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Kiaora fellow New Zealanders!
I have a question for you all.
My little bunny is arriving on the 24th, that is 3 days away - and I want to know the best brand of pellets I can buy for him. He is an 8 week old Rex, who is currently on 'Country Harvest'. He is coming with quite a lot of pellets, so it's not that I'm unprepared yet.. However I'm not sure whether to keep him on these when he comes home, or if there is something of better quality to slowly introduce? I have seen cheap bulk loads of different kinds on trademe, and I feel like there is so much selection I have no clue where to begin! I know that he need's high alfalfa/lucerne quality pellets. So what do you all recommend? I am looking at Country Harvest, the Oxbow Young rabbit, and also NRM pellets. I have heard they are all pretty good!
So which are your favourites? What do you use? Is any one better than the other? Any help is greatly appreciated. Thankyou in advance.
Rachael.
I can't speak on brand, but as long as you've got something with the right nutritional content it shouldn't matter. The reason I went with oxbow over here, is that I couldn't find anything else with a high enough fiber content that also had low enough protein and calcium. Barastoc rabbit pellets (not sure if you have those over there) have 21% fiber, but their protein was 16% minimum and calcium 1% minimum when it really should be max. Although I suppose it probably averages to 1% and it's just you may find it's a tiny bit higher. Also, their pellets are lucerne/alfalfa based and not grass hay based, which also puts me off.
Anyway, hopefully the figures below will help give you a better idea of what brand might be better than some others
Fiber: 18% minimum (20-25% best)
Fat: 1-2% max
Protein: 12-14% maximum
Calcium: 1% maximum
Thanks Azerane.
We do not have that brand (That I have found yet..) but I'm gonna go look and see if I can find all these contents and information now.
However you said you dislike that it is Lucerne based and had high protein, but is that not what I should be looking for seeing as Paisley is 8 weeks old?
I know for older bunnies you want more fibre and less of the 'growing bunny' ingredients.
I already have some 'Country Harvest' on it's way as that is what he has been fed, but I am going to make it a mission to find the best!
Thankyou so much for those percentages.. They will be very helpful.
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Ahh, well for an 8 week old bunny yes, you technically do want lucerne based pellets, but then if you're feeding a brand that's lucerne based, when your bunn grows old enough to take them off of lucerne, you often need to find a different brand. So Barastoc is fine, but if you have an adult bunny, it's not what you want. I forget about the lucerne thing sometimes since Bandit is older now
I see. Changing pellet's is a bit of a hassle, but I think I want to do it right this time and give him the best I can possibly do. So I'll use the country harvest, but possibly change him onto the 'Oxbow for young rabbits.' Then I may have to change it again after 6 months? It seemed to have the highest fibre and protein content, and I know other users on here are happy with Oxbow. I have looked up on the percentages and nutritional value, and NRM didn't have much to say except the ingredients. Country Harvest has 16% protein, 17% fibre and 5% fat.
Oxbow has protein 15%, fibre 20-25% and 2.5% fat. It also included vitamins and 1% calcium.
On a side note.. Do you have a thread of photos of Bandit? I think he is absolutely gorgeous! I have never heard of his breed, but he is quite the handsome little guy!
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Changing pellets is a bit of a pain, but once he's an adult you'll never have to do it again. Probably the only thing to consider besides the nutritional contents is the price. A 2.5kg bag of oxbow adult costs me $19 (though most places here seem to charge $25) so it's more expensive, but I've only got one bunny, and a bag still lasts me about 2 months or so, I always forget to count, lol.
Aww thanks, he is adorable, I will give him that
There's a few photos on his rabbit profile here:
http://www.rabbitsonline.net/rabbits/bandit-bandito-206.html
And there's also photos and videos of him throughout my blog for him here:
http://www.rabbitsonline.net/f18/bandit-rabbity-antics-73547/ (though I've just noticed that a bunch of the photos have become small, without being clickable to view full size, I will have to remedy that.)
