Thumper's not right :( UD post 7 :) oh no! UD post 10

Hi :wave: last night both bunnies were fine; eating their supper, moving etc :thumb:

This morning, all Thumper wanted to do was lie down . She even let me put her on my lap for a few minutes so I could stroke her, which is not like her at all. She eventually followed Coco out into the garden to free-range, but just plonked herself down on the concrete. I think she has wind :?. Again. At least this time she's not shivering, which is what she normally does. I managed to dose her up with some Metacam and will check her when I have some lunch; hopefully the Metacam will have kicked in and she'll be bouncing about again. She's neither hot nor cold, clean bum, eyes bright enough, just plonking herself down and is half asleep and won't eat.

I'll see how she is later on and if she's no better by this afternoon I might pop her to the vet although I don't see what a vet could do, to be honest. Fingers crossed the pain relief will kick in and she'll be fine. Normally when she's like this (exact same symptoms except shivering like the devil as well) the Metacam sorts her out within a couple of hours so ... tick, tock ...

Hope she's better soon. You seem to have a very good understanding of her anyway so at least she's in good hands.

Has she poo'd overnight ?

If not then personally I'd get her to a Vet sooner rather than later.

Hope she will be OK.

Jack's-Jane said:

Has she poo'd overnight ?

If not then personally I'd get her to a Vet sooner rather than later.

Hope she will be OK.

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Thank you both for your replies and kind thoughts

I believe so, yes, as there's far too many poos to be just Coco's and they're all lovely big round golden ones :thumb:

I'll go out to her in about an hour or so to see if she's perked up at all. I don't want to disturb her beforehand in case she's having a snooze (given that she was quite dozy this morning) and if she is then hopefully when she wakes/stirs the pain relief will have worked and she'll be okay.

I'll update later on

Hope Thumper is soon feeling back to normal, sending vibes

I usually give them about 2 hours unless the bun is displaying a lot of pain and other symptoms. If they are still not eating properly and acting quiet, I will take them to the vet.
Flopping down is generally a sign of pain so I'd say the metacam will hopefully help that. If she has not improved, I'd take her to the vet, they can give her some metaclop (gut stimulant) and a stronger painkiller. Usually mine perk up soon after having this, I also think the trip to the vet "kick starts" everything, sometimes.

:wave:

Thank you for all of your replies

I am very happy to say that I've just looked out of the window to see Thumper in the outdoor run, making a rather determined bid for freedom ... :lol: Guess the pain relief worked then! :lol:

I will keep an eye on her for the rest of the day but hopefully whatever it was has gone/passed through and she'll now be okay. Phew!

Ah good Trouble is usually a sign of an OK bunny :lol:

glad she's ok now :wave:

Spoke too soon! :shock:

Let the bunnies out for a run before tea and Thumper didn't even come out of the run and stayed flopped down where she was whereas Coco was out like a shot.

Anyway, took her (well them) to the vet who was fab, as ever. (NB it's amazing how they rally when one is trying to catch them to stuff them into their pet carrier ... :lol. Couldn't really find anything wrong so did a blood test for basic stuff and all was okay. Temperature was fine too. Guts sounded a little slow so she's had a couple of jabs and I have brought home some Zantac. I have to phone Claire (vet) tomorrow afternoon with an update and basically to take it from there. She was dreadfully stressed when we came back home (Thumper, not the vet); panting hard and just flopped down on the shed floor so left them alone for an hour. Spotted Thumper in the outdoor run after about 20 minutes, snuffling about in the thick straw floor covering, so that was good. Have just been out to give them their tea and BOTH are stuffing their faces, hurrah! :thumb:

Just wait and see what tomorrow brings by the look of it.

*sighs* I have a dreadful feeling that this is going to be a regular occurrence (or is it "occurrance") for Thumper from now on. If she doesn't improve - or heaven forbid gets worse - they will take a full blood sample from her leg and send it off to the lab. They didn't want to do it today as it's too much on top of the normal manhandling and she was stressed enough as it was; they need me to just take her in and wham, job done, no extra messing about.

Stumped.

Oh no, I hope Thumper settles down and feels better

My bun gets this every 4 weeks almost like clockwork and after nearly 3 years we have found that giving him 1ml of infacol ( for babies!) has him eating and out of pain within an hour. We have used it the last twice and instead of him being really unwell ( like yours laying flat out and shivering and refusing to eat or drink for up to 24 hrs) he has been eating again in less than an hour even when we had been out and it must have been 3 hours before we came home and he was well into the shivering flat out bit.
I didn't give him any other meds so I would know that it was the infacol working.
We now have a stock of infacol in!

Just a thought it you haven't ever tried it. My vet had never heard of using it for bunnies but I read about it on here.

Hope bun improves.

bunkin said:

My bun gets this every 4 weeks almost like clockwork and after nearly 3 years we have found that giving him 1ml of infacol ( for babies!) has him eating and out of pain within an hour. We have used it the last twice and instead of him being really unwell ( like yours laying flat out and shivering and refusing to eat or drink for up to 24 hrs) he has been eating again in less than an hour even when we had been out and it must have been 3 hours before we came home and he was well into the shivering flat out bit.
I didn't give him any other meds so I would know that it was the infacol working.
We now have a stock of infacol in!

Just a thought it you haven't ever tried it. My vet had never heard of using it for bunnies but I read about it on here.

Hope bun improves.

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What a fabulous piece of advice especially as the symptoms are the same! It's certainly worth a shot - and if it works it's a darned lot cheaper than the vet! Thanks!! :thumb:

Do they get veg at all?

Vegan_Bunny said:

Do they get veg at all?

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The only thing I haven't tried with my bun was totally cutting out all green food so for past 3 weeks he has had only his hay and pellets. Only time will tell if green food has been his problem, if he gets another attack then I know its def not green food. I had tried changing his greenery from gassy ones to only herbs but did not make any difference he still had his attacks every 4 weeks.

Yes, they do have veg; they love their cabbage!

But they've been having that since they were old enough and they're now 2 years old and Thumper only started with this just about August last year, so do you really think it would be that? They don't have an awful lot anyway; a leaf between them or even less sometimes as the leaves can be huge!

Angie B said:

Yes, they do have veg; they love their cabbage!

But they've been having that since they were old enough and they're now 2 years old and Thumper only started with this just about August last year, so do you really think it would be that? They don't have an awful lot anyway; a leaf between them or even less sometimes as the leaves can be huge!

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Cabbage is notorious for causing gas in bunnies. Tbh veg isn't very good for them anyway. I don't feed any veg or fruit to my bunnies, it's not worth the risk IMO! Veg is not a natural food source for buns; in the wild they eat things like bramble, grass, bark from trees, apple leaves, hawthorn, plantain etc.

I would cut out the cabbage and see if that helps, if they seem better without it, then slowly introduce some fresh forage into their diet. There are certain fresh plants that can actually help greatly with gut problems, such as bramble leaves. I make sure my two get plenty of them, especially Xena as she is prone to a dicky tummy. She would often exhibit signs of tummy pain whenever she had anything new or too much of something (even fresh forage) and her poos were often different sizes or shapes. I put her on some probiotic/profibre pellets and she has been perfectly ok since! Her tummy has even stopped being so loud!

If you are having problems with a bun's guts, I would definitely try to introduce these probiotic pellets (you can also get drops that go into their water) and see if that helps. This mixed with cutting out all veg and foods that cause gas, will hopefully make an improvement. If nothing changes, then I would be thinking there is something going on medically and would want it investigated further by a vet.

I really hope this helps.

Vegan_Bunny said:

Cabbage is notorious for causing gas in bunnies. Tbh veg isn't very good for them anyway. I don't feed any veg or fruit to my bunnies, it's not worth the risk IMO! Veg is not a natural food source for buns; in the wild they eat things like bramble, grass, bark from trees, apple leaves, hawthorn, plantain etc.

I would cut out the cabbage and see if that helps, if they seem better without it, then slowly introduce some fresh forage into their diet. There are certain fresh plants that can actually help greatly with gut problems, such as bramble leaves. I make sure my two get plenty of them, especially Xena as she is prone to a dicky tummy. She would often exhibit signs of tummy pain whenever she had anything new or too much of something (even fresh forage) and her poos were often different sizes or shapes. I put her on some probiotic/profibre pellets and she has been perfectly ok since! Her tummy has even stopped being so loud!

If you are having problems with a bun's guts, I would definitely try to introduce these probiotic pellets (you can also get drops that go into their water) and see if that helps. This mixed with cutting out all veg and foods that cause gas, will hopefully make an improvement. If nothing changes, then I would be thinking there is something going on medically and would want it investigated further by a vet.

I really hope this helps.

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Thank you very much :thumb: I didn't realise cabbage could cause gas

Thank you very much I didn't realise cabbage could cause gas

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That's why I won't let my husband have it :lol:

How is Thumper today?

Zoobec said:

That's why I won't let my husband have it :lol:

How is Thumper today?

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:lol:

She's a lot better thank you for asking

Has been free-ranging in the garden with her sister and doing binkies too, which is great and munching on the grass which is super-great! Just put them to bed actually and left them munching on a small bit of cabbage along with a mix of leftover pellets from tea, a pinch of herbs and a pinch of muesli and Thumper was the first to dig in, which is fab! :thumb: The vet wanted to know what she/they ate so I told her and she said that all was fine - agreeing that cabbage can indeed cause gas - and said that I could give her a little bit today to encourage her to eat, so they've only had a very small piece each and they wolfed it down, :lol:

If this happens again, as this must be the third time in a year now, Claire (vet) said they'd run a full blood test to see if they could find something, and do an X-Ray of her tummy too. She firmly believes that Thumper will have this again and suggested she could be prone to a touch of colic but only time will tell. I told her of the Infacol thing but she'd never heard of it and advised me not to use it for this instance at least; said she'd look into it though.

So hopefully Thumper's over this bout :thumb: Only time will tell if she'll get another one but the chances are she will

Poor ickle bunny wabbit

But on the bright side she's okay again now, all being well. Have to ring the vet again tomorrow afternoon but she said she's only expecting to hear about improvements

Fingers crossed!!