Young Continental Giant feeding

[Contimom]

I grew up with rabbits but we only adopted adults. Now my neighbor gave me one of the continental giants he breeds and I'm not finding a whole lot on if Conti's need any special feeding considerations when they are young to help them grow correctly. He stressed high protein but he also had mom and babies on adult food so should I slowly change her over to a young bunny food? I just don't want to not do something that I should have since I'm not used to having a baby bun. She's around 11 weeks.

 

[Blue eyes]

What type of pellets is she currently eating (brand) and is she eating hay -- if so, what type?

 

[JBun]

Also, is the food you have now the pellets the breeder sent home with you and were you given a one to two week supply of it? And what is their protein percentage and is she being free fed the pellets or are you limiting the amount(if so how much per day and her weight)? Adult breeder pellets are different than adult pet food pellets(usually non alfalfa based and lower protein), so feeding the adult breeder pellets may actually be appropriate for a growing conti.

At least for now you want to maintain the same diet the breeder was feeding(provided the rabbit has been healthy on this diet), before you gradually start switching foods to the ones you decide you want to feed. Though this doesn't include starting to feed a grass hay(eg timothy) if the rabbit didn't previously get hay.

 

[SableSteel]

You can look up information for flemish giants as well, they have the same care requirements. I would continue feeding whatever the breeder was feeding for now. There is a lot of mass that that rabbit still needs to grow and flemish/contis are often harder to keep muscle on from my experience so I would feed a 16-18% protein feed right now (which is probably going to be alfalfa based, timothy hays are usually lower protein). A lot of the complete diet feeds meant for show/breeding rabbits (such as purina, manna pro, etc) have high protein for all age ranges, so there isn't a separate adult/young rabbit food.

 

[Contimom]

Nutrena NatureWise Performance Rabbit Feed 18% is what she was eating with him. He did give me some but I ended up buying a bag to make sure I could switch it very slowly but now I'm not sure if I should. I bought the Oxbow Essential Young Rabbit Food but from what he was saying that isn't enough protein for her breed.
When her sister had shown up I ran to the store and just grabbed some Vitakraft timothy hay so she had something but then boughta 50 lb box of Oxbow orchard grass which I've been missing with the timothy and she doesn't seem to care which one she eats. I was planning to get some alfalfa as well just to mix in for the extra nutrients.

JBun as of right now I've been letting her free feed but she has been much more interested in the hay than the pellets. If I should be rationing it I will start to do that right away.

It devastated me that I messed up and ended up killing her sister as far as I can tell and I will never do something like that again. I've been doing much more research but it's hard to find info on how to feed young Conti's so I figured I'd try here. I never had feeding issues with the adults I adopted or the ones my sister and I ended up rescuing when we were younger and some were in terrible shape when we got them. They, however, were always adults. Babies now terrify me.

 

[Contimom]

I was wondering about that. More research tonight for me as well as taking the Oxbow pellets back to the store since it only had 15% protein.

 

[SableSteel]

I know some people who feed Nutrena NatureWise Performance Rabbit Feed 18% and have good results with it for young, large breed rabbits. They sell it in large bags at feed stores usually.