DIY Treats

[BolingbrookMom]

I’m sorry if this is somewhere else on the forum, I tried to use the search function and I couldn’t find it anywhere.

I’m looking into making my own dried fruits to give to our bunny.  The rescue place we got him from made their own mix that they gave their buns and we bought some of that and it has oats, plain cheerios, raisins, and dried bananas.  They said they dried their own fruit because it’s so difficult buying things that aren’t full of sugar especially in the quantity they need.

I’m curious if anyone here has tried making their own dried fruit?  I saw a recipe for bananas and it involves lemon juice (to keep them from browning and helps dry them out), but is lemon juice okay for them? 

[Sarita]

Lemon juice is fine for rabbits – it’s not something you want to give straight up but it won’t harm them at all.

[Elrohwen]

Yep, I agree that lemon juice won’t hurt them, though keep in mind that rabbits generally dislike citrus (I have a no-chew product that is lime flavored) so it might turn them off of the banana. Worth a try though.

Do you have a dehydrator? I always thought it would be fun to dehydrate fruits for them since one of mine won’t eat fresh fruit.

[BlueMoods]

Use pinapple juice instead for the bananas, it does the same as lemon juice and, rabbits like it better. I also dry blackberries and apples for mine (we grow both so have plenty. Beyond that they get herbs, leaf lettuce and whatever else is currently fresh from the garden or the dandelions from the yard. I always have mint growing, it stays green year round here, so they get that, and fruit wood branches when I have them from pruning the fruit trees.

What mine never get is commercially prepared dry fruit or pet treats, most of those are either loaded with added sugar or, preservatives, salt, stuff the rabbits simply don’t need and is none too good for them.

[Megabunny]

Bam does a lot of that. Hopefully she will see this. She’s got me doing some greens but I’ve looked into doing fruit and it would be forever without a dehydrator so I’ll stick to,drying kale and cilantro. There is somewhere how to make timothy hay treats in oven I’d like to try.

[BettyandValentin]

I am doing my own treats for my bunnies. I got an excalibur dehydrator last christmas and it work really well. Before that I was doing it in the summer outside when the days where very hot but for the winter I had nothing. I do mostly mix with carrots, apples, pinapple, strawberries, papaya and pear. I tried to dry parley, but they didn’t like it.

I also have a juicer and when I do carrots and apple juice, I keep the rest that isn’t juice and dehydrate it. It looks like some tiny cookies. They really love it.

A good dehydrator is expensive 100-200$ but you can use it for yourself also and it last a long time. I didn’t wanted to give cerals or unhealty treats to my bunnies and in the store, the dehydrated food always has addives.

[Ellis's Mom]

How safe is dehydrated fruit for bunnies? We’ve been told to keep sweets very limited for Ellis. I always thought dehydration increased the sugar concentration?

[mrs.scand3]

http://www.food.com/recipe/pumpkin-plus-pet-bunny-rabbit-treats-410860

http://bakebakebake.livejournal.com/1352167.html

here are a few recipes I love to make for my little girl!

[LongEaredLions]

Dehydrated fruit is fine for bunnies.
It does contain a bigger concentration of sugar than fresh fruit, so feed a smaller amount.

[BolingbrookMom]

So mrs.scand3 I’d be worried about the pumpkin recipe because of the whole wheat flour. I thought they weren’t supposed to have flour?

[mrs.scand3]

I was also worried about the flour so I talked to the vet about it and she had said in this recipe the flour becomes a small part plus its whole wheat so its natural for them to eat and mixed with pumpkin to help it to digest

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