Food and everything that comes with it

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LittlePanda0

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Does rabbits have food allergies? You know like dogs to chocolate. Plus is it okay to feed your rabbit more fruits than vegetables besides hay?
 
There are foods and plants that are toxic to rabbits.
It is not ok to feed your rabbit more fruits than vegetables. Fruits have a lot of sugar and can cause problems. Rabbits really need the fiber from the hay and veggies to keep their gut working properly. Fruits are for treats only. A fruit to them is like a piece of cake to us.
Hay is the #1 most important thing for a rabbit.
Below is a link to a professional rabbit website that explains what rabbits should eat at what age.
http://rabbit.org/faq-diet/
 
Thanks very much I was worried if I might feed her the wrong thing at some point
 
Yeah, the house rabbit society list is good. I looked it up a lot during my first year of rabbit ownership and I sometimes check it up again when I want to try a new vegetable. By the way, chocolate is bad for ALL animals (I try not to think about that when I eat it ^^). Rabbits are strict herbivores, so no grains, no dairy products, no sugar... In the end, your rabbit just needs a lot of hay and several different vegetables everyday. Fruits are not necessary and should be given only as an exceptional treat (rabbits get fat fast and are hard to put on a diet). Nothing else should be given except for a bit of pellets for vitamins - ideally only a few grams a day of high quality pellets to make sure there are no deficiencies in your rabbit's diet.
I thought rabbits' diet was terribly complicated when I started, but once you get used to it, it's really nothing. ^^
 
Does rabbits have food allergies? You know like dogs to chocolate. Plus is it okay to feed your rabbit more fruits than vegetables besides hay?

It has nothing to do with allergies, it's simply toxic. Some things are toxic to some mammals, but not to others (like choclate (toxic to most mammals, I think only a few primates tolerate it), grapes, and imho onion for dogs, but not for humans)

Being herbivores, rabbits can stomach quite some stuff, wild and free ranging rabbits also use some (somewhat) toxic plants to medicate themself. There aren't that many things that can knock a rabbit out of it's boots (that story about appleseeds is blown out of proportion, nonsens), but they may need to learn how to deal with stuff, putting a house bunny into a patch of lillies of the valley might end badly.

About diet, this is how I see it:
Their digestion system evolved for fresh grass, weeds, leafs, some twigs and bark.
Hay is an acceptable, convenient substitute for that, along with some veggies and good pellets the rabbit gets everything it needs.

Since their digestion is adapted to a rather lean diet they can develope problems when there is too much sugar (fruits, some pet shop food and treats) or starch (grains, too much of some veggies) in it, like wrong gut bacteria or yeasts. Not to mention that extra calories nobunny needs, being fat is something pretty bad for a rabbit.

I feed forage whenever possible, but I reckon that isn't an option for everyone, and it is a lot of work. But when they have more than enough grass and weeds mine even ignore apples. In winter, when feeding hay, they don't bother if they take one of my fingers along with their daily slice of apple, topinampur, beet, or whatever available, but that's harmless compered to giving them some green grass in winter.

Anyway, whenever you change something in their diet - do it slowly, in the course of about a week, they need the grow the right bacteria to adjust to the new situation. There are some quite safe plants, like plaintain (grass weed), leafs of roses, raspberry, blackberry, apple leaves...., which don't need that much time and come in handy in an emergency (rabbit not eating).

I try to keep their diet as diverse as possible, many different things, everything in moderation - that imho makes problems due to changing diet more unlikely, and lots of the healthy stuff (grass, weeds, hay)
 

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