Best way to wash off any potential parasites from garden greens?

[Sparky04]

Ever since Ragnar died, I’ve been very paranoid about feeding the rabbits greens from the garden. As some may know, Ragnar died during her spay from complications from living outdoors for whole life up until we took her in. The vet believed her death was caused from toxoplasma lying dormant in her liver. In her previous home, she had to graze outside for her food, so her risk of exposure would have been higher. We have a garden and we grow some fresh greens for our rabbits.We also have a large feral cat population in our neighborhood. So you can understand my concern. I scrub the greens under hot water (no soap) but I’m still worried it isn’t good enough. I’m scared to feed them anything grown in our garden. Are my fears substantiated? Is scrubbing under water enough or is there a proper way to do it. 

[Bam]

I can understand your worry. There is no way to completely “sterilize” fresh greens (well, radiation is used in some places but obviously that’s not an option for home grown produce.)

Toxoplasmosis is very common and it’s believed that very many people carry it too. It generally doesn’t give rise to a serious health problem unless the carrier is severely immunocompromized – or very, very weak like Ragnar must’ve been after her spay.

I grow veggies in pallet rims, two or three on top of each other, with weed-barrier weave in the bottom (lets through water but not weed and insects). If you grow greens like that they are less accessible to wild and feral animals – with the exception of birds, of course.

[Talindra]

Hello!
I took a class in horticulture a couple of years ago, One of the subject we really got into was pesticide and what to do when you buy fruits or vegies that have been sprayed. Since prices on organic food at the supermarket are so high, sad truth is not everyone can afford the organic section. So what my teacher said to us is basically you wash your fruits and vegies in cold water mix with white vinegar. So you take a mixing bowl, fill it with water. You basically try to aim for a 3 part water, one part vinegar. And you let your food soak for 20 minutes than rinse it off. It will remove all pesticide and almost all bacteria.
I am not sure if this would apply to parasites, but it will surely not hurt your rabbit. And it cannot be worse.

And other good idea for next year’s garden is to do an above ground garden. Most of the danger to rabbits come from poop dropings of animals. Well If they can’t walk in your garden they can’t poop in it. (except for birds…) There’s a couple of options on how to do this. I could find you some links if it’s something you want to look into.

Hope this helps.

[Author]

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