cecal dysbiosis, tried everything! suggestions needed!

[velveteen]

We have a dwarf cross bunny, who is approx 8 months old. We rescued him from euthanasia as a breeder brought him to a vet clinic to be put to sleep due to an abscess on his eye (vet thinks it was simply caused by a bit of hay or something similar poking him in the eye) The clinic did not want to euthanize, and they looked after him with eye drops until healed and we took him in at approx 7 weeks. I think that they got him at about 4 weeks, so very young! He is now semi blind in that eye.

I have always been feeding him correctly as I did a lot of research online and we take him to a rabbit savvy vet, who can confirm his diet has been fine.

Approx 3 months ago his cecotropes started to go mushy. They are like toothpaste consistency and have no grape like appearance as they should.
They are also not quite as dark has they used to be. I will note that Winston has a keen interest in food and is happy/inquisitive/active - nothing has changed other than his cecotropes.No weight loss, is in healthy range. He is still eating about 95% of his cecotropes, even though they are not looking normal. His normal pellet poops are fine.

He always was a hay eater.. and his diet consisted mostly of hay (oaten, timothy not available where I live) and a very small amount of alfalfa as a treat (i mean a tiny half handful every few days), veg such as asian greens, small amount of carrot, celery leaves, cilantro and other fresh herbs.. and he used to eat small amounts of pellets.

I am assuming it all changed after he was administered antibiotics for a skin legion/reaction he got from calici virus vaccination.. as things changed after that. I understand their gut can be upset from antibiotics easily.

Since then, our rabbit savvy vet has done a fecal test and found higher than normal levels of yeast. They put him on another dose of antibiotics which solved the problem, until about a week or two later the cecotropes went mushy again.

I have tried the hay/water diet and this always fixes the problem. BUT AS SOON as I reintroduce anything other than hay the mushy poop returns.

I don't want to keep putting him back on anti biotics as that is surely going to do more harm than good. It has been weeks now where he is on only hay/water (with a few days where i have reintroduced small amount of veg, but it always ends up having him back on hay/water)

I don't want to keep doing the hay/water thing for too long out of fear he is not getting enough nutrients from such a simple diet.. I need some help from anyone who can shed some light on the situation!!

Latest advice from vet was hay/water for a week and then introduce tiny tiny bits of veg back in slowly, that maybe the problem was that I was reintroducing veg at a too high a level...so I tried a small amount, such as one disc of carrot or one half leaf of asian veg... even that did not seem to work.

Can anyone suggest a type of veg to start with? I have cut all pellets from his diet for the last month as I know this is a sure guarantee his mushy cecotropes will return.

Any advice is appreciated!

* update - I thought it could be because he was taken away from his mother so young, his gut is unstable... but he used to eat all the foods I stated at the beginning of this post with no problems.. so this why I was assuming it was the antibiotics..

 

[mrbunny]

Hi there, Velveteen!

At four weeks, it sounds like your bunny may have been weaned off a bit early and may be part of the problem.

You can try Bene-Bac, which is a probiotic that is supposed to help with rabbit's digestive system by repopulating the gut with healthy bacteria. Some bunowners will say it works, and others will not. Either way, I don't think it hurts to try.

You have a fairly young rabbit (teenager) at 8 months old, so, yes, you should introduce vegetables very slowly. Rabbits have very sensitive digestive systems. At eight months, I would only introduce very small amounts of new vegetables. One vegetable at a time; ie. a tiny bit of dill only. Then wait a day and inspect the poop. The evidence is always in the poop =)

This is just a minor note, but some rabbits get gas from asian vegetables and do be careful, because some of them may be fairly high in calcium (this is not a concern for you currently as your rabbit is still young, but good to know when your rabbit is an adult). One of my rabbits have no issues with asian vegetables. Also, try to limit sweets and fruits.

The rule of thumb I use is that veggies given should be no more than twice the size of your rabbit's head. For your rabbit, since you are introducing them, I would go for much less than that.

As for veggies, dill and coriander are popular in this household.

Finally, here are some links that may help:

http://www.rabbit.org/faq/sections/diet.html

http://www.mybunny.org/info/rabbit_nutrition.htm

Good luck.

 

[Pipp]

It sounds like you're on the right track and you've gotten good treatment and advice.

Definitely try the Bene-Bac or a probiotic like Florentero.

I'd try herbs like parsley, which is supposed to be soothing to the stomach.

(Just as an additional note to the above post, calcium is only potentially a problem in old rabbits who may have kidney challenges).

Does he drink alot? I'd be inclined to try putting down a crock with a bit of juice mixed with water to see if that increases his fluids without wrecking havoc on his GI tract.

I'd suggest a journal to see if its certain foods or protein counts or what.

Have you tried fresh grass? And I'd try different varieties of hay, best to go for as much variety as you can within his limits.

How mushy are the poops? Hay diets traditionally mean dry poops while veggies can mean wetter looking, dark and/or misshapen poop, but it's not a sign of ill health, just reflects the diet.

Cecal dysbiosis means almost liquid cecals and a health concern, although I've been routinely seeing puddles around here and no hint as to who's responsible, everybunny seems perfectly fine, so I'm not too worried.

I did have a rabbit with 'mega-colon' syndrome once, and I put her on a mega-veggie diet -- huge salads -- and it pretty much cleared up. (Go figure). Not sure I'd be brave enough to try it in a cecal dysbiosis bunny who's more likely to be suffering from a system upset than a (theorized) genetic condition.

Please let us know how he's doing! This is very interesting and you're documenting it well, thanks for that!


sas :clover:

 

[velveteen]

Thanks for the reply..

He drinks plenty of water. He won't drink from a bottle, so he always has a heavy crock of fresh water and I see him drinking from it often. While he has been on the hay/water diet he is drinking even more water, which makes sense I guess!

The last few days I have not given him anything but hay/water... and I haven't see any cecotropes as he is eating them all.. and the one I saw in his cage he had stepped on anyhow. I'll have to try catch him in the act! Once I see normal ones, I will start off again with the veg and keep a journal like you say.

Whilst he is on the hay/water diet, he has unlimited oaten hay, but I am also giving him a bowl of mixed hay I get from the vet.. so he has variety, although he pretty much sniffs out all the alfalfa hay and leaves what is left of that..and goes back to eating his unlimited supply.

His normal pellet type poops are light in colour when on hay, and darker when veg is involved, which also makes sense - but the cecotropes are medium brown in colour, have NO grape like definition and you can see little bits of roughage in there, look like toothpaste as previously mentioned, so not "liquid" but not dark, glossy and properly formed like they should be.

I guess seeing as he is healthy in all other forms, this is not a major problem.. and some people might say "does it even matter"? I am starting to wonder myself, but there must be an answer to all this as it has not always been this way!

Will keep you all updated on Winston... my husband describes seeing me inspecting his cage as being "on poop patrol" :biggrin:

 

[tonyshuman]

I definitely would try a probiotic. If you can't find the ones mentioned human probiotics are fine as long as they are not milk-based. The use of antibiotics when yeast was present in the feces is strange to me--antibiotics don't usually kill yeast--you will need antifungals for that. Albon (metronidazole) is often used for cecal dysbiosis.

 

[naturestee]

Another vote for probiotics here!

I'm surprised that your vet has only found yeast overgrowth. Has an x-ray ever been done on his gut? I hand-raised a baby who had recurrent diarrhea/cecotrope issues for several weeks before she even turned 8 weeks old. After several attempts at treatment, the final diagnosis was a combination of Coccidia infection, Clostridium infecton, and an improperly-emptying cecum. Once the gut stimulant (to make the cecum empty more) was added to the antibiotics, probiotics, and careful diet, she recovered and did not have another problem. She is now pushing onto 3 years. So if this keeps being a problem, ask your vet about doing an x-ray. Dora's cecum was not only visibly distended on the x-ray, but could also be palpated by the vet when it was at its worst.

 

[velveteen]

tonyshuman wrote:

I definitely would try a probiotic. If you can't find the ones mentioned human probiotics are fine as long as they are not milk-based. The use of antibiotics when yeast was present in the feces is strange to me--antibiotics don't usually kill yeast--you will need antifungals for that. Albon (metronidazole) is often used for cecal dysbiosis.

I thought the same thing, I mean in humans antibiotics can CAUSE yeast infections, so I found it odd.

The vet I take Winston too specialises in rabbits. It is the only specialising rabbit vet in Western Australia... otherwise I would try others to see if there was any other alternative treatments.

The vet also said to me not to use probiotics as lactobacillus is not found in high quantities in a rabbit gut... this added with none of those brands available here in Australia made me weary. I did find another probiotic for pets, which I was going to look into.

I will pop in to see them once again this afternoon with another fecal sample to check it is still only overgrowth in yeast... and suggest the xray option. We really want to get him neutered but have to wait until we get all this sorted out first!

 

[tonyshuman]

Lactobacillus is ok because even though it is not found a ton in rabbit GI, it causes acidification of the GI tract which improves the environment for other bacteria that are supposed to be there.

 

[naturestee]

You might be able to find an appropriate probiotic if you look for ones made for horses. Their digestive tracts are fairly similar. Tonyshuman is right that although lactobacillus and other probiotic bugs might not survive long-term in the gut, they do acidify it which helps the good bacteria survive better.