new bunny

[Oliver Griffin]

So I finally got a bunny. I’ve done reasearch on rabbits for 3 YEARS. The thing is, he/she is very small. As in, fit-in-my-hand small; and also the smaller than their siblings. They were being fed a seed&corn diet, and meadow hay. I’m really scared of them going into stasis. Any advice on how to keep him healthy? (even though i know A LOT about their care, I’m still scared.)

pics: https://imgur.com/gallery/VJL5kFS

[Bam]

Congratulations on your new bun! He is adorable!

To keep him healthy, slowly and gradually switch his food from the seed and corn feed to healthy rabbit pellets. There are several good brands that make junior pellets suitable for young buns. Many of our members use Oxbow, if you are in Europe there are other brands that may be easier to get.

As for hay, grass hay is the most important part of a bun’s diet. All grass hay is good (meadow is a mix of many types of grasses), but baby buns also benefit from alfalfa hay. If a young bun eats lots of hay it helps making their gut microbial flora robust and diverse -and that’s the best GI stasis-prevention there is. Hay wears the teeth (rabbit teeth grow all the bun’s life and need constant wearing down), that’s very important for tummy health as well.

The HRS suggests introduction of greens at around week 12, unless the bun has had greens while still with its mother and siblings and seem to be doing good on that diet.

Here’s a link to this site’s info on a healthy bunny diet: https://binkybunny.com/BUNNYINFO/tabid/53/CategoryID/2/PID/940/Default.aspx

[Sirius&Luna]

He’s adorable! He doesn’t look TOO small, just about regular dwarf breed, baby bunny small Both the black and white buns in my profile pic were runts and were that small when I first got them so I wouldn’t be worried about him being under 8 weeks

Bam’s covered everything diet wise

[Ellie from The Netherlands]

Aww, such a cutiepie! Their seed&corn feeding schedule sounds atrocious, although I suppose you already know that since you’re asking about diet changes. Welcome to the community and congrats on becoming a new bunny slave! There are many helpful topics pinned to the first parts of the subforums. If you need basic info you can quickly find many answers there. Also, feel free to post more pics. Did I mention more pics? Because we always appreciate pics ^_^

[Author]

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