Did you know ...

[Karen]

Just a thread to post things people might not know, like ...

Did you know

... rabbits don't digest sugar well? That's why they cannot have too much fruit in a given day - Miss Hoppy gets her three raisins, and no more.

... bunnies cannot throw up? That's why a tummy ache or a hairball can be a life-threatening condition for a bunny.

[Sara luvs her Tinky]

I did not know any of that :D

I didn't even know a bunny could / or would get a hairball.. poor buns with their sensitive tums !

[Paws13]

Bunnies can get hairballs? I thought only cats can get hairballs, but bunnies. WOW! :eek: So my grandma was right. You do learn something everyday! Thanks, Karen!

[Karen]

Any animal hat grooms itself, like cats do and bunnies do - can get a hairball ... it is rarer in bunnies, but as stated, can be fatal. Unlike cats, where it's just *urk* gross when they get puked up!

[lvpets2002]

:) WoW great info!! Did not know this.. Also did you know that a mouse or rat cannot Burp.. If they get a hold of any kind of Coke or high acids they will explode.. Their bodies cannot releave the air..

[TamanduaGirl]

actualy any animal can get a hair blockage or enough hair to upset the tummy and make them puke(if they can puke). Cats are different in that it forms together in a mass(ball) in their stomach some of the modern treatments for hairballs include enzymes that break up the binding agents. I'm not convinced these are wise since the cat body obviously deleloped the ball spit up methode to keep hair out of the rest of the digestive system.

My dog puked a couple time from to much of her own hair but it was just normal tummy juive and loose hair.

Because bunnies are herbivores and the food doesn't digest well the hair can get wrapped up in the undigested matter and if not enough fiber in the diet the hair can cause to fecal matter to get stuck together in larger masses that might not pass or if you aren't brushing and it's a heavey shead then it can blocm farther up from their being a big mass of fur.

[TamanduaGirl]

A paste of asprin and water will cure ringworm double check asprin is okay for the species used on. It's okay on dogs and bunnies.

I used a mixture of asprin and neem oil.


Neem oil is antifungle and works on mites too.

[Argranade]

:) WoW great info!! Did not know this.. Also did you know that a mouse or rat cannot Burp.. If they get a hold of any kind of Coke or high acids they will explode.. Their bodies cannot releave the air..

YIKES! :eek:

[JuniorxMyxLove]

they can't throw up? wow, I never knew that!
I knew horses can't throw up, which is why colic can get so dangerous...

[Kalei]

Wow so that's why I've never seen any of my bunnies throw up before. I didn't know that! It's a very good thing to know, thank you Karen. And horses too? I didn't know that horses couldn't throw up, that is a very interesting fact. Wow, I want to learn more now. More knowledge!!

I don't know if anyone already knew this or not, but did you know that fish sleep? When my big Queen is sleeping, she goes down to her fav corner of the tank and lightly sits on the rocks, and I can tell she's sleeping cause when I go in front of her it takes her a few seconds to see me and then wehn she does she wakes right out of it and gets up!:)

[Husky15]

I knew one of those facts, but did not know the other - that is really interesting. :eek:

[Beki]

a horse with black skin and a white coat isn't a white horse, its considered a gray. a horse with pink skin and white coat is a cremello (white) :p

[Sevaede]

:) WoW great info!! Did not know this.. Also did you know that a mouse or rat cannot Burp.. If they get a hold of any kind of Coke or high acids they will explode.. Their bodies cannot releave the air..

Same for birds!

I once met a couple who took their bird with them everywhere and they were telling me about the coke/no gas thing.

[lvpets2002]

:eek: WoW Really Birds too.. Hey I did know this guy in school that was the same way.. Beleive it or not.. It was so crazy he could not drink any kind of coke beverages..
Same for birds!

I once met a couple who took their bird with them everywhere and they were telling me about the coke/no gas thing.

[Freedom]

Something about cats above does not agree with what my vet told me. He said that in the wild, whatever it is cats eat (rare mouse bones?) pushes the hair through and they don't normally cough it up. In homes, they don't have "whatever it is" in their diets. And they CAN die from throwing up repeatedly; ripped diaphram. That's why the hairball remedies are important; not for human comfort of not steeping on one, but to prevent the repeated throwing up.

Anyway, on to a maybe unknown fact. Underneath all that fur, a dog has pink skin. BUT if you shave a cat down, the skin is the color of the fur which grows there (except white fur grows on pink skin). So a brown tabby has skin that is black and brown stripes! An orangie has orange skin. A tuxedo has black and pink skin. And . . . A calico has . . . skin of many colors!

[Husky_mom]

actually if you wet the white haired part of a dog........you can see some spot of different colored skin........not only pink skin.........

[DrKym]

Did you know Giraffes only have 7 neckbones?

[Freedom]

Did you know only cats, camels and giraffes walk two left feet, then two right feet? All other animals walk front left and rear right, then front right and rear left.

There's are term for each type of walk, but I don't remember what they are.

I've noticed giraffes seem rather "stiff necked" looking when they move, now I know why. Must be large bones, those 7!

[DrKym]

HEHE yes I knew that about the walking ( I dig giraffes so I found that out in story about them )

The neck bones btw are 10 inches each, and humans have 7 neckbones also.

Did you know that Dolphins are voluntary breathers? meaning they can never truly sleep? They have to choose to breathe, sleep would put them at risk of asphyxiation! :eek:

[Kalei]

Wow! That's amazing about the dolphins! I could never imagine a life without sleep. I wonder if some dolphins are like "I don't wanna breath! I'm sick of breathing!" lol.

[Beki]

Did you know that there are no true albino horses in the world (white coat, pink skin, pink eyes) because for some reason it is lethal to horses.
If there is such a horse, its ither still born or dies within two weeks. There is also a LWS (lethal white syndrome) aswell, common genetic disorder mainly with American Paint Horses. born all white and has a non functioning colin( extracts water from feases).
Also True white horses are rare! a horse with white coat and pink skin is a true white and they usually have blue eyes or brown eyes.
Also one more fact about horse coat color!
True black horses are uncommon but not rare! there are two types, non-fading black and fading black. fading black horses fade to a brownish color when normally expsed to sunlight on rebular basis, and non fading have like a blueish black coat. visually you can tell the difference between a true black horse, and a dark bay or dark brown horse because a true black horse does not have fine brown hair around the muzzle and eyes.

[TamanduaGirl]

My cat is back and has white skin

[Beki]

wow that sounds really neat can you put a pic up?


My cat is back and has white skin

[TamanduaGirl]

wow that sounds really neat can you put a pic up?

Really she's just a black cat unless you see skin but here's one of her showing off a naked belly
http://farm1.static.flickr.com/84/362780560_6ff804f9de.jpg
http://www.flickr.com/photos/tamanduagirl/362780560/

Just a little more dignified pic
http://i128.photobucket.com/albums/p169/TamanduaGirl/other/01_05e.jpg

[CathyBogart]

And they CAN die from throwing up repeatedly; ripped diaphram.


Vomiting will not tear the diaphragm, though it can rupture the esophagus.

Did you know that snakes have a third lung?

[Zippy]

No,I didn't.
Did you know that guinea pigs can't make there own vitamin C

[Karen]

I didn't know that about snakies, hmm, I guess with all that length, they'd have room for an extra lung!

What creatures can make their own vitamin C?

[Zippy]

Here is a quote for a guinea pig book:
Guinea pigs,unlike most other mammals,are unable to manufacture vitamin C within their bodies.
Guinea Pig:your happy healthy pet 2nd edition by Audrey Pavia

[Ceph]

oo,ooo, I have a did you know about rabbits :p

They are hind gut fermentors...they have the same general digestive system as a horse does...which explains the no throw up thing...ruminants such as cows regurgitate to chomp on the food and break it down some more...but horses and rabbits have enlarged cecum's and do all their fermenting back there. :)

random animal science fact....I have lots of them....I no more random facts than testable ones (its because they are more interesting)

[chocolatepuppy]

What creatures can make their own vitamin C?

dogs ;)

[tazz1227]

Thanks Karen! You always have great information to keep my bunnies healthy and happy!

[Blue Dragonfly]

Yeah i knew about the hair balls. If your rabbit starts getting constipated you can use some kind of oil to make the hairball move if it hasn't get too big, then the vet has to operate to remove it.

I was told that if you give your rabbit pineapple juice every so often it can help prevent hairballs, because the acid in it dissolves the furballs in the stomach. Worth a try.

[Karen]

If your bunnies have plenty of hay to munch on, that helps keep their digestive tract running well - real hay being much better than the compressed cubes for that purpose.


Miss Hoppy loves her 3 nightly raisins so much that last night, several hours before 11, she thought it was raisin time, apparently because of the crinkle of the bag of Pepperidge Farm goldfish I was eating, so I held out a goldfish cracker, thinking she'd smell it wasn't a raisin and turn it down, but she first chomped it in half, then came back for the other half! At least it was a "whole grain" goldfish! After that, I gave her her raisins, yes, I can be convinced to make it raisin time early every once in a while!

[mike001]

Any animal hat grooms itself, like cats do and bunnies do - can get a hairball ... it is rarer in bunnies, but as stated, can be fatal. Unlike cats, where it's just *urk* gross when they get puked up!


Karen, I was reading about the hairballs...does that mean that a dog who self mutilates and chews off his hair and swallows it can get hairballs???

[angelbow20]

- Houseflies prefer to breed in the middle of the room.
-egg shells are as strong as bone.
-A dog cant hear the lowest key on the piano.
-some female turtles may wait up to 5 yrs to lay their eggs after mating.
- humming birds can fly upside down.

[Babyboonie]

This thread is great - I've learnt so many interesting facts that I wouldn't have even thought of looking into! Well done Karen! Hopefully one day soon I'll have my very own "did you know" fact.