Why is my bunny shedding
Why is my rabbit shedding? | Rabbit Moulting
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why is my rabbit shedding their fur and is this normal the quick answer is yes this is completely
normal similar to dogs you are going to find that your rabbits will shed their fur multiple
times throughout their lifespan and this is called molding we're going to jump into the
exact definition of molting and a little bit of details around rabbit shedding and what you can do
to help your rabbit during this time i'm Danielle of this littoral farm where we bring new content
every Wednesday and Sunday so that you can learn about homesteading and farming but without
further ado let's talk a little bit more about molting throughout the lifespan of your rabbit
you're going to notice that they're always kind of shedding a little bit of fur throughout their life
but there are going to be larger molter seasons or times throughout their life where they're going to
have a larger amount of molting that does happen and these are going to be one when the rabbit
is molting is a baby coat so this is going to be around at their four to five month year old stage
and they're going to be shedding off all of their baby fur and they're going to be growing in a nice
larger adult fur so this is going to be a relatively larger mulch and then you're
going to notice that throughout the year there are going to be two large molds so you're going
to have basically at the end of summer they're going to do this probably um in the late summer
early fall so right now we're in fall so we're going to be seeing one of our rabbits actual
summer mulch but you're going to notice that at this time period they're going to have a blowout
of fur and they're going to have a much larger amount of shedding and then this is again going
to happen at the end of winter where they are going to have a large blowout of fur again where
they are basically getting rid of their winter fur and they are preparing for summer so they're
gonna get in that nicer coat now it's interesting because you are going to find that this happens in
almost all breeds of rabbits unless you have a more particular breed that doesn't do this and
it's going to always happen around two times every year throughout their entire lifespan for some of
your rabbits you might not even know that this is happening i know that we have four different
adult rabbits right now that are preparing for the winter months coming and only one of ours is
having a really large molting that is going to need a little bit of help during this time for
the rabbits you're going to notice that the fur is going to start to mold or shed from the top
of their nose and then carry on through the back and i'll throw up some pictures of what
the molding will look like on various different rabbits but you can see that for some it actually
looks quite scary and this is nothing to be afraid of this is just something that's going to happen
to your rabbit throughout their life but there are a lot of things that you can do to help your
rabbit out through the process now number one is going to be if your rabbit is just happening this
happened to them you'll notice that the fur is going maybe into the tray underneath and that's
totally fine if there is a large buildup of hair then you are probably going to want to remove
that from the try or the cage and this is just because they will tend to eat some of the hair
or they might start pulling it off of their own body and eat some of it and digest it
and this could cause them to have hair balls or it just get kind of stuck within them and
not have that loose of stool and you can see this if you go into your rabbits tray and you actually
look at some of their droppings and if there are pieces of droppings that are strung together with
some hair then this might be an issue that your rabbit is running into and this might be another
time that you want to actually help your rabbit so if you're noticing that your rabbit is taking a
really long time to mulch anything really over two weeks is when you're going to want to intervene
and help out if you are working with meat rabbits which we're doing primarily here we have both
New Zealand and Californian rabbits and most the time you're really not going to have to worry but
you are going to really want to step in and help out if there are large chunks or the molding has
been going on for a really long time just because this could cause some issues as they do eat it
so we actually have one of our rabbits today his name is chubbs and i'm gonna be showing you guys
what he looks like and what you can do if your rabbit is in a similar state so i'm gonna go ahead
and grab him and bring him over to our table and we can go into a little more detail now i have our
rabbit chubs down here and you can see that his hair is just coming straight off in huge clumps
so this would be an issue where you would really want to start to intervene and help him out i'm
just covering his eyes that he feels comfortable here um but you're going to notice that during
this molting time a lot of your rabbits may have changes in their attitude they may not want to be
picked up or pet as much because their skin is a lot more sensitive during this time so it really
can make the attitude of your rabbit change this guy is such a nice lovable rabbit that he's really
not that bad now the ways that you can really help out are one just going to be using your
hands and kind of pulling out some of the fur now if there are large clumps you can kind of grab
those and pull those out or just kind of brushing him with your hand and you might want to do this
every day every other day until they are done with the mulching process or if you see that
you need to kind of help out so really go in and see what you think is necessary
now another way that you can do this is by taking either like a baby comb or some type of dog brush
that is soft bristles and kind of just brushing in on your rabbits and getting out any of those
with that so this is going to be something great that you can do here so i'm going to continue
cleaning him up this is going to take a little bit of time here and then we'll tune back in and
i'll give you a little more details on what you need to know when you're rabbit shedding
shedding in rabbits is completely normal this process is called molting and you're going to find
that most the time especially with meat rabbits you probably do not need to worry about this in
any way shape or form but it can be really nice to help them out and it can help with stopping
any clogs within their system especially if they are digesting this whether it's in their food bowl
or in their cage or they're just trying to clean themselves off and they're getting a lot of it in
their mouths now when you do help you can use your hands or a brush now you are going to be pulling
off a lot of hair i'm assuming a lot of it's going to get in your clothes but if you are able to save
some i suggest throwing it in a plastic baggie or container and saving it for the colder months
when you are breeding some of your doughs and this way if they aren't providing enough fur and their
nests are pulling enough then you can actually supplement with some of this as well now that's
just a little bit about rabbits but we have a full playlist down here and you can also subscribe
to our channel up here so i do suggest following along in our journey and learning more and comment
down below if there's anything else that you would like to learn about home studying with rabbits bye