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"Tummy bunny" parents please help.

thumps_

Wise Old Thumper
Thumper has had a difficult winter since the cold weather with mild dysbiosis for the 1st. time in a year. I thought it was the cold, then the pain relief for his dentals, we had to change diet quickly - a rough patch.

The unusual thing was that he suddenly refused to touch any packet greens from "A" or "T" but would eat the same things from"S", or greens from kind folk at the allotment.

When Elve mk2's piggies sadly died & she warned us.
I found several other people had had a difficult time with their bunnies tummies, & similar symptoms.

Some supermarkets wash their packaged greens in water treated with antibacterials - usually chlorine, to reduce food spoilage bacteria & prolong shelf life. The veg can absorb this, so washing doesn't necessarily get it all off.

If anyone has had these issues, which haven't responded as usual (uneaten caecs, smelly caecs/wind, hypomotility, or unusual stasis that grumbles on), please can you post. I hope we are not breaking rules by indicating where we get veg from with an initial.

ETA I'm wondering whether the antibacterials used to wash the veg were increased during the cold snap, & this has caused the dysbiosis.
 
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i shop at tescos and im having an awful time with alvin as you know :cry::cry:

pearl is fine on the veg and she eats more of it :?

eta - does the organic stuff get washed the same?
 
Thank you donnamt. Yes the bunnies with good gut motility will be able to tolerate it, no probs. It's those like Thumps & Alvin, who are a bit on the slow side at the best of times, & go into stasis easily, who find the antibacterials a last straw.
ETA It seems to vary with the organic stuff - "S" says it's washed in spring water.
 
eric will only eat 's' veg - sometimes i have to use 'm' and he's not so keen.

esme will slowly get around to veg from any shop (except 'a') but she scoffs 's' straight away.

not even my piggies would eat the spring greens i bought from 'a':shock:

i'm hoping to grow as much of my own as i can this year but i don't have a very big garden now so it certainly won't be enough:?
 
I stopped buying T's because sometimes the kale and spring greens had an unusual smell, I'd also had problems with Basils tummy, I now buy fresh from the greengrocers and he seems fine:D
 
What an interesting thread. We started to have problems with our tummy bunny on 4 weeks ago and we had not changed the diet. We thought it may be the spring greens and after doing some research on "cabbage" we have been feeding kale, herbs and carrot mainly and his tum has definitely not been as bad the last 2 weeks. We are also giving him Pro-fibre which may have helped too though.

So are you saying that "S" veg is less likely to upset tums than other supermarkets? I use all of the big supermarkets so have never really related it.:roll:
 
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I get the vast majority of bunny greens at 'T' but go to 'M' if T don't have what I'm looking for. I tend to buy the spring greens in the whole cabbages not the shreaded, I don't know if they are washed as it doesn't say so, just advises that you wash thoroughly before using - I tend to soak them for a couple of minutes as well as rinsing thoroughly.

Roo had an unexplained bloat-type episode a few weeks ago, on 12 February, sadly I can't remember whose greens he had at the time. He did have a few bloat-type episodes about 15 months ago when he was on shreaded kale from either M or T that I didn't wash because it said 'ready washed', didn't know about the chlorine at that time:(

Art's also had quite a few episodes of not eating but *could* be relate to his bladder, he *could* equally have a delacate stomach as well as a dodgy bladder.

All in all, they probably have less of these episodes now that I'm washing the greens more thoroughly :?

Re: uneaten caecs - Artie isn't eating all his at the moment, he seems bright and happy in himself and is due a check up for his bladder issues in a week or so, I was intending to ask about it at his check up as it is something he does from time to time but he's also taking longer to eat his Excel so there's probably something other than a veg issue going on.
 
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Thank you everyone. This is really helpful for all of us. I need lots of posts, to be able to say anything definite.

bunny babe,
Until a lot more posts come in, I can only say that it's the experience of about 8 of us, that "T" &"A" veg seem to have been associated with mild dysbiosis in our buns. Currently 3 people find "S" OK & 1 person has found that "W" is OK. 3 people have found greengrocers veg OK (which doesn't surprise me).
The key to treating mild dysbiosis is to get the gut moving faster with fiber.
The pro fiber will have helped a lot. It may be worth considering where you buy your greens from though. dare I say "watch this space"?
 
M sometimes have some organic spring greens at our local branch but it's very rare, I'd buy them all the time if they had them as they are really good quality and hopefully not messed about with for shelf life. It would be good to find a greengrocer to get them from, I need to search around. When I've been at Harcourt-Brown vets they have a big box of kale delivered and it's not bagged just loads of leaves in a box... but then they probably have more bunnies on the premises than I have :lol::lol:

It will be really interesting to see if patterns emerge with their upset tums.
 
I'm not sure if this is helpful but I was feeding my buns market veg. I thought it would be healthier that supermarket stuff. I also give greens to my locusts and crickets (for my bearded dragon) and they all started to die. With the pet shop I came to the conclusion that it must be pesticides on the veg that wouldn't wash off.

I've just fed them some curly kale from A and there are a few dead again. :?
This is unwashed and I wash it myself in tap water.

I continuously worry about feeding my buns this veg, is it's killing bugs so really it can't be doing them much good.

What do you reckon about organic veg? Does that have to be free from chemicals?
 
Daisy has had several bouts of stasis I originally suspected the greens but then thought it was the hay n hide tunnels since Ive removed them she's had no more trouble! However, I would say for the last month she has not been eating all her cecotrophs and she's had a bit of a messy bum but there has been no change to her routine! My two nearly always have Tesco greens and sometimes they are more keen on them than others?! do you know what concentration the chloride is in the water they use to wash the greens? Is it much higher than tap water?
 
Thank you Jenova. I'd be surprised if you had problems with pesticides in winter, but not in summer. I can only speak as a gardener. Insect pests on brassicas here, are mainly butterfly caterpillars in summer. Insect life really tails off in Autumn & Winter so there's no need to spray. Is there a reptile forum & do a similar thread about the locusts dying?
Organic veg have to be grown chemical free & it's very strict. I don't know about the preparation of it once it's been harvested.
 
I've just remembered this thread started almost a year to the day!

Sorry using my iPhone hope the link works properly!

http://forums.rabbitrehome.org.uk/showthread.php?t=171435

Thank you Boudicca.
I've had a look at the link. Folk seemed to think it was the cold weather then. I was aware that sudden fluctuations in temp. particularly the sudden drop from 20C to below 10C when heating is turned off can certainly precipitate stasis in house buns. We were cold in mid Dec. so I moved upstairs with Thumps, kept the heating on 24/7 & maintained a temp of 15C to 18C. He didn't get any better.

The friends I've asked haven't had temperature issues either. It's definitely been related to where we buy the veg. & improved when we've changed where we've bought our veg from.

ETA No I don't know the concentrations used, & don't know how to find out at present. I do know that it's some thing the buns can smell, it's not the veg itself, & varies from supermarket to supermarket. I'm pretty sure that it has to be stronger than tap water.

I also remembered a gentleman who did marathon swimming & swallowed so much swimming pool water, he got the rare human form of caecal bacterial overgrowth severely. Bunnies are far more susceptable to much smaller changes in caecal flora.
 
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I stopped buying T's because sometimes the kale and spring greens had an unusual smell, I'd also had problems with Basils tummy, I now buy fresh from the greengrocers and he seems fine:D

I bought Kale from T... And after being open in the fridge for less than 4 hours it smelled like feet :?
I haven't bought it since

Mine all prefer the stuff bought from the veggies shop in town, ironically the stuff is cheaper in there too :roll:
 
I think you are right about the greens,both my bunnies have had stasis this year and they have never had it before.I buy all my greens from "T",sometimes the buns wont touch them,the other day I bought a bag with five little plants in and it looks like one of them got missed in the spraying procces and was covered in botrytis.This week I have only been able to get the shreded greens and both my buns have had sloopy poos,which I guess is down to them using more preservative.
Also during the cold snaps they havent been able to eat grass,which I believe keeps their tummies working properly.
 
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Snowdrop had a stasis bout after eating T greens. We havent shopped there in a while and she now has them from the Co-op but refuses to eat them anymore. She wont eat anything green at the minute.
 
Basil had his last bout of stassis 2 weeks ago and needed vet treatment, and Barney had an upset tum about the same time, since then they have not had any veg from the supermarkets, and both have settled down okay.
I now buy from my greengrocers and if they haven't any, the buns go without, which encourages them to eat more hay, I also give them readygrass if they don't have any green veg, I also limit carrot to a small piece daily.
I've always washed the veg before giving it to the rabbits.

Also Basil was outdoors until December, but he kept having stassis which the vet thought was linked to the cold weather, he now lives as a housebun, and has fewer episodes, but this has also coincided with buying fresh veg:D
 
I bought Kale from T... And after being open in the fridge for less than 4 hours it smelled like feet :?
I haven't bought it since

Mine all prefer the stuff bought from the veggies shop in town, ironically the stuff is cheaper in there too :roll:

I've bought them making sure they were well within sell by date, and when they've been opened on the same day of purchase they have smelled - I thought it was a sour smell:lol: I was throwing away more than I could use, that's one reason I stopped using T.

ETA This is the chopped kale and spring greens from T that's in sealed bags.

The greengrocers kale is fresh and unwrapped, I think he gets it in now especially for me:oops:


I need to see if we could grow some in the garden;)
 
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