Different sized, dark poops

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annamichelle99

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I have only had my bunny for a couple of weeks. He seems very comfortable and curious with us so far. However I’ve noticed that his poops are drastically different sizes. He drinks a lot of water, he loves his hay and Romain lettuce, and I try to give him limited amounts of pellets and treats. I’ve read that different sized poops could be a result of stress and will most likely go away. BUT this has been going on a while and he doesn’t seem stressed. From what I’ve read, consistently varying sized poops is a cause for concern. But I’m still not sure why. I haven’t been able to find what could be the problem. Does anyone know what we should be doing differently to fix this or what health problems he may be having? Or is this normal?
 
I have several questions first. How many oz. of water do you think he is drinking in a day? Is he eating a pile of hay at least the size of his body per day? What cut of hay do you feed(soft and leafy, mix of leafy and hard stems, coarse and mostly hard stems)? What is the brand/type of pellets and how much per day is he fed? What treats do you feed and how much in tbsp per day? How old is your bun and approx. weight? How is his body condition? Does his back feel rounded along the spine or does the spine feel like it is protruding and sharp at all? You say the odd poop has been going on for a while. How long exactly?

http://ontariorabbit.ca/wp-content/uploads/2015/02/BCS_Rabbit_Final_Approved.pdf(Body condition chart - for breeding rabbits, but has good photos for comparison for all rabbit types)

Is he the bun in your profile photo? Could you maybe post a picture of the irregular fecal poop?
 
Hi I can’t tell you the exact amount of water he is drinking but I can tell you I am constantly refilling his bowl. He is a Holland Lop (he’s pretty small) and he is almost 6 months old. We feed him Timothy hay and he eats on that all day. I give him a very small amount of pellets. I don’t remember the brand but I believe it is a popular one not off brand. I give him two blue berries a day as treats one in the morning and one in the evening. He’s had this odd poop every since we got him. I didn’t know much at all when we brought him home but I immediately started doing a lot of research so that’s when I realized it’s not normal. His spine seems normal and rounded. I have never weighed him but I would guess 3 pounds maybe? I will try to post a pic later when I can. Thanks so much for the response!
 
Here’s his size and the poop
 

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With your rabbit being a charlie colored rabbit(mostly white with some colored spots), there is a chance the odd sized poop you're seeing is due to a genetic digestive disorder called megacolon. Charlie colored rabbits are the most prone to having this genetic condition. Megacolon can cause there to be odd shaped and sized poop on a normal basis, due to problems with the nerve function in the rabbits digestive tract. Are you seeing any egg shaped or other irregular shaped poop, or are they just odd sized?

I've had 3 rabbits with megacolon. My first died from it before I learned what her health issues were caused by, and my other two both had to be on a very specific and strict diet to help maintain the best digestive function possible for the condition they had, so as to help minimize the chances of serious digestive illness developing. One lived a healthy life for a couple of years before passing from an unrelated surgical complication, and the other lived to be 5 before he passed. But for those 5 years, until the last few months before he passed, he was able to maintain really good health despite his condition, because I was able to find the optimal diet to help manage his digestive disorder.

There's some info on megacolon in the links below. If you think this is what your rabbit might have, I can tell you more about the specific diet I had mine on, but what diet works best can also vary with each individual rabbit. So what diet was best for mine, may not always work best for other megacolon rabbits.

http://wabbitwiki.com/wiki/Megacolon
https://www.vgr1.com/megacolon/
 

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