What is Rabbit Mash and how is it useful for challenged rabbits?

Question

I read something about mash for rabbits.

What is it made with? How to prepare it? In which cases is it useful?

Answer 1

Rabbit Mash

My senior rabbit has problems with maintaining her weight, so I explored this on kaninchenwiese.de.

It works for rabbits that need more energy because they are:

• outside in the winter (low temperatures, beneath 0°C)
• (chronically) ill
• seniors
• lactating or pregnant
• big breeds

But one must be aware that in the long run, health issues could arise. If the rabbit eats the mash only, for example, the food-grinding would be missed, which causes the teeth to grow longer than usual.

And (even if you want your rabbit to gain weight) it should be fed in low doses. Around 1 full teaspoon for one kilogram of rabbit daily is enough. (This would be 2 full teaspoons for a 2 kg dwarf rabbit senior per day.)

Possible ingredients:

• oil seeds (sunflower, chia seeds, sorghum bicolor, hemp seed, pumpkin seeds, flax seed, poppy seed, sesame) they support the digestive system and help with fur issues
• flour seeds (amaranth, buckwheat, spelt seeds, barley seeds, grass seeds, oats, sorghum, corn/maize, quinoa) in general grains need to be fed with spelt to be healthy
• aromatic seeds (aniseed, nettle seeds, dill seeds, fennel seed, coriander, caraway, milk thistle seeds) they have lots of positive active components
• bran a common food for horses
• dried herbs (examples: basil, dill, thyme, sage, chives, oregano, marjoram, parsley, chamomile, coriander, rosemary, peppermint) ready mixes for rabbits, or self made mixes for special aims like supporting the digestive system or the breathing
• immune supporting additives, like drops/powder from the shop or ginger (ginger needs slow, slow, slow habituation, but has a positive effect to the immune system proven by research)
• fruits (any of your rabbit's preferred kinds, grated) mine loves apple and carrot, raisins sometimes

Example for a recipe from the linked website (above)

• one cup crushed oat (with spelt)
• one cup crushed flax seeds
• 4 cups herb mix

My mix for my senior rabbit (with chronic common colds):

• ¹/₂ cup flax seed
• ¹/₂ cup sesame seed
• ¹/₂ cup oat flakes
• ¹/₂ cup sunflower seeds (without spelt)
• 4 cups of dried kitchen herbs (basil, thyme, marjoram, parsley, chive and dill)
• Sometimes I grind ¹/₈ apple or carrot into the mix, or cut 4 raisins into very small pieces, to vary the taste.

I buy these ingredients in a supermarket, because I am limited in my options to buy other seeds and dried herbs where I live

Preparation

I mix the whole cups (without fresh food like apple/carrot) together into a closable plastic food storage box. Each day I take two teaspoons full of the mix out of it.

Then I crush the mix in a mortar, while waiting for the water to boil.

I mix the crushed components with warm water (between 30 and 50°C) and let them soak and swell for around 30 minutes.

The first few times I needed to experiment with how much water is needed. One can use a little bit at first and then add some until the consistency is like baby food.

I serve this mix on a small plate to my senior, but in extreme cases it is possible to feed it with a syringe too. If you have rabbits who should not gain weight in addition to your rabbit, then you may need to separate them for around one hour. My senior defends her plate against her husband, so I do not need this. But maybe your rabbit is not powerful enough to do so.