Recently we had an issue with one of our rabbits. He has maloclusion (teeth/jaw issue) so was not eating well. I am happy to say after a visit to the vet and a change in his diet he is doing awesome. The vet recommended a diet such as this.

Here is a recipe for Rabbit Mush. He loves it! I recommend preparing it in a very large bowl or halve the recipe. I found this recipe makes enough for about a week's worth of meals. Today, I took a cookie sheet and put roughly measured individual piles on a piece of foil, then covered that with another sheet of foil, did the same until all the food was put down. I put the sheet in the freezer. When the food is frozen, I will put into a ziploc bag. I can then take out what I need to either microwave to thaw or put in another ziploc bag to thaw in the fridge. This was easier than putting each measured meal in an individual baggie and more economical.

Angel's Mush

Recipe

4-5 cups high fiber (29-30%) pellets (high quality; your bunny's favorite alfalfa-timothy blend)

1 cup oat or barley flour

Mix together, and then cover in water and let soak 2-3 hrs

Add:

11.5-12 oz V-8 juice (We don't use low sodium V-8 juice since the juice is a relatively small part of the mush, and doesn't add enough sodium for it to be a problem.)

1 can vanilla Ensure (or the generic equivalent which is much less expensive, and identical in all other ways)

1 large can pumpkin (the two-pie size, but plain pumpkin, not pumpkin pie filling)

Mix all and add water or Pedialyte to attain desired consistency. Can be thinned to syringe-feed consistency. Use pedialyte only if the rabbit needs the electrolytes. A healthy rabbit doesn't.

For a healthy rabbit, the consistency should be fairly dry, and it should be given in "lumps." If it squashes down, and the rabbit has no incisors, it can be hard for him/her to eat it. I "fluff" if up again if this happens.

Storage

I freeze it in heavy freezer bags, in quantities that we'll use within 4 days. We thaw it in the refrigerator, and keep it refrigerated until it's used up or gets older than five days thawed.

In a pinch, we thaw in a microwave.

It can be stored frozen for several months. It doesn't go bad, but would lose some of its taste, like frozen vegetables do.

We serve it to healthy bunnies straight from the refrigerator, and leave it for as much as 12 hours. For sick rabbits, when we are syringe feeding, we put the syringe in hot water so the mush is warm.

Amount

All the rabbit can/will eat if weight gain is needed. We give it twice a day, and start with 1/2 to 1 cup twice daily for healthy rabbits, where quantity depends on their activity level, whether they can eat other things, etc., as well as their weight. I let them eat all they want for a day, and determine how much that is. Then I limit them to that, and check their weight once a week, and make modifications based on weight gain or loss.

(It also depends on how much of their mush their mate eats... )

I'm syringe feeding a bed-ridden rabbit who weighs about 5 lbs. He maintains his weight on 210 cc's of syringed mush per day, plus 120 cc's sub-cu fluids, and generous vegetables. (Rabbits should have 10cc's of fluid per pound of rabbit three times a day. Fluids are in the mush, in the sub-cu fluids, and in the vegetables, if they can eat them.)

Sometimes he eats more mush, sometimes, less. But he averages 210 cc's per day.