How can I get my rabbit to eat more hay?

[Plymothian_Sophie]

The question is basically in the title, but yeah, my rabbit eats hay, but I dont think she's eating nearly as much as she should be. I read somewhere she should be eating her body weight in hay, and I don't think she's eating that.
Not sure of it's because she's only 14 weeks, but yeah, any ideas how I can get her to eat more than she currently does? Many Thanks

 

[PaGal]

What exactly are you feeding her? If she is being fed unlimited pellets then that could explain if she is not eating as much hay as you feel she should.

My one bun is kept in a cage at night but has free run of a room during the day. As he is older he is on limited pellets. I feed him twice a day and noticed that in the morning when I feed him if I lock him back in the cage for a half hour or so he will munch on hay the whole time as soon as he has finished his pellets. If I leave the door open after feeding pellets he will hop out and not munch on hay as soon as his pellets are gone.

You can place hay in more than one place especially if your bun gets free time out of a cage. I keep a plastic container filled with hay outside the cage. Half the time he eats out of that. He seems to like having a choice of where he eats. Also he seems to eat more when he just happens to come across the hay while out rather than if he has to head to decide he is hungry and then head to the cage.

You can fill empty paper towel or toilet paper tubes with hay and lay those around.

 

[britknee247365]

introduce some fresh grass from outside, just make sure it is clean and not near any road sides or vehicles. My bunny would not touch hay, i gave him some fresh grass and now he eats all the hay he can get

 

[Plymothian_Sophie]

Hi! At the moment she has a scoop of Excell pellets in the morning and one in the evening, because she's still young apparantly she needs pellets more often?
She is locked in nightimes, and during the day her cage is left open so she can come and go as she pleases in the entire upstairs of the house, she has 2/3 hay racks around (attatched one to the cage thing around the banister so she can't fall down the stairs) and ones a cube thing with hay inside
We don't have much in the means of grass in our garden as it's being rennovated so we have a nice garden summertime, however I do give her the Blueberry Warren stuff, and I put that in with her hay aswell, I'm also slowly starting to introduce more greens into her diet.
I know she eats alot of hay anyway, but she definately doesn't eat as much as she should

 

[MikeScone]

If she's eating hay, I wouldn't get too hung up on exactly how much. Just provide as much as she'll eat.

You might try some other sort of hay, although at 14 weeks she's still pretty young. She needs alfalfa hay at that age.

Every bun's tastes are different. After six months, try introducing various grass hays (timothy, brome, meadow grass, oat hay, orchard grass) and see which she likes best. Between then and the time she's a year old, you can gradually cut down on the alfalfa until you just give grass hay. Don't be surprised if her tastes change over time - when Natasha first came to live with me she loved orchard grass, then she changed her mind. Meadow hay is her favorite now, although she also eats timothy. Oat hay she thinks is a treat, and I won't tell her otherwise. I just ask her if she wants some of the yummy hay, and she runs into the living room and waits next to the cardboard box for me to put her evening ration into it.

 

[Blue eyes]

. I read somewhere she should be eating her body weight in hay, and I don't think she's eating that.

I believe that estimate is for body SIZE (as in volume) and not actual weight. So if you make a pile of hay that takes up the same space as her body size, that's the ballpark (very rough) estimate.

 

[Imbrium]

Yeah, it's volume... can't imagine if my bunnies ate 8.5 lbs of hay a day!

You might try some other sort of hay, although at 14 weeks she's still pretty young. She needs alfalfa hay at that age.

Every bun's tastes are different. After six months, try introducing various grass hays (timothy, brome, meadow grass, oat hay, orchard grass) and see which she likes best.

Alfalfa is good for growing bunns... but I would NOT feed purely alfalfa. They absolutely, positively don't want to give it up! I had a hell of a time weaning my girls onto grass hay and ended up feeding an 80%/20% orchard/alfalfa blend until they were over a year and a half old before I could finally get them eating JUST grass hay. I recommend maybe a 50/50 mix of alfalfa and grass hay so that you don't cultivate a super-picky bunny (or super-pickiER in this case ><).

 

[Plymothian_Sophie]

I believe that estimate is for body SIZE (as in volume) and not actual weight. So if you make a pile of hay that takes up the same space as her body size, that's the ballpark (very rough) estimate.

Thank God, the amount of people who told me it was their weight in hay is unreal, also saw it saw that on 2/3 websites and I thought it seemed a bit much!
I don't think she is still eating her body size in hay though so will definitely try and change her hays up a bit, is there anywhere/any company that sells like 'sample' sized hays, don't want to but massive bags of hay if she doesn't like that hay

 

[Plymothian_Sophie]

*buy massive bags
She currently has meadow hay, and I put B\W in with it so she has a mixture
Also what greens are best to be feeding her? I bought a cabbage yesterday and was going to give her a little bit but was told cabbage can make her ill?
I bought cabbage because I have reptiles and their live feed likes cabbage, and I can also give some to my hamster that way (being resourceful )

 

[Imbrium]

Wow... there's that many people saying something that ridiculous??

Cabbage can cause gas; also, it's considered a "non-leafy-green" veggie. For both reasons, it should be very limited. Here's some diet/veggie info:
http://www.rabbit.org/care/veggies.html
http://www.medirabbit.com/EN/Food/Food_main.htm
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cruciferous_vegetables (ie the ones that can cause gas)

I don't know about companies that sell samples of hay, but feed stores will often let you grab a handful of each of the hays they sell for taste-testing purposes.

 

[Stephankne]

If she's eating hay, I wouldn't get too hung up on exactly how much. Just provide as much as she'll eat.

You might try some other sort of hay, although at 14 weeks she's still pretty young. She needs alfalfa hay at that age.

Every bun's tastes are different. After six months, try introducing various grass hays (timothy, brome, meadow grass, oat hay, orchard grass) and see which she likes best. Between then and the time she's a year old, you can gradually cut down on the alfalfa until you just give grass hay. Don't be surprised if her tastes change over time - when Natasha first came to live with me she loved orchard grass, then she changed her mind. Meadow hay is her favorite now, although she also eats timothy. Oat hay she thinks is a treat, and I won't tell her otherwise. I just ask her if she wants some of the yummy hay, and she runs into the living room and waits next to the cardboard box for me to put her evening ration into it.

How long should/can they eat alfalfa hay for? If I put alfalfa and a variety of other hay in my 5 month olds cage and he will only eat the alfalfa. He does seem to munch on the oat hay also (occasionally)

 

[Imbrium]

7 months is the cut-off where small and medium sized breeds are considered adults - by then, you need to be weaning them off of alfalfa and onto grass hay. Large breed rabbits aren't considered adults until they're 12 months old, so they should get extra pellets (compared to what they'll get as adults) and can have alfalfa hay until then.

I actually fed an 80%/20% orchard/alfalfa mix to my girls from 7 mos old until about 18 mos old (when I finally got them to eat JUST grass hay by diluting the 80/20 mix with increasing amounts of pure orchard to wean them off of it)... but that was a last resort. I tried 14 different grass hays and the Sierra Valley 80/20 blend was the only thing they'd eat a reasonable amount of so I caved and let them have it, crossing my fingers it was the right choice and that the benefits of eating lots of grass hay would outweigh the health risks of feeding them alfalfa as adults. I worried about it a lot though, and was never really happy about having to make that compromise. I lucked out and they never had problems with the extra protein and calcium, but getting them off of alfalfa completely while they're still pretty young has been a huge relief... hopefully they won't have any health issues later in life because I let them keep eating a fair amount of alfalfa for so long.

I replied to a post you made in another thread a couple minutes ago regarding your hay/picky bunny dilemma