Rabbits can be affected by several different parasites which can make them poorly.
Heavy worm infestations can cause sickness, diarrhoea, weight loss and weaken your rabbit’s immune system.
It is therefore important to treat your rabbit to get rid of any worms it may have picked up on a regular basis. The Vets4Pets vets and nurses can recommend a specific worming programme based around your rabbit’s lifestyle.
The main worms which affect rabbits are roundworms and tapeworms.
Roundworms look like this under a microscope:but in real life they are beige and can be coiled like a spring.
The most common species of roundworm can also infect people. Children are the most likely to be infected and once the worms spread throughout the body, they can affect the eyes and cause blindness.
Tapeworms are white or pale in colour and resemble flat segments filled with moving eggs that look like grains of rice. Rabbits are infected with tapeworm by swallowing fleas while grooming. Once inside your rabbit’s gut, the worm larvae carried by the flea develops into an adult worm that can grow to 5 metres in length!
Email
Print
