SICK BUNNY! Bald Red spot on Thumpers Butt and HAIRBALL

[Leo090]

I have a 4.5lb dutch rabbit named Thumpy. He has been suffering from a hairball for the past month. It keeps returning after constant medicines such as lactitone, laxtulos, and i used raglen before(but now I ran out). He gets doses of simethicone whenever gassy,lots of belly massages, but still has occasionaly tinny hairry poops,and then returns to big poops and then goes back to small poops. I used ot give him fresh pinapple juice but I doesnt always work. I now bought canned pumkin. I will see how that works.

I also have another problem with him

Thumper is a chocolate colored rabbit. In the past month the fur on his butt became more of a brownish orange color and his hair near his tail could come out easily when pulled, it sorta hung off. The tips of this hair were always white like a piece of skin or root, i dunt know what that is. Today i was brushing that area and I looked and there was a bald spot and it was bare skin and bleeding. I dont know if I caused it from excessive brushing . His fur kept coming out of that area near his tail(i brushed his body for 1 minute) . When I noticed the bleeding i took a cotton swab soaked in peroxide and gently applied it, he didnt mind too much. The red skin turned pinkish white when I did this, a reaction i guess to the peroxide. I did this every 4 hours,and the wound now looks like pink skin. no more blood. Did I cause this from brushing. He never ended up with bald spots before when i brush him. What could cause this.



He gets endless amounts of timothy hay. Dandelions and chickory and cilantro twice a day.L&B Pellets fed by hand maybe twice a week.

Please help me save poor thumpy

 

[naturestee]

It sounds like urine scald/urine burn.Is his cage kept clean? If so, something else may be causing the urine to get on his skin, such as a urinary tract infection or arthritis. Pain from this same problem may be what's causing the stasis/hairball issues because it can cause the gut to slow down.

He'll need to go to the vet. Till then, put neosporin (not neosporin plus!) on the sore area to prevent infections. Keep his cage as clean as possible. And start feeding the canned pumpkin- I find that helps a lot with fur-filled poops.

 

[Maureen Las]

I have also read that hydrogen peroxide is too strong to be used on rabbits. I have heard that a weak betadine solution is the best, however, I agree with naturestee that neosporin and another vet visit is the way to go.

 

[naturestee]

Good point about the hydrogen peroxide. It can actually damage healthy skin.

 

[Leo090]

HI everyone Thank you for your replies. This mornign i looked at the area right above his tail and the skin is clean pink, not as red as when i brushed him yesterday.kind of flaky. I applied more peroxide just to be sure. Before i applied anything i had to pull out a loose chunk of hair, same as the hair that kept falling off before.His cage is cleaned once a day. I dont think itever reaches a point of filthy.

 

[Leo090]

Are pellets mandatory, Do I starve my rabbit ifi just give him greens and hay? and occasional pellet or a spoon fulcanned pumkin

 

[Leo090]

If it is in fact urine burn, will neosporin cure it?

 

[naturestee]

If it is urine burn, neosporin will help the skin heal but you still need to find out why it's happening.Like I said, if it's not from a dirty cage (which it doesn't sound like it is), it's most likely from a health problem which may also be affecting his gut motility due to the pain. So you really need to have a vet check it out. If the cause isn't treated,it will keep happening.

I'm not familiar with L&M pellets. Do you have a link to a website with the nutrition info?

I consider pellets necessary unless you do a lot of research on nutrition and feed a huge variety of greens daily, plus a little bit of fruit and multiple types of hay. IMO it's very hard to make sure a rabbit is getting all the necessary vitamins and minerals without pellets. If you're feeding a large amount and variety of greens, you really only need to feed a few tablespoons of pellets a day. Think of them as vitamin pellets.

Here's a link to my Q&A on feeding:
http://rabbitsonline.net/view_topic.php?id=16340&forum_id=1

 

[Leo090]

The red spot on thumpers butt is getting smaller, and there appears to be hair growing out sprial pattern in the middle of the bald spot, i am assuming this is fresh black hair.