First time rabbit owner! Just a few questions :)

[JennyL]

After a week of waiting I was finally able to take home my first ever bunny on Wednesday, an 8 week Flemish Giant I’ve named Jinglebell. I’ve been reading everything I could as far as online rabbit information goes, but I’ve read some conflicting information on bunnies not eating their cecals, which I’ve noticed Jingle has been having issues with.

I didn’t notice it the first night but for the past few days I’ve noticed him leaving wet, long poop (it doesn’t look like the pictures of cecals I’ve seen on google, but it certainly smells like the descriptions) lying around both my room and his cage. I’m still working on litter training him so I’m more concerned about the fact that he hasn’t been eating them than I am about them lying around. 

He’s still leaving pellets, of course, and he appears to be urinating just fine. Some articles I’ve read said that rabbits should eat all of their cecals, while others have said it wasn’t necessary. I found around 3-4 yesterday, and a little over that same amount today.

His diet consists of unlimited pellets, and unlimited timothy hay. His litter is recycled newspaper pellets on top of regular newspaper, and I haven’t seen him eating anything he shouldn’t have been (at least while I was watching).

I feel like a new mom. Any help is greatly appreciated!

P.S- not cecal related, but does anyone know a realistic time frame of how long it will take to get him mostly litter trained? The articles I read made it seem like it would be almost instantaneous, but I haven’t noticed any huge improvements in the three days that I’ve had him. Thanks again!

[Sarita]

The cecals aren’t unusual for a young rabbit because they eat unlimited pellets which are high in protein. I wouldn’t worry about that other than it is messy and a pain to clean.

Also some rabbits just don’t eat all their cecals even when they grow up and it’s not really a concern unless they aren’t formed correctly.

I would however recommend you have a vet visit with an overall health checkup including a fecal test to check for coccidia.

[JennyL]

Thank you very much. I was getting antsy about it, I’m glad it’s not entirely abnormal. I had planned on taking him to the vet once he was old enough to get neutered, but it looks like I’ll be bringing him by sooner!

[I LOVE LOPS]

My Gizmo is 4 months old and when I got him he had cecals to, he didnt eat them. They dont always do, I had a question on here about it to!! LOL Good luck with youre new bunny, he is cute!

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