Mycotoxin poisoning

[The Mother of Bunnies]

Hi guys,

I have three bunnies- Bun,Roo and Hops. Hops and bun are 2 and Roo is 1 and a half. Recently Roo had an eye infection so we rushed him to the vet. He was diagnosed with pink eye and given drops and meloxicam. 2 days later, he seemed off. Back to the vet. She noticed there was blood in his mouth and thought maybe it was because his teeth needed some grinding down. She doesn’t do that, so I book an apptt for the next day. She also puts Roo on cisapride, more meloxicam, enroflacin, critical care, etc. Next day, the other vet says his teeth are fine and he can’t see any problems. I decline an X-ray as I didn’t want to put Roo under, as he’s sick and I just had a bad feeling. I go home and start to research. I read about Mycotoxin poisoning. A lightbulb went off. We noticed that our 50 pound box of Oxbow Timothy hay seemed different. Almost looked like blades of thick grass, felt weirdly cool to the touch. There was some brown pieces. I rushed out to buy smaller bags of Timothy hay. I threw all of the bunnies hay from their trays into the garbage. I continued my research. When I saw bleeding mouth ulcers as one of the symptoms, plus pink eye, GI stasis I rushed to the ermerhency vet. I asked for sucrasulfate which he gave. Not 2 days later, Bun had an eye infection and hops was starting GI stasis. I rushed them to my vet. She said there is no test for an animal. She only saw one case once and it was during an autopsy. I told her I’ll be submitting samples to a private lab. Those go in on Monday. Until then, I’ve been force feeding, doing eye drops on Bun and Roo and continuously giving the other meds. Has anyone else ever experienced this? I’m finding it hard to get information as it’s so hard to diagnose. Any thoughts?? I’ll update as soon as I get test results back. I’ll be sending in their pellets as well. Sorry for the novel! Thanks in advance.

[LittlePuffyTail]

Sorry to hear your troubles. Did you e-mail Oxbow to tell them your concerns? If not, definitely do that. They are usually really great at responding and customer service. And I believe they routinely check batches so maybe they could give you more info.

I used to be super paranoid about hay as I seemed to kept getting bad bags for a time. From the research that I’ve done, the type of mold that can cause mycotoxins is usually found on legume hay, like alfalfa. I’ve read it’s pretty rare for it to happen to Timothy or grass hays. Did you notice any black, dusty chunks in the big box of Oxbow? As a natural product, hay can vary from season to season so it’s not unusual for some bags to look or smell a bit different. Bad hay usually has chunks stuck together with black mold or is very dusty.

Mycotoxins can also happen with a bad batch of pellets.

I can definitely understand your concerns.

How are they doing today? I really hope this is just a coincidence and your bunnies are all back to normal very soon.

[LBJ10]

As LPT pointed out, this is something that is very rare. Even more so for grass hay (vs. alfalfa). I would definitely contact Oxbow about your concerns.

[Author]

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