

Appropriate protein content depends a lot on the. Un t’s age. If the bun is younger than 6-7 months, a high protein content is good, because protein is needed for growth.

If the bun is fully grown, the protein content can be around 13% or so. If your breeder breeds show rabbits he/she probably use a show feed with a high protein and fat content, but pet bunnies that are desexed and live indoors don’t need rich food like that. The fiber-content of a good bunny pellets should be high. Some bunny feed have 25% fiber and that’s great.

Rabbits GI system is “made” for very skinny food with lots of fiber. They should eat often, but that of course means their food must be low cal or the bun will get over-weight. Grass hay is the most rabbit-appropriate food we can give our buns, so they should always have grass hay. Timothy is great, orchard or oat are other alternatives.

[Vienna Blue in France]

My make is Versele-Laga Complete Herbivores = 42 eur for 8kg bag so I’m hoping its good!

I’ve just looked at my pellet ingrédients and apart from using a magnifying glass to see through the 5 languages its translated into… mine has

14% Protein,
7% crude ash (I know what that means for dog food, but I’ve no idea if 7% is good)
20% crude fiber
10% Timothy & grasses
4% carrots
2% seeds (I think as there are so many brackets and ‘:’ that I don’t know what belongs to what….)

And then the feeding instructions are “An average daily portion of 50-80g is recommended ! ”

Well!! That’s REALLY helpful when buns can range from 500g to 8kg !!

[Azerane]

1/4 cup daily is more than enough. My two adults only get 2 tablespoons each per day. They have unlimited hay and get about 1 and 1/2 cups of leafy greens each every day.

[flemishwhite]

Bunny lived with us for 11 1/2 years.  She weighed about 8 pounds.  After she died, we adopted two Flemish Giant sisters. I don’t know how much they now weigh. They are big!  If  I had a guess, I’d guess that they weight 13 to 15 pounds.  All three rabbits were/are house rabbits….they don’t live in a cage, they had/have free run of the house.

My experience feeding house rabbits for the last 13 years……….we feed them all they want to eat.  Heaps of green vegetables to munch on. They do get tired on the same thing.  They’ll be happy eating carrot tops for a few weeks, and then they don’t want carrot tops.  OK, next dill tops…once again dill tops and then they don’t want any more.  Next fennel tops…same thing after a while they get tired of fennel. They do seem to be happy consistently eating romaine lettuce, and we do feed them additionally parsley, dandelion greens, bok choi,  We  get a lot of our veggies from the farmer’s market.  We get the carrot tops, fennel tops free. Just for our two now Flemish rabbits, I think we can easily spend $20 to $30 a week on greens from the grocery store and from farmer’s market that we can’t get for free. Surprisingly the bunnies prefer farmer’s market greens from those we buy at the grocery stores!!!! I think they can sense freshness that we can’t sense.  

Also, in season, the Flemish girls like Fuji apples from farmer’s market. Can you believe that when we buy Fuji apples from the grocery store…they don’t want them!!!  For the greens and apples, they definitely prefer farmer’s market.  Would you be so brazen to suggest we have spoiled bunnies?

When Bunny was with us and now our Flemish girls absolutely positively expect every morning to have banana slices. The bananas need to have a lot of green on the skin.  They like their bananas a little tart.  If the bananas are too ripe, they won’t eat them.

 Additionally, a big part on their dietary intake is oat hay.  They eat a lot of oat hay. This is good because it helps grind down their teeth. Oat hay has silicate abrasives.  Bunny teeth are always growing and they need abrasive food to eat to wear down their teeth. They like to eat the oat hay because it has oat kernels which I think are really tasty to a bunny. Oat hay is a member of the grass family.  Rabbits naturally like to eat grass.

…….and finally, we give them all the pellets they want.  But I take care buying pellets.  I try to buy pellets that don’t have sugar in them (molasses, corn syrup, etc).  For caged rabbits to be fed entirely on pellets, the pellets have sugar in them to boost calories.  My bunnies don’t need the sugar calories in pellets.

Feeding them all they want to eat hasn’t resulted in obese bunnies. All my bunnies have been girls, so they do have noticeable dewlaps, but they have not been really overweight. 

 

 

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