Resiting Water, Tears Up His New Stuffed Buddy!

[SablePoint]

Ever since his buddy, Koga, passed away, Bun Bun has been showing some depressing signs(which I mentioned before) - but I have never seen him display the behavior I witnessed yesterday!
He tore up a new stuffed buddy I got him yesterday! But it's not like he tear stuffing out of it, but he digged at it, tossed it around, and hesitated cuddling with it. I mean, rabbits like to throw things, but a stuffed animal that is as big as he is - I didn't know could do it!

Another more serious issue is going on too. I must of screwed up big time on giving him vegitable juice. I only wanted to keep his immune system strong since he's getting old and vegitable juice(V8, pure vegitables no additives or artifical flavoring) is high in Vit. C.

Well, I notice he started ignoring his water bottle since last thursday. It's like he's dependant on vegitable juice and won't drink anything else. I took the juice bottle away from him this morning. He still is resisting to drink from his water bottle.

What should I do to get him back to drinking his water?
Could this behavior indicate a serious problem? I see fresh urine spots, so maybe he's drinking a little bit while I'm not around. The bottle is still almost full though.

I've givin my rabbits juices before, but they still drank from their water bottles. I've never seen this behavior before and I'm really concerned.

Thanks for any responses!

 

[Korr_and_Sophie]

You could try putting a little bit of the juice in the water bottle. Just enough to colour it and give it a bit of flavour. Gradually decrease the amount until he is just drinking water.

 

[Maureen Las]

Poor rabbit is lonely and angry that his friend is gone.

Ihave rabbit who has astuffed animal that gets tossed around and dug at but he still seems to like the stuffed animal.I would leave it there unless he starts to rip and eat it
I would guess your bun is waiting for V8 juice. if he doesn't drink any waterI would add a bowl of water with a little V8 juice added to it ; that way he may smell it and drink the diluted version.

Ihave 2 rabbits that drink water diluted with apple juice all the time ;I think thatifI stopped it they would stop drinking .I started to add it to improve the amount that they drank and it worked well

To be honestI am not sure how to wean a bun off something tasy but some members add a drop of vanilla extract to water because the rabbits like the smell and drink more.

Maybe you will get some other opinions also.
mine are too spoiled for me to look at this objectively

 

[Stanza]

Maybe try putting his water in a bowl and see if he drinks from it?

 

[SablePoint]

Thanks guys. The diluting the water with juice sounds like a good idea!