Top 7 Rabbits Health problem

What’s wrong with my bunny? So your buddy’s not acting quite himself, or you think he might be sick, but you don’t know what’s wrong with him. Today, we’re going to discuss common rabbit health problems, symptoms, and what you can do about it. I bring you informative bunny article each week, so to see cute bunnies or just to get tips on how to be a better bunny parent, make sure you subscribe to our site right now.

Overgrown Teeth

So, the first problem we’re going to talk about in rabbits is overgrown teeth. Rabbit’s teeth grow continuously, and they can become overgrown for several different reasons. Some of those reasons include that your rabbit’s not eating enough hay, they don’t have enough rabbit-safe items to chew on, or they can have a genetic disorder called malocclusion. Malocclusion is simply a fancy word for a misalignment of your rabbit’s teeth so that they’re not wearing down properly when your rabbit’s eating. There are several different things you can do to help your rabbit if their teeth are overgrowing. First, you need to determine if this was a one-time thing because they were sick and they weren’t eating as much, if they’re just not eating enough hay, if they’re not using their toys, or if this is because of a genetic disorder that they have.

So once you determine the cause, you can do your course of action by maybe switching to a first cut hay which is more fibrous for your bunny so that it can grind down their teeth better, adding in some different types of toys so they’re more prone to use them and grind down their teeth that way, giving them some more treats that they might like that are harder for them but still healthy for your rabbit. Or if it is a malocclusion and none of these efforts are helping your rabbit, you would need to seek a rabbit-savvy vet and figure out how to get your rabbit’s teeth trimmed down initially and then figure out a long-term solution.

That can either be a regular teeth trimming, a regular teeth grinding, or it could be a removal of your rabbit’s incisors at your rabbit-savvy vet. So, this is something that needs to be determined between you and your vet to decide what’s best for you and your bunny.

GI Stasis

The next health problem for rabbits is GI stasis. GI stasis is very dangerous for rabbits. It’s essentially where the rabbit’s GI system slows down or stops completely. At that time, bad bacteria build up in your rabbit’s digestive system and it causes painful bloating and gas, which is very uncomfortable for your rabbit and causes them to lack motivation to eat or drink. GI stasis can be caused by different health factors, underlying health factors, it could be caused by a blockage in your rabbit’s GI system, or it could be caused by mental stress. So there could be so many underlying reasons why your rabbit may have GI stasis. It’s important if your rabbit displays symptoms like not pooping, having very tiny poops, not eating, or if they’re becoming very tired or sluggish. If you see any odd behaviors like this, especially if it involves not eating or pooping, you need to contact your rabbit-savvy vet immediately because they may have GI stasis. GI stasis should not be taken lightly, and I would not suggest trying a lot of at-home methods. I have done at-home methods successfully, but I only did them at the very beginning of the signs of GI stasis and my rabbits improved rapidly. If you’re not seeing an improvement in three hours with feeding your rabbit critical care and giving some at-home remedies, you need to seek a vet sooner rather than later because it could become dangerous very quickly.

Rabbits Head Tilt or Loss of Balance

The next illness that’s common to rabbits is head tilt or loss of balance. This can be caused by an ear infection or a brain infection. Now, this can be caused by a bacteria or a parasite, so it’s hard to determine what the underlying cause is for these symptoms until you seek professional help. If your rabbit does start displaying symptoms where they’re unable to keep their balance or they’re tilting their head to one side and rotating it continuously, that’s a sign that this is what’s going on with your rabbit. At this point, you need to dim the lights and keep a quiet environment so your rabbit does not self-harm. At this point, you need to contact your rabbit-savvy vet so that they can figure out the underlying cause and treat your rabbit for whatever is causing these symptoms. This could be temporary or permanent depending on what was the cause and exactly how early you caught it in the process.

Loss of Appetite

The next illness that’s common for rabbits is loss of appetite. Loss of appetite can be caused by illness or it can be caused by mental or emotional stress for your rabbit. It’s important that if you notice your rabbit’s not eating, like if you put their rabbit’s food down in the morning, you come back several hours later and the food’s still there and this is out of character for them, you need to take notice of this. At this early stage of not eating, I would suggest doing a home remedy like a pineapple juice and water mixture, feeding that in a syringe, and feeding some critical care.

If they’re still not stimulating their appetite by the next feeding and they’re not eating on their own, you need to contact your vet. At this point, there’s some kind of underlying cause and it’s not just an upset stomach, and you need to find out exactly what it is and you need to have your vet treat it. If you don’t, your rabbit can go into stasis like we were discussing before, and it could be very dangerous and even fatal.

Bunny Diarrhea

The next illness that your bunny can possibly have is bunny diarrhea. Now, it’s highly unusual for a bunny to have full-fledged diarrhea. Generally, it’s intermittent soft cecotropes. You’ll know this because your bunny will have regular pelleted poops and then they’ll intermittently have soft, mucousy diarrhea-like poops which are their cecotrope poops. When this happens, the best thing to do is to remove all sugary and starchy low-fiber items from your bunny’s diet and feed high-fiber leafy greens and high-fiber hay, good quality high-fiber hay at that.

When my bunny had this due to a low-fiber diet before his rescue, we also removed pellets from his diet to stimulate more hay eating. When he also had this, he started to lose his appetite due to the discomfort in his tummy, so I also gave a three-day course of baby gas drops in a pineapple juice and water mixture in a syringe. This did help clear up my bunny’s soft cecotropes, and he was able to return to a regular diet in several weeks. So that’s the course of action we used, and there’s a lot of great home remedies online that you can look into. But if your bunny does not start to improve very rapidly, you need to contact your vet because if they’re not eating and they’re still being force-fed after 24 to 48 hours, this is not normal and there could be some other underlying cause and you need to seek help before it becomes stasis.

Breathing Difficulties

The next health-related problem for a bunny is breathing difficulties. Breathing difficulties in bunnies are usually caused by two different things: respiratory infection or heat stress. The first thing you need to do is determine if this is heat-related. If your bunny is overheating, the first thing you need to do is look for information on how to safely and quickly cool your bunny’s body temperature down. This is why it is so important to keep your bunny cool during the hot months of the summer. Anything over 85 degrees is too hot for your bunny outside. Now, if it’s not heat-related and it could be respiratory-related, there could be signs like discharge around the eyes and nose and also noisy breathing. If this is the case, you need to contact your rabbit-savvy vet immediately, and if it’s after hours, contact an emergency vet center.

Ear Mites

The next bunny health problem is ear mites. Ear mites might present themselves as your bunny scratching their ear a lot. They might have some bad discharge from their ears, they might also have some crusted skin in their ears or some scabs, or they might have some lesions. Now, bunny ear mites are not necessarily an emergency, but if you let them continue on too long, they can become an emergency. If your bunny gets to the point where they have lesions in their ears, they can become infected when scratched a lot and that can become a problem and cause for concern. It’s important that you get them treated as soon as possible so that it does not develop into a serious problem.

It’s important to remember that bunnies have delicate systems. Proper care and diet can go a long way in helping your bunny from getting sick. But if your bunny does get sick, it’s important to remember that bunnies are prey animals, so they’re very good at hiding their illnesses. A good thing to do is to do a quick bunny health checkup each week, checking your bunny for any of these signs and symptoms of illnesses. If you notice anything abnormal from your bunny, especially if they stop eating, it’s important that you get help and you don’t want the problem to get worse because then it can become more expensive or life-threatening for your bunny.

Thanks for joining us today, and comment below and let us know what bunny article you’d like to see next. Thanks, guys, and as always, don’t forget to share the cutie rab.