I switched to Home Fresh (extruded) Hutch Deluxe 17% last November. To begin, you still get a full 50 pounds when you buy a 50-pound bag. I used to feed Manna Pro Pro (16%) and Manna Pro Gro (18%). I always transfer my feed from the bags to food grade lidded 5-gallon buckets from Tractor Supply. The 50-pound bags of Manna Pro filled two 5-gallon buckets; the 50-pound bag of Home Fresh fills three 5-gallon buckets. Therefore, even though extruded is not as dense a pellet as the Manna Pro pellets, the weight per 50-pound bags is 50 pounds.... volume is greater for Home Fresh because the pellets are not pressured together into a tighter, more dense piece.
As I said before, I switched last November, and I have noted changes in my herd with the new Home Fresh food. First, I feed the Home Fresh 17% to my entire herd, regardless of grow-outs, working does, or those dang spoiled bucks. Before Home Fresh, I had the hassle of feeding Manna Pro Pro 16% to bucks and non-working does. Grow-outs and working does got Manna Pro Gro 18%. This is a great way to feed, but not so great if you need help from others who then must be educated as to which rabbit gets what, etc etc. It was a headache, especially with does going in and out of work. It is much easier to manage the food for my herd using 17% for everyone than it was 16 and 18 percent. 17% seems to do a good job taking care of the needs of the entire herd.
While Home Fresh 17% does a great job feeding my entire herd, here is what I noticed when I fed them the same quantity, by weight, as I had fed them their Manna Pro feed: ALL OF MY BREEDERS became fat! Overweight does give smaller litters, to none at all. NOT GOOD! So why did this happen when they were being fed the same amount of food by weight? My conclusion is because the extruded pellet is MUSH EASIER for the rabbit to digest. The less dense pellet provides the rabbits with greater access to the nutrients within each pellet.
Correcting the weight gain was an easy matter. I simply pulled my overweight girls and boys off pellet feed and fed straight hay until the ideal weights were once again achieved and then I slowly reintroduced the pellets to their diets, but now I feed FAR LESS than I fed before. I make sure they run out of pellets each day (only bucks and non-working does, that is) and that they always have access to hay to give them nibble feed between pellet feedings (NOTE: I never feed hay to any animal who has not yet achieved senior weight).
This has worked great. Home Fresh, while a little more expensive, is actually less expensive to feed because the animals need less per meal due to the extruded, easier to digest, pellet. As for grow-outs and working does, I never allow grow-outs to run out of pellets and Home Fresh has very clear instructions to follow on the back of their bags for working does. My recommendation is to follow their feeding instructions. I did not at first, and this is why my animals got fat. They were being overfed quality feed!
