How much greens?

[ParkersMum]

Out of interest how much is too much when it comes to greens?

Parker has continually access to hay, a small amount of pellets during the day & then a handful of greens 3 times a day.

Just wondering if he's having too much or too little. He seems happy enough, certainly not starving or anything but I always like to double check these things

 

[Blue eyes]

This article suggest up to 2-4 cups daily...
http://rabbit.org/natural-nutrition-part-ii-pellets-and-veggies-2/

 

[flemishwhite]

For my previous 11+ year old rabbit, and my now two flemmish babies, is that we give them all the dark green veggies they want. We buy green leafy veggies from the grocery store and also about two big shopping bags of carrot tops from the farmer's market. They just love carrot tops...and they are free!. For our now two new bunnies, we can spend about $20 a week on grocery store veggies. This is, once again, in addition to free carrot tops, and additionally oat hay. They eat a lot of oat hay! Eating oat hay is important since it helps wear down their teeth..rabbit teeth are always growing...they need something abrasive to wear down their teeth..and oat hay is a good abrasive. We also have a bowl of pellets for them to eat. They can eat all the pellets they want. I don't buy pellets that have sugar, molasses, etc in them..too much unneeded calories for the bunns . Now for treats..they just love a slice of banana..(the banana skin should have a little green in it..because they don't like a really ripe banana). They also really like apples, guava, and bing cherries.
Interesting to watch them eat a bing cherry. They just chew, and chew, and chew, the bing cherry and then they spit out the seed. The seed is completely clean of any cherry fruit. When I first gave my bunny a bing cherry, I was afraid she'd swallow the seed...I was really happy she spit it out!

 

[Preitler]

I feed greens only, whenever available, only small amounts of pellets as training treats (to get them back to their hutch after garden time). Mostly grass, and whatever weeds, flowers, branches and whatever grows here.
Very little other stuff, like veggies, bread, fruits - that's just the top of the pyramid.

Imho that's what rabbits digestion system and teeth are made for, at least for medium sized rabbits, big breeds may need some addition to that.

In summer, when they have unlimited supply of greens, the hay gets old and stale in the feeder. Unlimited means that I throw away about 2/3 or more of what I offer them, but hey, it's for free.

It's quite laborious to stick to this diet, gathering up to 20kg greens every day, in all weather.

In winter they get hay, half a handful pellets per day and rabbit, apples, beets, topinampur, carrots, and a little greens if I find some.

There are many ways to feed rabbits, many of them equally right, depends on your situation and rabbits what is best for you.

Yeah, it's really funny watching them eating cherrys or damson plums

 

[Aki]

It depends on the rabbit, for a fully grown rabbit, it's 7 to 8 % of the rabbit's weight with 2/3 of leafy greens and 1/3 of other vegetables. If you want to be thorough, you also have to watch the calcium and oxalate intake... I wouldn't go with the 'all you can eat' approach with a fully grown rabbit: rabbits can get fat with vegetables (Aki is on the plump side and she doesn't eat any treats, fruits, or anything fat / sugary... she just always chose the most fattening vegetables of the bunch - her husbunny is left with the leafy greens while she eats carrots, parsnip and the like), fruits and pellets being of course a lot worse. It's a lot easier to make a rabbit get fat than to make them lose weight (you can't exercise them like you would a dog) so I would just weight your rabbit, weight the vegetables you give and just watch your rabbit's weight from time to time (most vets weight rabbits when they do their shots). Of course, the weight problem comes more quickly if you've got a nethie, like me, than if you've got a giant breed (those can get banana and stay thin, while my poor baby is on a permanent diet and will never be a supermodel... XD)