Protexin – Probiotics

[M&MBunnies]

Hi all, any Australian bunny owners used Protexin probiotics for their bunnies? Looking for feedback on whether it worked or not. Any side effects?

I’ve head some exotics vet say probiotics don’t do anything for rabbits but this exotic vet I went to gave Protexin to manage soft poop, excess cecotropes and a bun prone to stasis/ gas/ reduced eating.

Thanks

[Wick & Fable]

No experience with Protexin (and also not Australian!), but generally there is no harm in trying a probiotic (if it is indeed a probiotic). You are correct that there are those in the veterinary field who do not see benefit or directly probiotic effects from giving the available probiotics to rabbits due to lack of research/empirical support, that being said, again, I haven’t come across stories of adverse reaction from any probiotic use. In fact, and likely why they are often provided, I come across a lot of anecdotal reporting that probiotics appear to help a lot in some cases.

I would say try it and see what happens.

The answers provided in this discussion are for general guideline purposes only. The information is not intended to diagnose or treat your pet. Seek the advice of your veterinarian or a qualified behaviorist.

[Bam]

The use of probiotics for rabbits is controversial, but there are no known adverse effects and they’re not possible to overdose unintentionally. Molly Varga (British rabbit vet and author of the 2nd edition of The Textbook of Rabbit Medicine) says they’re safe to give. Any unused surplus just gets pooped out.

Probiotics containing saccaromyces cerevisiae (certain isolated strains of brewer’s yeast) might help baby buns gain weight. This has been studied for the purpose of cost-effective rearing of meat rabbits, a topic that we do not discuss on these forums – for rather obvious reasons. Our house buns might still benefit from some of these findings.

[M&MBunnies]

Thank you. Good to know! It’s a bit like how baby gas drops/simethicone is controversial.

Does it make adult rabbits gain weight as well? One of mine is a 2.5kg lop so not overweight but shouldn’t gain anymore weight and has maxed out her healthy range.

[Wick & Fable]

If you think of it as just food, it shouldn’t add significant weight since it’s not sugary/calorie-dense (to my understanding) and you’re not feeding a large quantity of it either.

Also, note that weight ranges based on breed are arbitrarily set so using feel based on each individual rabbit is a much more valid measure of whether a rabbit is within healthy weight range: https://wabbitwiki.com/wiki/Weight_management

The answers provided in this discussion are for general guideline purposes only. The information is not intended to diagnose or treat your pet. Seek the advice of your veterinarian or a qualified behaviorist.

[Bam]

Rabbits are highly dependant on gut microbes to extract nourishment from their food. It is due to gut microbes that they can convert cellulose to starch, which humans can’t. In weaning rabbits, whose gut microbiota isn’t yet fully developped, adding a probiotic can help them extract and take up more nourishment from cheap foods like grass hay and hopefully also protect them from overgrowth of bad bacteria, which is a significant cause of production loss. (A very sad topic which we won’t discuss here, but at least some of these findings could help other rabbits lead good long healthy lives).

The human gut microbiota has been an active area of research these last 10 years, but too little is still known. But it seems a healthy gut microbiota can help adult humans maintain a healthy weight. You may have read about how experiments with mice where fecal transplants from healthy weight mice to obese mice resulted in (healthy) weight loss in the obese mice. There’s no doubt that a well-balanced, sturdy and diverse gut microbiota is very important for humans and animals alike, but it’s not fully understood how all these microbes interact with each other and their environment and we don’t really know to what extent it’s possible to manipulate the gut microbiota with the aid of pro- and prebiotics.

I’s say probiotics would rather promote a healthy weight, in either direction. But a word of caution would be to not spend a ton of money, there’s still so much we don’t know.

 

[M&MBunnies]

Thank you for all that. I was snot aware.

I’m not planning to give it forever. The vet said to give it for 2 weeks. My buns aren’t really liking the taste though so I’ve been mixing it with EmerAid ( Like Critical Care) and they have been eating that. I’m reluctant to feed them EmerAid for 2 weeks so we’ll see.

I’m just hoping a few days of probiotics will get them over the line.

[Bam]

Fingers crossed it will help! I have never used Emeraid, only Critical Care (Oxbow). It seems Emeraid comes in both an intensive care formula and a maintenance formula. It sounds like good stuff though, and if it’s anything like like Oxbow Critical Care, feeding it for two weeks shouldn’t be a problem.

I don’t give rabbit probiotics routinely either, I use them “as needed”.

 

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