help feeding a rabbit with Ecuniculi

My wife and I have an old english, snowy who we think is 8 ( got her as a rescue rabbit so not sure of her age ) We are fairly certain she has Ecuniculi. She is incontinent, lost the use of her hind legs and goes round in circles. Very frustratingly I only found the forum tonight, she lost the use of one of her rear legs about four months ago, improved and then got worse again. She was x rayed and this showed an old break at the top or her leg and bad arthritis so we put it down to that. She managed to get round on three legs and was content. However about 12 days ago she lost the use
of the other one.

I took her to the vets and had a very uncomfortable converation about quality of life, vet mention there was an outside chance the incontinence could be caused by a parasite/worms and prescribed lapizole and we are on day 8, the last couple of days she has gone off her food. We have got her on Bio-lapas a probiotic drink. Should we be be giving her something like fibreplex. I will be phoning the vets tomorrow to see what they recommend but would like your input as well.

Thanks

Adrian

I haven't had a bun go off their food with lapizole - BUT it is quite a large quantity of liquid and you might see if she is happier with panacur - same working ingredient but in a smaller paste version. `ps presume you are having 28 days treatment?

It can be difficult and tiring for a bunny with these symptoms to eat enough. Offer tempting foods such as fresh herbs . If your bunny finds it difficult to eat enough you may need to supplement the diet with recovery or critical care: You can offer some in a bowl, you may need to syringe feed her though. You can also offer a little porridge mashed up with banana. It is a good idea to ask your vet for blood tests as low potassium can be a cause of weakness too. Remember your bunny may also find it difficult to take in enough fluid, so sub-cut fluids or i.v. fluids may be needed too. A probiotic is a good idea: fibreplex can be fed for 2 days, before changing to a probiotic powder.

If the bunny does have E.c. she will need a 28 day course of panacur or lapizole, and anti inflammatories are needed as well, as it is inflammation that causes the symptoms. If she has arthritis she could do with being on anti inflammatories anyway.
Most vets will want to give an antibiotic too, as some bacteria such as pasteurella can cause similar symptoms.

At her age there is a chance that her problems are caused by a tumour or some other neurological problem sadly.

I hope she manages to make a recovery xx

Thanks, she is also on metacam which I believe is just a pain killer. I will see if I can get the vet to give me an anti-inflamatory tomorrow and see if that helps.

From what I have read on other threads Ecuniculi can put rabbit off their food. Snowy's favourite food is carrot tops and it is the one thing I can't find anywhere at the moment. Typical!! She normally likes oats so I will definitely give her go on porridge and banana.

She has an appointment to go to the vets on Saturday so I will get them to do the blood test then. I am hoping she will have improved a little by then as she does look quite poorly and I am worried about what they will say

monks said:

Thanks, she is also on metacam which I believe is just a pain killer. I will see if I can get the vet to give me an anti-inflamatory tomorrow and see if that helps.

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Metacam is a non-steroidal anti inflammatory, so it's good that she is on it xx

Hi, my bunny had E.c a few years ago when he was also 8. He made a full recovered and we only very recently had to make the decision to have him put to sleep. So, just to say that I have everything crossed that you get Snowy through this.

When Charlie had E.c he was completely stuck on his side for a week or so, then gradually righted himself, but it took until about day 10 before he took his first hop. We basically hand fed him for the whole time - we kept a pile of hay in front of him so he could reach out for it but hand fed him his veg and pellets. We did need to feed him more interesting and appetising veg, and his 'favourite' things - so he lived on coriander, fresh peas, and grapes. I know too much fruit is bad but we were just too pleased that he was eating to worry about that! We also fed him hazelnuts, as he liked them and they're high in calories. We syringe fed him somedays too if we didn't think he'd eaten enough.

Drug wise - as mentioned above she'll need at least 28 days of panacur or lapizole, but my vet actually advised we continue for 2 more weeks on top of this. Charlie was on anti inflammatory pain killers, antibiotics and stuff to keep his guts moving (metaclopramide).

Keep us posted on how she's doing. Sending Snowy some hugs too.

Bev

Thanks for all your support.

I am hoping snowy will make a reasonable recovery, the first leg she lost the use of she has lost all the muscle tone so we doubt she will regain use of that. However she did manage quite well on three legs ( could still go full pelt when she wanted to ) so we are keeping our fingers crossed.

Time to try and tempt her with some more food and fluids and then off to bed

Hi,

Just wanted to update you on Snowy. She went to the vet today and there are definite signs of improvement. One of her legs still has tone and she is starting to wriggle her toes and put her foot to the ground. There is no eye disease and the going round in circles has reduced. The vet is generally pleased with the progress and hopes that she will continue to go in the right direction. He has recommended pure pineapple juice for her gut as it is apparently really good for stopping their gut go into stasis. We are keeping our fingers crossed that she will continue to improve.

We have read that some of the spores can be contagious to them even once they have been treated and that you need to thoroughly clean to prevent this from happening on days 21 and 28 of treatment. As Snowy is a free range house bun that is going to mean that she has had some little accidents on the carpet. These, of course, have been cleared up with antibacterial wipes, but is there anything else we need to do? Will this be enough to remove them?

Many thanks again for all your help!

I'm glad Snowy is showing signs of improvement.

Normally people advise cleaning the environment with a bleach solution, but of course you can't bleach your carpets. Maybe a steam cleaner would do the trick? I've never used one myself though xx

:wave: the only thing that kills ec is bleech or steam. I'm not even sure that jays fluid works. it's a nasty that can unfortunately stick around for 3 months at least, possibly more in a house environment. If I were you I would keep her on something like a kitchen floor with towel down (if she needs the extra grip) for the next few months. You can boil the towels to kill the paracite and bleech the floor. It's very important to do this a least twice in the last week of treatement. Bleech her litter trays and water bowel/bottle as well. You can steam the carpets but I think that if it is hot enought to kill EC then it might damage your carpet. I'd perhaps consider getting it professionally cleaned instead which should hopefully get rid of most of the bugs just by the volume of water/chemicals that they use. once she has had her course she should be free of the paracite so can run everywhere without concern..... although you might not want her being incontinent on your nice clean carpets

Hello, glad to hear your rabbit is showing signs of improvment. Sorry if I missed it but just wanted to check that you are doing a 28 day worming course.

Awwhh!

I'm going through the same thing with one of my bunnies. Sadly, I lost one last year and the vet didn't tell me that the illness could be spread after he had gone, so I put my other bunnies in the shed without having bleached it properly... resulting in Jess getting it too It's a bit of a pain because she's bonded to my giant rabbit - he has no symptoms but I'm treating him anyway. He has a third of a tube of panacur in one go so it's costing me a small fortune! :lol:

I'm finding it hard to get Jess to eat too. She isn't touching her pellets at the moment. I've been trying anything and everything (anything's better than nothing!). Mostly, she's been having grass, leafy veg and rich tea biscuits. I worry she's not eating enough as she tends to stay sat in a corner all day but I have been weighing her every day and she's not lost anything yet so I guess she's getting enough. I also syringe a little water into her when doing her medicine as obviously, water is pretty vital. She's too wobbly to use a water bottle and I've only given her a tiny hamster bowl of water in case she fits and drowns in it. :shock: I'm sure that's unlikely, but I rather not have the worry! :lol:

I can't work out if she's improving or not. My mum thinks she looked better today, active and eating, but I had been at work all day so hadn't seen her hopping about. I guess not getting worse is a good sign! She's only a few days into her treatment too.

Best of luck with your bunny, and I really hope she gets better soon!

georgie_f said:

He has a third of a tube of panacur in one go so it's costing me a small fortune! :lol:

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Sorry to hear about your bunny, and I really hope Jess shows some definite improvement soon.

I've had previous Ec issues with bunnies and now pnancur mine several times a year (I do it regularly but then I'll do it if they're going to the bunny sitter or something is happening that will stress them out etc). My buns are both big so the tubes don't go far, I was buying them from the vet, I now get them for about a third of the price from Vet UK http://www.vetuk.co.uk/index.php?main_page=product_info&cPath=17_43&products_id=1105. Some people use the dog liquid instead which is also much cheaper but I find the paste easier to administer (I squeeze it into the centre of sugar snap peas).

Fingers crossed for Jess.

Dustyrabbit said:

Hello, glad to hear your rabbit is showing signs of improvment. Sorry if I missed it but just wanted to check that you are doing a 28 day worming course.

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Thanks for asking and yes we are


I hope Jess makes a quick recovery. We took snowy back to the vets on Saturday who confirmed it is a very slow recovery process. Snowy is spending time in nappies and also we are using puppy training pads so we can still cuddle her. http://www.pet-supermarket.co.uk/products-Four-Paws-Wee-Wee-Puppy-Training-Pads-22-x-23_CA2181.htm we are also using some cream from the vets to combat wee burn, some people on here use sudocream or tea tree cream. We also noticed snowy does not sleep much since it all started, our vet said if we could get her to lie on her back it is relaxing for them. We tried this today and that has worked, had her between two pillows.

We have also ordered her a specialised nappy which will hopefully be more comfortable for her from http://www.dog-nappy.co.uk/ which I found recommended on this forum. They look to be a better fit round the legs

monks said:

our vet said if we could get her to lie on her back it is relaxing for them

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I'm afraid that this is not at all relaxing for a bunny, its stressful. Bunny goes into survival mode and stays still as they feel threatened.

BevBunny said:

Sorry to hear about your bunny, and I really hope Jess shows some definite improvement soon.

I've had previous Ec issues with bunnies and now pnancur mine several times a year (I do it regularly but then I'll do it if they're going to the bunny sitter or something is happening that will stress them out etc). My buns are both big so the tubes don't go far, I was buying them from the vet, I now get them for about a third of the price from Vet UK http://www.vetuk.co.uk/index.php?main_page=product_info&cPath=17_43&products_id=1105. Some people use the dog liquid instead which is also much cheaper but I find the paste easier to administer (I squeeze it into the centre of sugar snap peas).

Fingers crossed for Jess.

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Thanks for the link BevBunny! I have actually ordered my panacur from here already though! :lol: I'd be lost without google shopping! :roll: A single tube is just under £10 from my vet. Of course, if I had to pay that price I would, just saving money is always good!

Jess is still wobbly. Her head seems more tilted today but she seems more active and is moving around her cage more. Thankyou for your well wishes.

Whilst I'm here - does anyone know how long it should take to see an improvement in Jess? She's been on panacur since wednesday and meloxodyl since thursday. Thankyooooou!

Kermit said:

I'm afraid that this is not at all relaxing for a bunny, its stressful. Bunny goes into survival mode and stays still as they feel threatened.

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We won't be doing that again then

@Georgie around day 6 snowy stopped eating, on day 9 she is eating but mostly if she is hand fed, she is moving round a little bit but does not have use of her back legs. She can move them a little bit but they are not strong enough for walking. At one point she could not move them at all and we are on day 12. From what I have read here and our vet has said it is a very slow recovery

BevBunny said:

(I squeeze it into the centre of sugar snap peas)

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Great tip!

Hope your bunny is ok Monks.

My Flynn was the same because of EC. I found keeping him on vetbed was most effective keeping him dry. He started getting a bit of movement in his toes, and i did a bit of physio on his legs every day (ask your vets advice and opinions on this). His recovery took a while, but one day he just ended up on his feet again, it was like a miracle. He still wobbles a bit from time to time, but he can binky and hop again now. Keep up the good work with your bunny, i hope she can learn to walk again.

Shazza thanks

Don't b***** it, looks as though she has a cold, she has had a bit of discharge from her nose and being slightly wheezy. To cap it off one of her eyes has picked up an infection, there is cloudy liquid from the eye and it is shut or barely open. Back to the vet tomorrow. At this rate we will be getting a season ticket.