Daily food intake for rabbits. What not to feed

Table: how to feed correctly and in what quantity

Additional questions about diet

Bread and grain

Feeding fresh bread to such animals is strictly prohibited. It is also forbidden to give completely stale or black bread. At home, cookies are a great treat for decorative pets. Sometimes you can pamper your decorative little ear with oatmeal cookies. It is not very often that rabbits can be given crackers in small quantities.

The diet should include oats and corn. It is forbidden to feed regular or feed wheat. This product They are given only in sprouted form. Uncontrolled amounts of corn and oats can lead to severe obesity. Raw oatmeal will be a wonderful treat for your pet. The right amount of such products has a wonderful effect on the animal’s body.

Alfalfa

Alfalfa is very beneficial for animals. But you can’t use it in large quantities. Also, do not give grass to your pets in a fresh state. This representative of the flora can only be given in combination with other herbs in a dried state. This type of food is especially appreciated in winter. It is best to dry the grass at home in a dark place.

Dangerous feed

• These include poisonous plants: dope, mate, celandine, larkspur.
• Red beets, potatoes, cabbage, and nuts can cause diarrhea. Legumes and alfalfa should be given in limited quantities.
• Confectionery, bread, pasta and other foods containing carbohydrates should not be given.
• It is forbidden to give meat products and sweet desserts. It is not recommended to feed your pets human food.

How to prepare food for the winter?

• In winter, animals also need vitamins and microelements. Therefore, it is best to start preparing food in advance;
• It is necessary to choose the juiciest and youngest grass;
• You cannot collect green fodder near roads and railroad tracks;
• It is best to dry such food in sunny areas - verandas, roofs, high decks;
• When storing food at home, sprinkle it with table salt;
• In winter, mold should not be allowed to appear;
• At least once a day, animals are given dry grass mixed with succulent and roughage.

Features of feeding rabbits

Rabbits are considered the most gentle creatures. It is necessary to feed them at home carefully and carefully. Children need to introduce a new diet gradually. At this time, individuals are very vulnerable. They are prone to diseases. Therefore, food should only be fresh and of high quality. It is important that animals at home always have access to water. With the right diet, animals will have shiny fur and a great mood.

The difference between factory feed and natural feed

Every livestock breeder should know what to feed a decorative rabbit. In stores, consumers are offered a large selection of different feeds. They are rich in vitamins, microelements, and acids. But if you feed animals exclusively with commercial food, they will quickly begin to gain weight. Therefore, it is often prohibited to give this type of food. At daily use dry food, the pet will begin to refuse natural food. And this type of nutrition must be present in the diet. Therefore, purchased food should be given in limited quantities. Experienced livestock breeders recommend giving them to animals as a reward or treat. It should be noted that eared animals are herbivores. Mixtures of dry fruits, grains, and nuts are undesirable for them. Properly selected high-quality feed contains 20% unrefined fiber, 1% calcium and fat, 15% protein.

• When feeding animals at home, you should use fresh, not weathered food;
• It is necessary that there is always fresh drinking water in drinking bowls;
• When feeding your Eared Ears at home, you should stick to a schedule. Food must be given at the same hours;
• Regardless of what type of feeding was chosen, the diet must include hay and straw;
• It is necessary to change the type of diet or introduce new foods gradually. It is important that the animals can get used to the new product. Optimal time: 5-7 days;
• After transplanting to other home conditions or after purchasing young animals, individuals should be fed the same products that they received previously;
• Green food should be given after drying. Do not use wet grass after rain or morning dew;
• You should not include in your diet green food picked near railway tracks or roadsides. Otherwise, animals may become severely poisoned by heavy metals;

Raising rabbits is a common activity in the agricultural sector. They are bred both in small farms and on large rabbit farms. In order for productive performance to reach maximum values, pets need to be provided with the right diet.

Feeding diet for rabbits at home

When it comes to nutritional features, there are 2 main areas:

• differences in the summer and winter diets of herbivores;
• differences in nutrition between baby rabbits, adult rabbits, pregnant females and lactating rabbits.

The weight category of the animals will also affect the volume of the diet. Therefore, to understand the norms, it is better to focus on percentages rather than grams. It is better to start characterizing the diet with the nutritional characteristics of wild rabbits.

Due to the constant growth of teeth, the animal definitely needs branches, incl. for grinding teeth. The animals pay special attention to the bark of fruit trees. The basis of nutrition is grass, hay, and found root vegetables. The average weight of a wild individual is about 2 kg. Domestic Eared Ears meat direction can weigh about 7 kg, so their nutrition should be of better quality.

Changing the diet occurs by adding:

• mixed feed;
• cereals;
• root vegetables that are not found in the wild;
• silo;
• special forage grasses (alfalfa, clover and others).

The ratio of food types in the diet:

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IN winter time green mass is replaced by hay and succulent feed, which includes silage, fodder and root crops, pulp, pulp. The meal plan is three meals a day, regardless of the time of year. Also, the diet must include table salt and bone meal as a source of minerals (up to 12 g per day).

Animals receive the bulk of vitamins through food. If you experience dry eyes, runny nose, and reluctance to mate, this may be a sign of a lack of vitamins. Vitamin C comes from green foods, B vitamins from wheat and bran, and carrots are a source of vitamin A.

Important!Grass for hay should not be dried under straight sun rays, because the sun destroys the vitamins in it, thereby reducing its beneficial qualities.

Pets can be given an additional vitamin complex by mixing it into wet food.

During the summer

The basis of summer nutrition is greens. To get the most nutritious grass, it is recommended to grow legumes, sow clover, lupine, oats, and winter crops. Legumes are especially useful for their vitamins and plant-based proteins.

It is better to make hay from grass before flowering begins, because it contains maximum quantity nutrients and will be most useful. Rabbits themselves know about the benefits of herbs, so they are reluctant to eat grass harvested in August - October.

Norm of greens:

• for adult rabbits at rest – 600–800 g;
• pregnant female – up to 900 g;
• lactating female - up to 1500 g.

There should be a lot of greens so that the rabbit can eat as much as his body requires. is also necessary in summer nutrition and should be about 300 g for adult rabbits, with the exception of nursing rabbits, for which the norm increases by 30%. Also, the daily diet must contain the products indicated in the table.

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Important!Problems with growth are a clear sign of a lack of B vitamins. Disorders in the musculoskeletal system are a sign of a lack of vitamin D. Their deficiency can be compensated for by bran, sprouted grains, and industrial feed.

For pregnant females, the amount of grains, meat and bone meal and minerals is doubled. For lactating females (rabbits up to 18 days of age), the entire diet is doubled.

In winter

The basis of winter nutrition is hay and root vegetables. In winter, 1 rabbit needs about 300 g of hay and 100 g of branches, combined feed and concentrates - up to 300 g. The green mass in the winter diet is replaced by silage, which is harvested during the period of intensive ripening of grasses. Daily norm– about 200-300 g per 1 animal, for a nursing rabbit – up to 600 g.

The winter daily ration of rabbits is given in the table.

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How much food to feed per day and how often should you feed your rabbit?

In nature, rabbits feed unscheduled, and since they are herbivores, they have constant access to food. When kept in cages, it is necessary to ensure the same constant access to greenery. Within 24 hours, a rabbit manages to make up to 30 approaches to food. You can put food in the cage 3 times a day (morning, lunch and evening).

Wet food is given in such a way that the food does not stagnate in the feeder for more than 2 hours. The morning food supply consists of dry food, and it is advisable to provide root vegetables in the afternoon. At night, rabbits are given dry food, hay, and twigs. Rabbits are crepuscular animals, so the dark time of day is not an obstacle to nutrition.

At rest, adults feed according to the usual pattern (minimum intake):

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A lactating rabbit should have unlimited access to hay. The vegetable diet must consist of 3 different types vegetables The total weight of feed increases by 2 times compared to the standard amount.

Did you know?The longest recorded length of rabbit ears is 80 centimeters.

• newborn rabbits and babies up to 1–1.5 months are fed by a female rabbit;
• Young animals are gradually added new types of food to their diet starting at 20 days of age.

Features of feeding rabbits with grain according to the Zolotukhin method

Zolotukhin’s method involves switching pets completely to a grain diet.

The advantages of such nutrition are considered:

• big energy value grains versus grass and hay;
• high content of carbohydrates, minerals and vitamins.

When at rest, rabbits are fed whole dry oats, which are constantly in the feeder. Before mating and litter - crushed barley. Rabbits are steamed with oats, and for breeding males corn is added to the grain mixture. A modification of the technique is soaking the grain and feeding with sprouted grain.

Ask any experienced rabbit breeder what their rabbits eat and most likely you will hear “They eat everything.” So it is, they eat and are afraid of the difficulties of feeding - what if something is wrong? - it’s not worth it for a novice rabbit breeder. Even if you took the risk of starting with a large farm and purchased a lot of females, do not panic.

I always respect any knowledge, but when I see in a book designed for an amateur rabbit breeder long tables with a list of all kinds of food and their breakdown into proteins, they want to show their education.” And the impressionable person feverishly begins to calculate how much protein and vitamins he did not give to his rabbits and what will happen now.

In fact, everything is somewhat simpler. Look at what you have and what you can buy or prepare, and proceed from this. Let's try to formulate a few “rules” of feeding:

1. There should be enough food. The system of constant access to food (used, in particular, by Mikhailov) is completely justified: in nature, a rabbit is exactly the same, constantly among edible herbs and branches and eats as needed, as much as its body, equipped with a single-chamber stomach, requires. And he doesn’t overeat and isn’t obese.

2. Food must be of high quality. Nothing moldy, rotten, frostbitten, wet, covered with frost, etc. It should not be given to rabbits. Fresh grass with dew is unacceptable, and in general the grass must be dried out.

3. Food should be as varied as possible. Imagine yourself in the place of a rabbit. even if you are constantly fed the same best thing day after day - well, what do you like there? - How many days do you think your favorite dish will start throwing up? And the rabbit for food more sensitive than humans. It is advisable to even make hay from different grasses; for rabbit hay, wild grasses are better suited than seeded ones.

4. Dry food (cereals, mixed feed, crackers, etc.) should be given along with water. The water should be clean, slightly heated in winter (slightly below room temperature). The claim that rabbits get water from grass is a myth.

5. If you dose food and give it three or four times a day, do it strictly at the same time. A “sliding schedule” is not suitable here, although rabbits adapt well to the feeding schedule.

6. Equalization in feeding is unreasonable. One breed needs to be fed more intensively, while another tolerates a lack of feed more easily. One female, say, has 7 rabbits, and another has 10 - the second needs to be fed (and watered!) more. During pregnancy, the female needs to eat more, and the closer the birth, the more food. A breeding male should eat better during the period of “active work” than during the rest period. Etc.

7. Animals kept in cages should receive not only plant food, but also animal food (whey, whole milk, bone meal, fish oil), and microelements, which in nature and when kept in pits they receive by eating clay.

There is nothing too abstruse about feeding rabbits; you can guess all these “rules” yourself. A rabbit is not some kind of alien, but a mammal just like everyone else, just like you. Well, with some of its own characteristics, but it also loves to eat deliciously to its heart’s content, drink water, snack on something “sweet” - one carrot, the other wormwood - everyone has individual taste preferences.

Of course, raising rabbits must be profitable, income must significantly exceed costs, “the economy must be economical,” etc. However, we must look for cost reductions where they do not harm the overall business. When rabbits are underfed because there is nothing special to feed them and they need to save money, this is somehow understandable, although it does not inspire approval. And when they are afraid to overfeed, keeping them in a cramped cage and stuffy barn without ventilation, this only indicates that the person has incorrectly calculated the number of rabbits permissible for his conditions or does not quite understand what he is doing, what is happening in this rabbitry and what else do they need? necessary.

But, as a rule, you just need exercise. A rabbit that has the opportunity to exercise will not eat too much and will not become obese. Organism. a rabbit is able to regulate the amount of food itself, if the animal is not under stress and is not sick, if it has at least a minimum necessary conditions. A walk and fresh air should be considered one of the components of nutrition, then everything will be fine with digestion, absorption of feed, health and growth.

Instead of long lists of a wide variety of herbs, vegetables, and other edible items (half of which you still don’t have and never will, since they don’t grow in your area), and such recipes and dosages, meaningless without taking into account the breed, the direction of rabbit breeding and the method of keeping, Let's look at what is really worth paying attention to.

What and how much

First of all, when starting rabbits, we must calculate how much feed we will have to prepare. Of course, the calculation will be very approximate; we will simply determine the required minimum of what rabbits can live on in any region and in any direction of rabbit breeding (except for decorative ones). Conventionally, let’s take cellular housing as the most costly in terms of feed. The following calculation can be used as a basis. An adult rabbit with a live weight of 4.5 kg will eat approximately 50 kg of concentrates, 50 kg of hay, 60 kg of succulent and 200 kg of green feed in a year. Male with a mixed type of feeding - 50 kg of concentrates, 20 kg of hay, 50 kg of silage and root crops, 65 kg of green feed. Young rabbits (from 45 to 120 days) with a mixed type of feeding - 15 kg of concentrates, 5 kg of hay, 15 kg of green feed. If where you live there is a lot of grass (forbs) and in the first half of summer it is possible to prepare a lot of hay, don’t be lazy, it can replace other feeds, although feeding rabbits with hay alone is also unwise. There is an opportunity to grow more vegetables or potatoes - go ahead, thinking, of course, about storage, so that there will be enough vegetables until spring. It doesn’t really matter what grows better, cabbage, carrots or rutabaga - they’re all good. Rabbits also eat potatoes with pleasure, both raw and boiled, but it is better to give them boiled, especially if they have been frozen. It’s easier with frozen carrots - just thaw them. But any vegetables must be cleared of soil, washed and chopped. At the same time, it is better to give succulent food after dry food. And if the basis of the diet at some point consists mainly of vegetables, be sure to feed hay along with them.

It is good to stock up on grain and bran - half a bag each - a bag per head is enough if you have hay and vegetables. Babies under 2 months should not be given bran, although, living with their mother, they will still try little by little and get used to it, so that after weaning they will already be familiar with bran. It’s just that dry bran (like other loose, dusty foods) can irritate the rabbit’s respiratory tract, so if you give them separately, it is better to moisten them and give them a little at a time so that the bran does not sour or mold in the feeders. They are good for sending other food - juicy chopped vegetables or silage.

Silage is prepared for the winter in barrels (wooden, if available, or plastic). In practice, this is sauerkraut, approximately the same as sauerkraut, which, by the way, can also be given little by little, sprinkled with bran.

It is better to give crushed grain - a grain crusher can now be bought at any hardware store. Better yet, soak and sprout. Pour a layer of grain 2-3 centimeters thick into an old trough, pour it slightly even with the grain warm water and place it in a warm, bright place. After two or three days, the grain will sprout and become excellent food for rabbits. It is good to soak legumes three to four hours before feeding.

If there are edible leftovers (not bones) from your own dinner, rabbits will happily eat them. The leftovers are usually used to make a mash, moistening it with milk, skim milk or fermented milk whey. However, make sure that the products are not spoiled. A bowl of Olivier left over from the New Year cannot be fed to rabbits in February. Better feed them a Christmas tree. The crackers are very good. Don't throw away the leftover bread, dry it, and the rabbits will chew it up as a treat.

In spring and autumn, rabbits switch from one type of feed to another, from fresh grass to canned food and concentrates and vice versa. This transition should not be abrupt; introduce the new (well-forgotten old) type of food gradually, over 5-7 days, and your animals will not have an upset stomach. Fresh grass is great, but if you eat too much of this food, diarrhea is quite possible. If leaves have already appeared on the oak tree, break the branches along with them or tear off at least the leaves - it helps rabbits against diarrhea.

Water, as we already know, must be fresh all the time. Periodically, once or twice a month - no more often, to prevent intestinal infections, you need to give light, slightly pink, potassium permanganate or add a drop of iodine solution to the water. In the chapter on arranging cages, it was already discussed what types of drinking bowls there are and how you can heat the water in cold weather.

It is especially needed in winter, when there is no fresh grass and a significant part of the rabbit’s diet is grain or mixed feed.

By the way, about compound feeds. Not all of them are suitable for a rabbit. Bird's milk is not suitable because shell rock or pebbles, which are necessary for birds, are added to it; this is harmful to a rabbit. Pork feed is also not the best option, although some rabbit breeders provide a little - usually on farms where pigs are also kept.

The question of what to give more and what less is decided not so much by the rabbit breeder as by the rabbit. Observe each animal, remember which food each rabbit likes best. They, of course, are not the same, but the rabbit’s body, like other mammals, knows better than any specialist what substances it needs most and what they contain, hence the taste preferences. The more varied your supply of food is, the fewer problems you will have with diseases, medications, veterinarians and other pharmacies.

By feeding frequency. Many rabbit breeders (not only Mikhailovites, who did not come up with this themselves) try to make cages with large feeders - separate for different types of food - so that the stock lasts for as long as possible. And this is correct, you just need to make sure that the food in them does not mold or spoil, and the design of the feeder should be such that the rabbits scatter as little food as possible, and the baby rabbits cannot climb into them. Mikhailovtsy claim that the rabbit eats 80 times a day, other experts believe that only 30 times, and they are most often fed three or four, or even twice a day. This is about the same as feeding a person to the belly, but once a week. A rabbit is not a dog; it is not typical for him to eat too much. Therefore, try to ensure that access to food is constant not only for nursing rabbits and small rabbits (for these, constant feeding is mandatory), but also for other rabbits.

Buffet instead of a pharmacy

Rabbits get an upset stomach from time to time. In this case, break the willow and oak branches. If you notice someone with diarrhea, put oak branches in the cage, usually this treatment is sufficient. You can give them without any frustration, but do not overdo it, this is not the main food. Some people harvest branches in the summer and store them as brooms, but branches are not hay. If you live in big city where getting branches in winter is a problem, this may be a way out (you can soak them, steam them), but for residents of villages and small towns it’s easier to break branches just before feeding. Just don’t give them straight out of the cold, icy. Experts recommend giving a little bit of pine needles in winter - they eat them too. Constipation occurs - most likely, they overfed dry food, give more water and succulent feed.

You may notice that rabbits eat their own excrement; this is not a food perversion or a disease - this is typical for rabbits, do not interfere. The alarm should be sounded when the rabbit stops eating, loses mobility, looks at one point, the fur becomes ragged, loses its shine and silkiness.

It is clear that a rabbit breeder is not a veterinarian; you will not be able to make an accurate diagnosis and carry out treatment yourself, especially at first. But you need to know the most basic signs of troubles that most often occur in rabbits, and before calling a veterinarian (who may not be in your area or who may not understand the diseases of rabbits any better than you), you can try to solve these problems yourself.

On “rabbit” sites on the Internet there is a lot of all kinds of advice and instructions on rabbit diseases. This table seemed to me the most successful (p. 105)

These tips, in my opinion, are good because they do not offer drugs, any chemicals or antibiotics. 70-80 percent of rabbit diseases come from diet, which is what they treat. Of course, there are infectious diseases that cannot be cured with any branches, but we will consider them separately.

Not by bread alone...

A special group of feeds should be considered feeds of animal origin. This group of feeds includes: cow's skim milk, buttermilk, whey, meat, meat and bone, blood and fish meal. Since rabbits are mainly herbivores, food of animal origin is introduced into their diets in small quantities (5-10 g per animal per day).

Raw materials of animal origin contain complete protein. Whole milk is used for feeding young animals, especially during early weaning, and lactating rabbits. Skim milk is added to mash or given to rabbits in fresh and fermented form. Whey and buttermilk are given in natural form or mash. Milk, skim milk, whey and buttermilk, both fresh and dry, are valuable dietary feeds.

Meat, meat and bone meal, fish meal and blood meal are highly nutritious foods that are also needed by rabbits. Fat in these feeds ranges from 1.9-2.5% in fish and blood meal to 10-14% in meat and
meat and bone meal. These feeds are rich in calcium (from 3.2 to 16 g per 100 g of feed) and phosphorus (from 1.5 to 8 g per 100 g). They are added to feed mixtures and are also included in finished feed: 1-2% by weight.

Feeding on vacation...

Males and females in private households are usually dormant in late autumn and winter. Rabbit breeders who raise rabbits indoors use them for reproduction all year round; such rabbits do not have a resting period, or they are determined by the rabbit breeder individually for each animal.

The purpose of feeding during the rest period (that is, between matings) is to maintain average fatness in animals, without obesity and emaciation. Concentrated feed is given in an amount of 60 g, which may contain, for example, 30 g of oats or barley, 20 g of corn and 10 g wheat bran. They are given plenty of hay and haylage (let’s say 50/50 alfalfa hay and meadow hay), straw, and twig food. Juicy food can be given in maximum quantities.

If a breeding animal begins to lose weight and the cause is not illness, increase the amount of concentrated feed and good quality hay, haylage or other good quality feed. Conversely, if they gain a lot of fat, feed more branch feed, straw and other roughage.

For males and females during the rest period, mineral food is added per head: 1 g of salt, 2-4 g of finely ground eggshells and 4-6 g of bone meal. These feedings are necessary if succulent food is used - beets, pumpkin, cabbage, silage, etc.

A good mixture will be made from 30% grain feed (10% oats or barley, 10% corn and 10% bran) and 70% hay (40% alfalfa-clover or legumes and 30% meadow).

If meadow hay is very rich in legumes, its percentage can be reduced by adding alfalfa hay.

All these percentages, of course, are conditions and are given simply as an example. Look at what you have available, monitor the condition of the animals and create your own recipes, remembering that the main task is not to overfeed them and prevent them from starving. This type of feeding is called maintenance feeding.

...and during the mating period

Mating is a crucial period in rabbit breeding. Males and females are prepared for mating by eliminating errors in feeding, if any were made - by the time of mating, the rabbits should be in a state of factory fatness. Ultimately, the yield of products depends on the preparedness of the rabbits of the main herd for mating. Weak rabbits receive more concentrated feed, and fattened ones are put on a diet for weight loss. Both obesity and emaciation are undesirable: in such cases, rabbits produce weak, non-viable offspring, and in males the quantity and quality of sperm sharply decreases.

Sperm production of males depends on the content of protein, vitamins A, E and B, as well as minerals in the diet. To enrich the diet with protein, oil cakes and bran are added to the feed, and as a complete protein of animal origin - meat and bone, fishmeal etc. The feed mixture should not contain a lot of feed that contributes to obesity (barley, potatoes, corn).

Preparation for mating of poorly nourished rabbits begins 3 weeks before the start of the breeding period. In this case, they use a diet similar in nutritional value to the diet of full-term rabbits (see below). The food should be plentiful and varied, containing almost all vitamins. The same diet is maintained during the mating period.

In other words, for the period of mating and preparation for it, additional rations are given, which depend on the condition of the animal and production use.

Feeding pregnant females and rabbits

During pregnancy, the female, especially in the second half, slightly reduces the amount of roughage. At this time, the supply of mineral and vitamin feed is increased. Rabbit milk contains up to 20% fat, 15% protein, about 2% sugar, and up to 2.5% minerals. The formation of such a highly nutritious product requires a lot of good, easily digestible, varied feed. Therefore, suckling females are given only the highest quality food during the entire suckling period. Their quality is especially noticed when the baby rabbits begin to leave the nest and try to eat from the feeders.

To ensure that the female has a lot of milk, the number of root vegetables is increased. Concentrated feeds should be varied. In the second half of the suckling period, concentrates and other feeds are added to the basic norm, depending on the number of rabbits. After weaning the young animals, these additives can be excluded from the female’s diet - look at the condition of the animal.

Often, rabbits are separated from the female at the age of 45 days. In my opinion, it’s not worth doing this so early, but if you decide to work using this technology, then for the first days, feed the baby rabbits the same food that they received while under the uterus. Then gradually switch them to other foods. Rabbits aged 1-2 months are not recommended to be given vegetable waste, potato peelings, coarse hay, straw, or coarse green food. These feeds can cause digestive upset in young animals because the digestive organs of rabbits are not yet adapted to digest large quantities of feed, especially roughage.

Placed rabbits can be fed with green grass, good bean hay, oats, mixed feed (special!), boiled potatoes with the addition of a small amount of bran, red carrots, and fodder beets. Wet food is usually given to rabbits 1-2 times a day so that it is eaten within 1-1.5 hours, otherwise it may turn sour and freeze in winter.

It is better to give dry food for several days so that the rabbit always has something to chew.

The rabbit is a nocturnal animal; in the wild it feeds at night and early in the morning. Therefore, rabbits should have enough food in their feeder at night. It is most convenient to give a large amount of green grass, hay, and twig food at night.

Breed and food

I am sure that after reading the description of the breeds, many readers will want to get the “best”: a Flandre, a white or gray giant, or some new breed of this type, which, perhaps, is just about to amaze us with its record size. In fact, when a rabbit breeder grows a super rabbit weighing 10-12 kg, newspapers and magazines write about him (or rather, about both of them), publish photographs - it’s nice to bask in the rays of glory. And at exhibitions they will give medals and bring rabbits for mating. I myself have written more than once about such record holders.

All this is wonderful, but keeping only record holders in the commercial economy, oddly enough, is not very profitable. Breeding business is one thing, but meat and skins are another. Here it is necessary to consider not only the slaughter yield and the value of the skin, but also what had to be spent on it. I am not a supporter of saving on feed specifically; there are more effective ways to save, but you also need to count feed.

Medium-sized breeds of rabbits appear to be better feed consumers than rabbits large breeds. Rabbits of these breeds are fertilized on the 126th day, and large ones - on the 180th, that is, the latter use feed longer without producing products. It’s about the same with breeding males. To maintain their weight, rabbits weighing up to 5 kg per 1 kg of growth consume less feed, since the feed given to rabbits is in excess of the quantity. Necessary to maintain their live weight, it is turned into meat. If breeds of rabbits weighing, for example, 7 kg and rabbits weighing 4 kg are bred, then almost twice as much feed will be needed to maintain the weight of one rabbit of the first breed. It's like the prestigious, but heavy 600th Mercedes and the lightweight Volkswagen Golf: these cars travel the same distance different quantities gasoline - due to the fact that the “gelding” has to carry more than its own weight.

Therefore, if you give the same amount of food to these two rabbits, as much as is necessary to maintain their weight, then a rabbit weighing 7 kg will actually not produce any product, it will only retain its weight, while a rabbit weighing 4 kg will maintain its weight with half the food. half will be processed into products. So choose, extra money or possible fame. If you have money, then it is better to breed rabbits mainly of breeds with a live weight of 4.7 to 52 kg. Although this does not mean at all that it is impossible to combine these breeds - we are only talking about the costs in general, for the entire livestock.

In addition, you can also save something on the color of the skin. Eat scientific research, showing that albino rabbits with white hair (New Zealand white, giant white, etc.) are calmer and therefore consume less food to maintain their weight. Rabbits of breeds with white hair gain fat faster when consuming the same amount of feed, which is why they are used more often when bred for meat.

Rabbits from multiple litters have lower live weight at birth and even at laying, however, at 60 days of age at proper feeding they catch up in weight with their peers of low-fertility litters. As a result of their intensive growth, they consume less feed per 1 kg of growth. Rabbits pass this ability on to their offspring. It follows that rabbits should be kept from multiple litters. With age, feed consumption per 1 kg of growth (if there is room to grow) increases. Therefore, rabbits raised for slaughter should be fed ad libitum and should be slaughtered at a young age.

Feeding decorative rabbits

Here we will have to take the advice of specialists from the Institute of Ecology and Evolution. A. N. Severtsov RAS E. V. Kotenkova and O. G. Orleneva:

“Compared to ordinary rabbits, dwarf rabbits are more demanding of food. Their diet includes solid, green and twig food. As solid feed, they eat grains of oats, wheat, rolled oats, bran and special feed.

Green food includes all kinds of grains, legumes, dandelions and other herbaceous plants. It is important to remember that no poisonous plants are included in the food. In urban conditions, it is advisable to wash herbaceous plants well, you can... weak manganese solution and then dry.

From branch food, dwarf rabbits eat silt, rowan, apple tree well, and in winter they eat spruce branches. Among vegetables, their diet should include carrots, cabbage (in limited quantities, since excess can cause tympany) and beets (can only be given to adult animals, since it often leads to stomach upset in rabbits). Hay is a must.

In the summer, if there is a sufficient amount of green feed, we do not add mineral supplements and vitamins to the feed. However, in winter they are simply necessary, since adult animals (especially pregnant and lactating females) and rabbits can die as a result of the lack of sufficient minerals and vitamins in the feed. Rabbits have a particularly acute need for calcium compounds. It is very convenient to add mineral fertilizer to bran or rolled oats. In the vivarium and at home we use the following proportions: liter jar rolled oats or bran, we add 5 finely ground tablets of calcium glycerophosphate, 0.5 teaspoons of table salt, 2 teaspoons of dry milk, 1 teaspoon of Ushastik mineral supplement, 1 finely ground tablet of vitamin C with glucose and 0. 5h. spoons - complex vitamin for rodents "Farmavit". According to our experience, feeding with compound feed or adding only specialized mineral supplements to the feed turns out to be insufficient. Rabbits can be given up to 2 prices cow's milk, and during “baby” molting at the age of 2-3 months, add calcium gluconate for injection to the water at the rate of 1 ampoule per 0.5 liter of water. Some breeders give lactating rabbits milk to drink, which, however, in some cases may be one of the causes of mastitis.”

CLEANITY IS THE KEY TO HEALTH!

May experienced rabbit breeders forgive me for my banality, but everyone should know this. Believe it or not, but now even in rural areas Among the indigenous villagers there are people who have never owned any kind of farm. How do they earn their bread? separate question, but it happens. What should you ask a city dweller who decides to have rabbits?

So, gentlemen, rabbit breeders, a rabbit is not only valuable fur and 2-3 kg of tasty meat, it is also a lot of useful physical exercises that strengthen your health and fill your soul with pride in your own ability to keep the farm in good order and clean. And for this you need very little - visit the rabbitry more often and clean it regularly.

I will not recommend any schedules to you, since everyone has their own farm and the need for cleaning arises at different intervals - depending on the number of rabbits, the method of keeping, the design of the rabbitry, etc. We will become more familiar with what experienced rabbit breeders usually do, and what to do in general to keep it clean.

To do this, you will need simple equipment, which you need to acquire even before buying rabbits, namely: a scraper, a stiff brush, a broom, a broom, a shovel, a bucket, a whitewash brush, boxes for rabbit waste, a low cart like a skateboard, which is used for dashing rides boys in the city, only the board is wider and longer. One of the boxes must fit securely on the trolley. If you keep rabbits in a hole or basement, a cart, of course, is not needed - there will be no place to roll it out, but you can think about a lifting device like a well gate, so as not to carry boxes and buckets with your hands along basements and stairs.

The floor grate is cleaned with a metal scraper. Manure, contaminated food debris and bedding are raked into a low box placed under the cage or an oblong basin placed on a cart. Then the grate is lifted or completely removed from the cage, and the manure that has accumulated under it is raked away. So that the rabbits in the cage do not interfere with cleaning, they are driven to another compartment of the cage, and the hole is closed with a plywood latch. In this way, all the cages are cleaned in turn, and then the floor of the rabbitry is swept. The cleaning principle is top to bottom. If the cages are two-tiered, first clean the entire upper tier, then the lower one, and then the floor.

To speed up the removal of manure from the cage under the floor grid, as we already know from the chapter on cage design, you can (and should) install trays made of tin, boards or plywood, onto which the manure falls between the slats of the grid. If the pallet is wooden, then its bottom is lined with plastic film to protect the boards from swelling and delamination of the plywood.

First, the cage grid is cleaned, then the tray is pulled out and the manure accumulated in it is shaken out into a box or through a special hatch in the wall of the rabbitry directly into a compost pit located outside. If the premises are being built specifically for rabbits, it is a good idea to provide such a manure removal system.

After cleaning, do not throw the substance collected in the box into a landfill, but make compost out of it, mixing it with some kind of plant matter (fallen leaves, straw, etc.) and fertilize the garden with it. And even better - send it to your own mini-production of vermicompost, the structure of which is described at the end of the book.

Twice a year, if not more often, especially in damp times (spring and autumn), the cells must be disinfected. In private farming, the simplest and most in an efficient way is the treatment of rabbitry, cages, and equipment with fire. To do this, use a regular blowtorch or gas torch. Well-cleaned wooden parts of the cage are treated with fire until slightly browned. In this case, extreme caution must be taken, otherwise you can burn not only your rabbitry and house, but also the buildings of your neighbors.

IMPORTANT: NEVER SMOKE IN THE RABBIT HOUSE!

From chemicals greatest distribution received bleach, used in the form of a 10% solution, which, using a washcloth or another wide brush, is used to treat the walls of the rabbitry, cages and equipment.

Cages, equipment, feeders and drinkers can also be treated with ash lye, which kills pathogens well, but is completely harmless to rabbits. It is prepared in the following way. Pure wood ash (1/3 of the volume of water) is added to boiling water and boiled for 230 minutes. The solution should then be filtered through 2-3 layers of gauze, the strained lye should be brought to a boil again and the cells and equipment should be immediately treated while hot. There are many other disinfectants that can be purchased at your veterinary pharmacy.

It is useful to cover the walls of the rabbitry and the outer parts of the cages with a solution of slaked lime. As we have already said, whitewashing with lime will also add more light to the rabbitry. Treat wooden feeders using a blowtorch, and it is better to wash and boil the metal, glass and ceramic parts of automatic feeders and automatic drinkers.

Cages are especially thoroughly cleaned and disinfected before placing newly acquired rabbits in them and at each transplant, before mass litters and during infectious diseases rabbits.

Under no circumstances should sanitary treatment of the rabbitry, cages and equipment be neglected. Otherwise it could turn into a big disaster. You should always remember that preventing rabbit diseases is easier than treating them. It is better to spend a few hours on treatment than to spend months on treatment.

Many infectious and pathogenic microbes that cause illness and death in rabbits remain viable for several months. A disease introduced into a rabbitry can recur and occur even after a complete change of livestock.

When purchasing new rabbits, especially at the market, do not rush to place them with your rabbits. They must be quarantined separately for a month. And only after making sure of their complete well-being can they be placed in a rabbitry.

Keep cages and rabbitry away from dampness. Dirty and wet floors and cage bars contribute to the occurrence of dangerous diseases such as infectious stomatitis (“wet face”), pasteurellosis, staphylococcosis, coccidiosis and others.

Rabbits are neat animals. Over time, they steadily develop the habit of emptying the stomach and bladder in a strictly defined place in the cell. They especially keep the dark compartment where I rest clean. Typically, rabbits choose a place for the toilet in one of the corners near the back wall of the cage. In this case, the highest place is chosen. Knowing all this, you can easily accustom your rabbits to the place you choose for them. To do this, lift the grate in the desired corner, preferably near the door, slightly, placing a small wooden block under it, and put a little rabbit feces on the grate itself, which will encourage them to recover in this particular place. This will keep the cage clean and make it easier to clean.