I just got home and my bun was here with my partner while I was gone, I called her to come get some veggies and she didn’t come, so I went into the room where her litterbox is and jiggled the pellet bag so she would come out from under the bed (she has an under bed area of her own lined with plywood so she can’t dig in the mattress or carpet). She didn’t appear right away, which was pretty unusual. I noticed my closet door was slightly ajar and so I looked inside to find her sitting on top of my bag of gypsum and it looked like she was eating the gypsum pellets.
I did a quick google search and found this thread:
https://binkybunny.com/FORUM/tab…fault.aspx
And a couple other instances of people catching their bunnies chewing the drywall and not seeming to have a problem.
The closet I have my gardening stuff in doesn’t have a normal door, it’s like a sliding door that doesn’t anchor to the ground at all, so if you push on it it moves inward and she can kind of slip around it. She has gotten in there before, so a started putting something in front of it to keep her out, but I guess I moved it and didn’t put it back right. I have caught her in there before chewing the bag, but I just assumed she was tearing it up because she likes getting into stuff that makes a mess when you bite on it, like my down comforter, but now that I saw her eating it, I’m wondering if maybe she isn’t getting enough calcium. I read so many different things about amounts of pellets to give that I erred on the low side I give her just under 1/4 cup along with several large handfuls of greens and unlimited hay, she weighs 10 pounds and definitely doesn’t look skinny. I also noticed the gypsum has an odor like artificial grape flavor, so maybe it’s just that? Now that I caught her eating it, I’m pretty sure she had been doing it before and I just didn’t realize, so I don’t think she’s going to get sick from it, but I am going to put the gardening stuff out in the shed now that it’s not so wet anymore (my shed is so leaky I didn’t want the gypsum to get wet and melt everywhere). Should I be monitoring her pee to make sure it’s not sludgy? I remember reading somewhere that dietary calcium isn’t the cause of bladder sludge, but I’m hazy on the details. Anyone have any thoughts on this? She seems fine anyhow, she just ate some cabbage and is all stretched out…
*edit* fixed link
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