Grazing ideas

[Stickerbunny]

My buns get hungry and when they are bored of their hay, they begin eating whatever they can get their teeth on – namely my carpet. Once I feed them again, they stop for a few hours. So I need some grazing ideas beyond hay.

They have – Oxbow oat, Oxbow orchard and fresh farm brome hay. They get 1/4 pellets (oxbow adult), split in half and served once in the morning and once at night. They get a large salad during the day, though again I split it up for them. Example salad would be: 2 leaves of romaine, 2 leaves of kale, 2 baby carrots, a handful of an organic herb mix, a handful of cilantro. This used to leave me with left over veggies, because they were picky and didn’t want to eat all their fresh greens. But now, it is devoured as soon as it is offered and they are very big fans of veggies.

They love their hay and they eat it like pigs (they can go through one of the small bags of oxbow in 2 days). But they seem to grow bored of just hay and need something else to graze on.

I was thinking upping their veggie intake and feeding them three small salads during the day. The vet is happy with their weight atm, so maybe decrease pellets when the greens go up.

They have every store bought toy in the pet store, phone books, dig boxes, tunnels, cardboard boxes, paper, blankets, towels, jumping platforms, etc. And they don’t live in a cage. So it’s not boredom, once I give them fresh grass (our yard is kept pesticide/chemical free for them) or fresh greens they stop being destructive.

Suggestions, critiques, advice?

[Sarita]

It sounds like you are distracting them when you feed them, so maybe it is partly boredom even though they have every toy know to bunnies. Or they just love destroying the carpet – is it one particular spot in the carpet that they destroy – or just any and everywhere?

Is this something they’ve just started up though or has it always been this way?

[Stickerbunny]

Powder used to eat carpet if he ran out of hay, it was his way of saying “Hey, I am out of hay, feed me again” (he eats A TON of hay, when I first got him I didn’t realize how much lol). Stickers always has eaten carpet, but I’ve been able to curb her of the habit, except when she gets hungry. And no it’s anywhere in the carpet, they just start eating it like a wild bunny would grass. If there is food down (salad, or pellets) they eat that, but when they run out, if they don’t feel like hay, it’s carpet munching time. They also do it to remind me “hey, our dinner is late” if I don’t give them their pellets at exactly 9pm.

Since they have started actually not fighting me on the greens though, they have gotten worse about it. Used to, their salads would stay down until I took them up for being out too long. Now, they eat their whole salads, so they can’t go back to the plate when they want more. Well, they still go back to the plate, but it’s empty and they don’t like it.

[Sarita]

Have you tried any of BB’s small hay bales? Maybe take a look at those.

[Malp_15]

could you (or have you) try and hide their food around the house? so instead of just putting it down in front of them, there is a lettuce leaf in one box and across the room some pellets in another, etc. Get what I mean?? Or even feeding them their pellets in one of those cat treat balls? Just something to make meal time more interesting and make it last longer.

[kinggoblin]

Mine doesn’t eat the carpet anymore ( I think it has to do with his maolocclusion because he won’t chew anything anymore ) but he will still dig at it to get my attention when he is out and I am just watching tv and not paying attention to him, but fluffing his fuzzy hair on the top of his head makes him flip out into a binky frenzy and he forgets about the carpet.

Sometimes I give him his slimcats treatball with pellets and he will chase it all over the living room and kitchen, sometimes even after its empty. You could try hiding their greens in boxes and stuff so they have to look for it. Or you could buy or make them brown bag hay + treat bags like binkybunny sells, my bunny loves those.

[Stickerbunny]

I’ve tried sprinkling their pellets around a dig box, but poor Powder didn’t get any cause Stickers ate them all and he’s a bit… erm, slow. I once put craisins in his hay for foraging and he couldn’t find them at all, so sat sniffing around the hay container instead cause he smelled them, just couldn’t figure out where they were. lol Not tried the cat ball yet, might get one and see if Powder can use it.

Sarita, no I haven’t tried the mini bales, the shipping is pricey for how fast my two eat hay so just been getting the stuff available locally. They eat a lot of it.

[Author]

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