Weird behavior.... help?

[waterlilly0212]

Hi all-

I need your advice on something....

Ok. My bunny Bailey and I just moved back to RI from FL for the summer. (I go to school in FL) At school, he had full roam of my dorm room, and ate on a pretty regular basis. I would feed him a small handful of pellets 2x a day, and also a bowl of greens (lettuce, parsley, etc) 2x day. Every time I fed him, he would run around me in circles and grunt at me until I fed him, and he regularly devoured the whole serving in one sitting. (I staggered the pellet feedings and green feedings).

NOW. Since I got home, his eating has been really weird. He had a usual period of adjustment where he acted all scared, but now he's better. But his eating still hasn't evened out. Now he is eating only one serving of pellets, randomly through the day. I give him more and he doesn't eat them. I still give him greens 2x day, and those are the only thing he still regularly eats. He has a smaller cage here, but the same size litterbox and same water bottle, but he rarely goes in the cage. The water level in the water bottle hasn't gone down and it has been almost a week. (I have been making sure to keep his greens really wet so he doesn't get dehydrated, and I have regularly been doing the skin test to make sure he isn't dehydrated.) He hardly eats any hay (in his litterbox), only sometimes does he eat it...
He IS using the litterbox to pee and poop though, which is good. And when I place hay outside the cage he eats more of it.

What should I do? Is he just changing is eating habits to meet different metabolic needs? Its not like he isn't eating at all..... What should I do? I'm particularly nervous about the water.... Should I move it so it is pointing on the outside of his cage?

Please help..... Thank you!!!

 

[Maureen Las]

Sometimes when a rabbit goes through a lot of stress they will get the beginning of GI slowldown which can turn into stasis.
I would recommend spiking his water with a little apple juice to see if that will encourage him to drink. you can get 2 crocks

1 for water and 1 for spiked water and place them outside the cage.I would also move the water bottle out of the cage if he seldom goes in.

if he seriously has not been drinking I would go buy a fresh pineapple , squeeze the juice from it ( and syringe him severl ml of pineapple juice (has to be fresh ) about 2 times perday.
Feel his tummy to see if it is hard

if his GI tract is slowing down he could have gas which would make him less likely to eat. A rabbit can have simethicone which can be purchased as infant gas drops at the drugstore. Simethicone should be the only ingredient in additon to the preservatives. You can get mylicon infant gas drops or infant gasX but always check the back of the box to make sure that it doesn have aluminum hydroxide or magnesium in it ;; just simethicone. If his tummy feel hard you can give him 1 cc with about 3 doses several hours apart. This med is safe and won't hurt him. it breaks up big gas bubbles and make them easier to expel.

while you are at the pharmacy also get some pedialyte (baby electrolyte drink)

if he doesn't drink the spiked water you should start syringing him pedialyte . This will relace lost electrolytes and he will feel better .
Syringe him the pedialyte (as much as he will take) every few hours giving him time to rest inbetween as you don't want to stress him out more.

you can do these things one step at a time to see if he will respond to one treatment. try not to stress him out more.

if you can get to a pet store like petco pick up either a bottle of powdered benebac or the little gel tubes.; this is a probiotic which will help reestablish the beneficial bacteria in his Gi tract.

Continue to give wet greens ; this is a good idea

and hopfully you can get him out of this before it becomes a major problem....

let us know......

 

[tonyshuman]

It is also possible that he doesn't need as much energy and water because it's not as hot in RI, or he's getting older. However, he's about 2 years old, right?

Spiking the water is good, and it is possible that he had a GI upset from the stress of the trip. My guys all get a bit upset when we take them on car rides. Bene-Bac is great for the GI. If you suspect stasis (which I would only suspect if he isn't pooing as much), pineapple juice is also a good idea. I think the wet greens are good too.

It is possible that he doesn't want to go in his cage as much because it's smaller and that's why he eats hay outside of his cage. Do you lock him up in there at night or when you're not home? It might be good to make hay and water available outside of the cage when he gets to play outside of the cage so that he doesn't have to go in there--he might be worried about getting locked up.