RABBITS URINE COLOR
The normal color of rabbits urine is a pale to dark yellow. Often the rabbits urine can change to become orange, pink, red, or brown.
There is no reason to panic when you first see a change in the color of your rabbit’s urine. A red urine color may cause you to panic!
This condition is called red urine. This change in color can happen in healthy rabbits as well as those who are sick.
This change of color in the rabbits urine can be due to organic compounds and plant pigments in the rabbits food source. This can happen more often in rabbits being fed a natural food source diet.
Stress or even the change of season can cause discoloration of the urine. Especially the first cold snap of the winter or during the summer were heat stress to the rabbit can result in red urine.
Dehydration will concentrate the urine, causing it to become darker in color and intensifying any pigmentation that is present.
If the rabbit is on any antibiotics this will also increase the levels of pigments in the urine.
Most often the time the change in urine color is not a medical issue. If a rabbit has certain health issues related to the kidney, liver, or bladder this will also cause the same color change in the rabbits urine. If the rabbit has been straining to urinate, attempting to pee more often, or urinating in smaller quantities such as only a few drops at a time a bladder problem is likely.
When naturally feeding rabbits with a large amounts of plants in their diet, these natural compound’s and pigments high in beta – carotene, such as sweet potato, squash, carrots, melons, spinach and lots of other dark leafy greens can cause this change in urine color. Ingestion of pine or fur needles can also have the same results.
This change of urine color is unpredictable as two rabbits on the same diet can have different results. One rabbit may have yellow urine and the other orange. Most of the times when this color change is from the diet it will only last a few days but I have had a few rabbits take up to a month.
So do not panic and always pay attention to your rabbits behaviors, as spending time with your rabbits you will notice any issues and be able to take care of any issues soon than later.
Posted on February 2, 2021, in Uncategorized. Bookmark the permalink. 3 Comments.
This is a very informative post. It’s been a while since your last post and I appreciate very much your coming back with more info about rabbits. THANK YOU from Sydney, Cape Breton, Nova Scotia.
Want to try to post more, will try to do one a month again. Thanks, and Glad you enjoy my stuff!
So glad I found your website! Planning to start raising meat rabbits this year and doing all the research I can into how to feed them without standard pellets. Thanks for so much info! Will be buying Beyond the Pellet soon 🙂