Wool block?

Crystal. This girl needs to put on some condition so I can breed her. Calf manna, BOSS, unlimited alfalfa and pellets, wheat bread, flax seed, oats. Nada is building condition fast. Although she went on a 3 week diet when I brought her home. I was afraid I was going to lose her altogether. I Actually wonder if she developed beginning stages of wool block during her hunger strike. She gets papaya and pineapple, but I'm wondering if that's enough.

I recently read an article that said if you suspect chronic wool block, to take them off all feed except pineapple or papaya for a few days, and then to bring back hay, and eventually pellets.

Does anyone have any experience with this?

If she's gone to a richer diet, that will sometimes induce molting, so she may be ingesting more wool while grooming? (Once when a bunny show was coming up, I wanted to get them into great condition so they were switched to a heavy grain diet and then they all blew their coats. Ooops!)

Show buns are much more susceptible to wool block, so treat her like a fiber bunny and give haircuts as soon as it gets long enough to be useful? We generally have no wool block problems, I'm not sure if it's from them getting so many haircuts or from feeding a lot of forage along with their pellets. Usually about once a week, they'll get forage only. I figure that gets more dietary fiber going through them.

Ive heard that as a practice, forage only for a day. Maybe I'll try that first.

I've not had much luck with papaya and pineapple for block. I take them off pellets and load up a syringe with mineral oil, 1cc, and give it to them every 8 hours till the magic happens. :shock: Trust me, it will happen. Usually the second day.

Homer":23swynw4 said:

I've not had much luck with papaya and pineapple for block. I take them off pellets and load up a syringe with mineral oil, 1cc, and give it to them every 8 hours till the magic happens. :shock: Trust me, it will happen. Usually the second day.

Click to expand...

How long after the mineral oil do you put them back on feed?

I've given 3cc of cat hairbal remedy (very similar to mineral oil) with good results for wool block. I haven't had to do it for a long while though with twice a week papaya tablets and free fed hay. I never took the food away during these times as I was usually able to tell it was hairbal because the rabbits were off feed, and wouldn't start eating again until after they passed the hairbal.

This doe, and another buck I'm a bit concerned about are lackluster eaters, and their condition shows, but they've been this way since I got them. I suspect wool block for a couple reasons. I'll try the mineral oil, if it helps, awesome. It's not going to hurt as far as I can tell.

I put mine back on feed the day after the "magic" happens.

I have one rabbit (my SA buck I got at the Loveland show) who is a very lackluster eater, but hairbal was never a suspect. The slightest change in anything and he goes off feed for three or four days. One thing I tried with him is I picked up a show conditioning formula at the local feed store. It's manna pro brand, and it's only like 12-14% protein, but it's higher in fat and chelated (sp?, they're easier to absorb at any rate) minerals.

Since putting him on it (he gets 1 TB a day) he actually eats that and the sunflower seeds he wouldn't touch before, regardless of his stress level. When he's not stressed out, he also eats more of his normal pellets than before, too, and has gained back more than the condition he lost in the stress of bringing him home and Qt him. He still goes off feed if he's too stresssd (moving the rabbits back home from the barn) but he can better take the occasional fasting since he's got more on his bones now. He's just a nervous rabbit. I'm contemplating replacing him with one of his sons if they prove to be of sturdier stuff, but I won't know until they start producing if they will be worth the switch or not.

Anywho, don't know if I'd be worth a shot or not for your buns if your not sure if it's hairball or not, but it's helped my little guy.

I tried the mineral oil on my two most worrisome.... fingers crossed this fixes my problem.