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BINKYBUNNY FORUMS

This topic has 5sd replies, 3 voices, and was last updated 12 years, 2 months ago by Slowebot.

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- 02/14/2014 at 10:46 PM
  Slowebot
  Participant
  111 posts
  I have a 10 week old bunny who is so picky. He will jump into his food box and start digging at the alfalfa hay bag even though I’ve been trying to limit his intake of alfalfa. I also have two bags of pellets, one timothy based and one alfalfa and he will flat out deny the timothy based pellets. Considering his pretty young age should I even be trying to limit his alfalfa intake? If I am, how should I get him to be less picky (he’s got loads of ‘tude and will climb in my lap to dig into the bags he wants).
- 02/14/2014 at 11:02 PM
  Megabunny
  Participant
  2041 posts
  I don’t think you’re supposed to limit the alfalfa hay or pellets at all for the first 6 or 7 months. You can worry about introducing timothy hay and slowly switch to timothy pellets then. I’d have to reread the baby diet requirements again, but don’t worry about his intake of alfalfa right now. Cute pic, btw
- 02/14/2014 at 11:35 PM
  Slowebot
  Participant
  111 posts
  That’s what I read too but what I quickly found out about rabbits is there is so much misleading information out there so i just wanted to double check with some other bunny owners! I’m not too worried he’s going to get sick or anything, it was more of a habit things, I’d hate to break such a hard core alfalfa addiction later when it does become unhealthy for him. But thank you!
  
  Also thank you for the picture complement, I think he’s cute too haha. Your bun looks awesome too!
- 02/15/2014 at 8:56 AM
  Megabunny
  Participant
  2041 posts
  What you’re saying makes sense but I think you’ll be OK . I’ve worked on better diets w/ mine since joining this forum and the kiddos argued a bit about it, but if you make it a gradual process with the pellets, you should be able to change them over without them starving. And you can keep some timothy hay going in the meantime if you want, of course. I really wish rabbits could stay on alfalfa or clover all the time. It would be so much easier!
- 02/15/2014 at 9:16 AM
  Beka27
  Participant
  16016 posts
  Megabunny is absolutely right, as usual! He’s fine on alfalfa right now.
  
  It does sound like he may put up a fight when it is time to transition him to timothy, but it will need to be done. He can be transitioned between 6-7 months, although some choose to wait until a year. Since he’s such a hardcore alfalfa fan, I would probably suggest transitioning over a longer length of time.
  
  The general timetable is:
  Week 1: 75% alfalfa, 25% timothy
  Week 2: 50% alfalfa, 50% timothy
  Week 3: 25% alfalfa, 75% timothy
  Week 4: only timothy
  
  You could stretch this a bit if you wanted and do each ratio for two weeks rather than one. The hard part is staying strong because he may protest as his alfalfa gets limited.
  
  I would keep offering both alfalfa and timothy hay every day until you start to transition.
- 02/15/2014 at 11:18 AM
  Slowebot
  Participant
  111 posts
  Okay, thank you guys
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