Is Smudgy ill?

The vet said that pellets would be ok. I'm going to get some Timothy hay as well as meadow hay and mix the two so they get a variety.

If i feed them fresh grass then i assume the silicates in the grass will also help but is there such a thing as too much fresh grass? Rabbits in the wild seem to eat loads of the stuff.

Graeme27Uk said:

The vet said that pellets would be ok. I'm going to get some Timothy hay as well as meadow hay and mix the two so they get a variety.

If i feed them fresh grass then i assume the silicates in the grass will also help but is there such a thing as too much fresh grass? Rabbits in the wild seem to eat loads of the stuff.

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Its all a matter of what they are used to. Grass is fine as part of the rabbits diet but as with all new foods should be introduced slowly to avoid stomach upsets.

You can also buy dried grasses from horse feed merchants (but these can be fattening if over fed).

Graeme27Uk said:

The vet said that pellets would be ok. I'm going to get some Timothy hay as well as meadow hay and mix the two so they get a variety.

If i feed them fresh grass then i assume the silicates in the grass will also help but is there such a thing as too much fresh grass? Rabbits in the wild seem to eat loads of the stuff.

Click to expand...

Not that it's the same case as your bun, but keep a close eye on smudge as our Mini lop before xmas cut down on her hay eating and her poos reduced in size and hardened! After 4 days of eating pellet and veg fine but still only eating a reduced amount of hay, she stopped pooing and eating was grinding her teeth and was in GI Stasis 8 hours after us last seeing her eat a meesly amount of hay. Her teeth were fine and we are pretty sure it was because gave her cauliflower leaf for the first time and gave her a bit too much! We now give her Oxbow Timothy hay which is better for her and her teeth than the cheap pet shop hays and as she is not a great hay eater we prefer to give her the best hay! I know you will but keep an eye on her as for our bun the lessened intake of hay was the first sign of a problem!

CRBevis said:

Not that it's the same case as your bun, but keep a close eye on smudge as our Mini lop before xmas cut down on her hay eating and her poos reduced in size and hardened! After 4 days of eating pellet and veg fine but still only eating a reduced amount of hay, she stopped pooing and eating was grinding her teeth and was in GI Stasis 8 hours after us last seeing her eat a meesly amount of hay. Her teeth were fine and we are pretty sure it was because gave her cauliflower leaf for the first time and gave her a bit too much! We now give her Oxbow Timothy hay which is better for her and her teeth than the cheap pet shop hays and as she is not a great hay eater we prefer to give her the best hay! I know you will but keep an eye on her as for our bun the lessened intake of hay was the first sign of a problem!

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If it was GI stasis wouldn't there be some other signs? ie she's not eating at all... she is tucking into her breaky hay this morning. Depending on the weather we are going over to P@H as they said they do Timothy Hay. Don't know if its good hay but we can have a look.

We did get them some herbal stuff before which they seemed to like, but that was only a small bag of the stuff.


I put loads of fresh hay out last night as usual, more than their body sizes as it suggests, and the lot seems to have gone somewhere (no evidence they've stashed it...). The only thing is I cant be sure how much Smudge ate over night. They don't seem to have touched their pellets but then I guess hay is more important.

Graeme27Uk said:

If it was GI stasis wouldn't there be some other signs? ie she's not eating at all... she is tucking into her breaky hay this morning. Depending on the weather we are going over to P@H as they said they do Timothy Hay. Don't know if its good hay but we can have a look.

We did get them some herbal stuff before which they seemed to like, but that was only a small bag of the stuff.


I put loads of fresh hay out last night as usual, more than their body sizes as it suggests, and the lot seems to have gone somewhere (no evidence they've stashed it...). The only thing is I cant be sure how much Smudge ate over night. They don't seem to have touched their pellets but then I guess hay is more important.

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Just saying that one of the first signs of our bun getting ill was her decreasing her hay intake! It was over a matter of 4 days for her to get to the stage of her tummy not working and she was eating everything else fine until she stopped eating, it was 3am in the morning we saw her eat some hay and she seemed fine! by 10am it was clear she was ill! Not saying your bun is heading for this just saying not all bunnys show all the symptoms that they say to look for when diagnosing any illness if anything wrong at all! Bunnys hide illness well which is why it is necessary to take to a vet when you can see something is definetly wrong. If we knew that her cutting back on the hay was an indication we would of got her to the vet before her tummy stopped. P@H do do a Hay called Timothy Hay buts its a cheap make, not the one that you can get from either the Hay experts or the one by Oxbow! I saw it in there this morning it's 3 odd pound for a reasonable sized pack but the real good Timothy hay by Oxbow is £4.99 for 425gms so price as with anything usually indicates the quality!

U/D on Smudgy

Well the vet gave me some powder stuff to give to her to get her bacteria working better.

Her poop's seem to be larger and more moist now.


However, as an aside....

Is it normal for a rabbit to lay out on their side... right over? I'll get a pic if i can but they are a bit camera shy.

Piccies of Smudge






She seems to be eating and running about like normal?

Is she just very relaxed?

Yes one of mine flops out like that all the time but the other one not so much. Think it means she is just chilldren and relaxed.

Glad to hear there was nothing serious wrong.