Fresh Grass?

Hi everyone. Have actually have been thinking of something to post today so I could get involved with HH or at least just to say hi!

I was actually pondering something this morning while looking out in the garden while washing up. There's lots of lovely green fresh grass in our garden and I was thinking of picking some and giving it to Pippin. I once read (a very long time ago) that you should give grass to pet rabbits. Since keeping bunnies myself, however I have read that it's great to give them fresh grass. I guess our knowledge on rabbits has grown immensly over the years!

Who else feeds their bunny fresh grass? We don't ahve a big garden so it would only be a supplement to the hay we use but I thought it would be better somehow, diet wise. Or at least taste nicer than the dried stuff. Is there anything I need to look out for or is all grass good grass? We don't use pesticides or anything else and I try to keep our garden as 'green' as possible. Environmentally green I mean

Feed away! Even a domesticated rabbit's natural diet should really mainly consist of grass.

Ours are all getting handfuls of fresh grass. The back garden still resembles a bog so is not fit to put the bunnies out on yet

Like any new food though I'd start with a handful and then increase as Pippin's tum gets used to it.

Brilliant thanks

Hubby's going to (hopefully!) build a run soon for outdoors. What's more natural than a bunny grazing on fresh grass outside:)

Daisy has fresh grass from about now til it gets too awful to give to him. He really enjoys it. However im not happy giving it to him at the moment all the time next doors cats are still messing all over it. I dont want to give him anything nasty - the last of the measures to make our garden a fortress should be going up next weekend so fingers crossed they will go and do their business elsewhere and my baby can have his grass again.

A fortress? That sounds like a plan! How's it going to work?

Welll we have brought 2 M high willow screening. There are small gaps between each peice of willow that makes it difficult to scramble up - also it is to narrow on the top for the cats to balance on (they are incredibly fat - from eating little bunnies Im sure). This is now 90% of the way round the garden and the amount of poo this weekend had gone down to only a couple (before there was millions of it). There is also going to be criss cross willow trellis on top of this to make it even more tricky to get over. Cant wait to get the rest up. Im hoping that because they are so fat and lazy they will give up and go elsewhere. We have spent a fortune.

We tried cat scarers....they burried them, we tried motion sensors with squirties - they wernt scared, we tried soalking them - they just sit on the fence watching you turn on the hose and then jump off at the very last second. I love animals but these are DEMONS!!! My other neighbour was attacked by one last week when he was getting on his motor bike.

My poor boy has been terrorised by them looking in at him and they even keep trying to come into the house! So I cant even leave a window open in case they come in to try and get my Daiz.

Sorry for rant!!! Ha Ha you only asked about grass!""

Katieb wrote:(they are incredibly fat - from eating little bunnies Im sure).

I'm sorry, in all seriousness it must be a right pain. We have cats so we don't actually see many in our garden but our neighbours have a dog that used to always manage to find it's way in and poo in our garden! It took weeks beofre he finally managed to prevent the dog from coming over here. It's bad enough having to clean up after someone elses animals but we have 4 young children and cat and dog poo is very dangerous if they fell in it. I didn't mean to rant either! Just winds me up!

Hopefully your willow idea will work wonders and handsome Daisy will be able to relax much more

Ours love grass, so much so, that they have eaten practically all the grass in the compound and now are fascinated by the grass that grows between the two layers of chicken wire. It drives them mad as they can see it, smell it, but can't reach it. I go and pull it for them every now and then to keep them happy. I also pick dandelions and dockens for them when we are out for walks as they love those too.

Bertie gets loads of fresh grass. The Common here is just down the road, and I cycle through it every day, so I'm the mad man in the park picking grass and dandelions at the mo I want to be able to say why I'm doing it, but I mostly just get funny looks from passers by.....

Same here with dandelions. There are loads near us and I can't walk passed them without picking some. When I was a child I used to believe picking dandelions would make you wet the bed

We have no access to 'safe' grass at our current home but we are moving to a house with a lawned garden soon and I cannot wait to get the rabbits out munching on it. Just need to put up a new fence first.

I'm hoping to get our two out on the grass soon, but our garden is like a bog most of the year unfortunately. I think grass at this time of year is very rich, so as Vanessa says, just start off with small amounts and build up.

Magoo wrote:When I was a child I used to believe picking dandelions would make you wet the bed

I remember my mum saying that dandelions were known as "wet the bed" when she was a child! They are a powerful diuretic I think, so there's probably some truth in it!

Jay - that's really funny You need a badge saying "I'm picking it for my rabbit, honest ..."

That's interesting saying that it's a diuretic. That makes sense as it's good for a bunny's urinary tract.

Well, I have this 'garden', not that its much of one. My landlord has never ever done anything with it, it doesn't even have a fence. I refuse to do anyhting with it, as its not my house.. On the plus side, though, I have knee-high grass so I go yank that out once a week in SPring/summer, and mu bunnies love it. And there are plenty of dandelions.

My neighbours must think Im mad...

When I go house-hunting when Im done at Uni etc, I will surely look for a house with a nice garden, so my bunnies can get some sunshine..

Vivi wrote:

When I go house-hunting when Im done at Uni etc, I will surely look for a house with a nice garden, so my bunnies can get some sunshine..

When we went to view our house we also saw another 2 on the same estate and one was identical, except with a much smaller garden. Naturally I went for the house with the biggest lawn and the most rabbit keeping potential!

Magoo wrote:That's interesting saying that it's a diuretic. That makes sense as it's good for a bunny's urinary tract.

Apparently in French, dandelions are called "pissenlit" which means "urinate in bed" Can you tell I've been off checking Wiki?!

Wiki's a good internet friend of mine.