New Bunny = Atrocious Diet

[kherrmann3]

As you may know, I picked up the little girl, that I found on Craigslist, last night. Her old owner was telling us how she has been being fed, etc. It is a terrible diet for a rabbit. It's not as bad as I've seen other people do, but it's still not very good. I will go over what she WAS being fed, and what I am doing to try and fix it. Need some suggestions! Thanks!

What was being done:
- Fed once a day, filled bowl to the top (bowl holds about 3 ounces).
- Food = Kaytee Fiesta CRAP and some "Small World" pellets from Wal*Mart.
- Hay = Kaytee Timothy Hay, was only given a small handful of hay every-other-day.
- Litter = Aspen shavings, not sure how often they were changed. Their house didn't smell...

What is being done to fix this:
- Fed once a day. I am giving her about two ounces/day, and will wean her down to less.
- Food = Mixture of old pellets, SunSeed Vita Rabbit & Oxbox BBT (which is what Toby eats).
- Hay = Mixture of the pokey Kaytee stuff as well as some Oxbow Orchard grass and Kleenmama's 3rd cut.
- Litter = Yesterdays News

She seems a little on the heavy side. I'm not sure what she weighs, though. I don't want to stress her out more than she already has been. What would the ideal weight for a lionlop be? I think she is a mixture of a lionhead and a Holland lop. She is too small to be a mini-lop mix.

How much should I be feeding her? Toby gets one ounce of food per day in addition to the unlimited hay. Would one-to-two ounces be OK for her, for now at least?

Also, she is shedding, A LOT! It doesn't seem like molting because it's not going in lines down her body. It seems like her hair is falling out everywhere. Would that be from the crummy diet?

 

[irishlops]

sorry to hearr about this poor bunny, i really dont know... sorry but what you are going to do sound really good to me.

 

[Maureen Las]

I have no idea what a lion lop would weigh .I believe Pam or Peg would know but I know they are small. (maybe 3-4 lbs?)if she was given a huge amount of pellets by her previous ownerI would not drastically cut down to a small amount right away . Start at 2 oz and go down slowly Reduce the amount by increments in order to have her body adjust to the change slowly. In time you probably would not need to give her much more than about 1/8th cup pellets particularly if she is oveweight but it should take a couple months to get her down to such a small amount.
Everything else that you have planned seems great. a lot of hay right away won't hurt her
her fur problem could be from a bad diet , a molt or even fur mites but just keep an eye on it. if it is a dietary problem it will resolve in time, if it is a molt the spots should fill in within several weeks and if it is mites it will just get worse.
sounds like she is going to have a great home with you

 

[MyBabyBunnies]

I'd just like to say that Aspen litter is safe for rabbits. It's a hardwood and does not release the same chemicals into the air that softwoods such a pine and cedar do. If you notice, Aspen doesn't have the same wood chip type smell that the pine/cedar ones do.

While the diet may not be great, it's actually about the best I've heard of from a lot of uneducated pet owners. And none the less, she's in better hands now!

 

[kherrmann3]

I don't think that the fur loss is from mites. It just seems like she's shedding... a lot. Her fur isn't patchy or anything. She just has a lot of loose fur.

She only ate 1/4 ounce of food from last night to this morning. I don't know if it's because of the move, but I'll keep monitoring her food intake.

She has a massive butt! I didn't notice it last night, but she's a bit chunky. As least it looks that way to me. Will has once again used the term "badonkadonk". Yeah...