# rabbit allergy?



## sham (Jan 26, 2007)

Anyone heard of dogs allergic to rabbit? It seems like it would be a rather hypoallergenic meat to me and is sometimes used as an alternative meat in foods for dogs with a lot of allergies. We upped the raw organic rabbit in our dogs' diet and now my akita has ear problems with big bald patches in front of her ears and much itching all over which I at first thought was just due to blowing her summer coat faster than usual. They've been eating slightly less rabbit at a time for the past year and we finally reached high enough production to make it a main part of their diet. However they also received some spiced sausage that was leftover from making spaghetti and a freezer burnt duck over the past couple weeks. I know my akita is allergic to lamb and does really well with large game meat like elk or buffalo based foods. Her digestive tract is a little sensitive to beef and occasionally she has a reaction to poorer quality chicken. We are using a kibble with chicken but we never had problems with our own chickens or good quality chicken and consumption of kibble nearly came to nothing when we increased the rabbit over the past few weeks. She's also been eating the same brand of chicken based kibble for the past year and a half with no problems. We switched to it because we realized the large game based kibble we were using included lamb broth when trying to fix her bad lamb reaction. 

So is it the increase in rabbit or something else they got this month? I really hope she's not allergic to rabbit because that pretty much ruins our ability to afford much raw unless I can convince my mom to let me raise quail in her horse stable instead. She hates birds though so we sold out our chickens we were raising for meat when we had to move to a smaller place and keep the meat animals at her place. Then we spent the past 16months getting a meat rabbit operation in place and I butchered 35lbs this month. I suppose I could sell it and then buy other meat but it's not worth the effort or legal issues to sell it as human grade rather than pet food prices and I'm not sure I'd make enough to buy an equivalent amount of something else.


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## sassafras (Jun 22, 2010)

A dog can develop an allergy to any meat source, there's really no such thing as a hypoallergenic meat. It's only considered/used as an alternative protein source because it isn't commonly used in most brands of dog food. Whether or not your dog actually IS allergic to rabbit is another question entirely, you'd have to do a food trial to investigate that.


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## LazyGRanch713 (Jul 22, 2009)

sassafras said:


> A dog can develop an allergy to any meat source, there's really no such thing as a hypoallergenic meat. It's only considered/used as an alternative protein source because it isn't commonly used in most brands of dog food. Whether or not your dog actually IS allergic to rabbit is another question entirely, you'd have to do a food trial to investigate that.


One of mine was intolerant (not necessarily allergic) to a lot of things, mainly protein sources (even things that most people would have considered "novel", like lamb and turkey). For awhile, he would do fine on a protein source (say, chicken), and after a few weeks he would start reacting (diarrhea, losing weight, poor coat, etc). If I switched the protein sources, he would do fine...for awhile. 
If she's been getting a lot of rabbit lately, and her system is a bit sensitive anyhow, I would wonder if it wasn't basically her bodys way of saying "I've had enough of that". If you have a holistic vet in your area, I would strongly recommend asking them about NAET. It really helped my dog, who was 68 pounds and should have been at about 85.


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## Kathyy (Jun 15, 2008)

Are the issues she is having now the same as what happens with the suspect foods? An allergic dog probably has more than a stray allergy to this meat or that meat. Environmental allergies are out there as well.

Are you covering the omega 3 issue by feedng fish oil or fatty fish?
Is there enough fat in the diet? Rabbit is only 37% fat which is kind of low for a lot of dogs. If the skin is eaten I bet the fat content is higher but Max wouldn't eat the skin of the first whole rabbit he was offered. Are you giving the head as well? Brain and eyes are high in fat and omega 3 and vitamin E.

I bet you could trade for other meat, that is a good idea.


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