Your rabbit eats dinner twice — and you've likely never seen it

Somewhere around dawn, while you were asleep, your rabbit ate a meal you have never served.

Rabbits are hindgut fermenters. Grass and hay are tough stuff, so the fibre is sorted in the gut: the indigestible bits become the round, dry pellets you sweep up, while finer material is fermented in the caecum, a large pouch teeming with microbes. That fermentation produces something far richer — soft, shiny, grape-like clusters called caecotrophs, packed with protein and B vitamins.

And the rabbit eats them. Straight from the source, usually tucked quietly in a corner, often at night or early morning. It isn't a bad habit. It's the second half of digestion, and rabbits can't thrive without it.

Which is why this is worth knowing as an owner.

If you start finding squashed caecotrophs in the hutch or stuck to your rabbit's back end, something is off. The usual culprits are too much muesli-style food or treats and not enough hay — a rich diet makes more caecotrophs than the rabbit wants to eat. Obesity, arthritis or dental pain can also stop them reaching round to groom.

Unlimited grass hay, a measured portion of pellets, greens for the rest. That's the whole trick.

Sticky bottoms matter urgently in warm weather, because soiled fur attracts flystrike. If it doesn't resolve within a day or two, see a vet experienced with rabbits.