It is not the hardness of pellets that causes wear, it is the rough surface of grass. If you run your fingers down a blade of grass or hay, you’ll find it catches. This is because the surface of grass is actually like abrasive sandpaper and that is what causes wear. Pellets are hard but they easily shatter into pieces, so this does not create the right kind of wear. If the roughness, rather than harness of the surface that is important.

If we decrease his pellets and increase his green foods to make him chew more do you think its likely his digestion will suffer? thats the reason we have limited him on carrot tops in the past, the assumption it will cause him to start producing much looser droppings (to put it nicely).

As far as he is concerned I suspect he would be happy in a world where he only ever had to eat carrot top and if that were a valid subsititue for hay we would be able to make that change pretty easily.

Have you tried fresh grass? It’s just as good as hay, and some bunnies that like fresh foods (like carrot tops) prefer it.

The more he chews the more wear his teeth will get, so although grass/hay is the best, anything he eats will create some wear. Pellets are very concentrated and break up easily so he doesn’t need to chew many times to eat all the nutrients he needs. Green foods are less concentrated so he needs so eat a bigger volume (and chew more times) to get the same number of nutrients. So, even if you can’t persuade him to eat hay, you may find that decreasing pellets and increasing the portion of fresh foods in his diet will help overall as he’ll have to chew more.

The best types of food for this are often natural leaves, so things like blackberry, raspberry, hazel, apple, pear, hawthorn, thistle. You can also dry these to give you spare for the winter. There is a forum topic here where several rabbit owners are discussing collecting plants to feed you may find helpful: http://forums.rabbitrehome.org.uk/showthread.php?t=274136

He does have dental problems, maybe as a result who knows, and we would love to find a way of getting him to change his habits. I have just sent of for a sampler pack of different hays in case there is something he will eat but i dont hold out much hope.

So my question is a bit different – if Max point blank wont eat hay then is there something else that has similar characteristics in terms of making him grind his teeth down and which he can eat in decent quantities? He would for example be very happy to munch on carrot tops all day but i suspect thats not going to do his insides much good so we limit the amount we allow him.

I’ve never heard of hay making bunnies hyper. They do enjoy playing with hay and digging about it in and eating it is good for them so that may make them feel happier and be more active. It’s really important rabbits have access to hay 24/7 for their teeth and digestive system, if you’re worried about the reaction to timothy hay you could try meadow or oat hay instead. If they are babies you could also try alfalfa but you’ll need to swap later as it’s too rich for adults and can make them overweight.

Do get someone experienced to check if you have boys or girls if you have three, it’s easy to make a mistake and you can end up with hundreds if you aren’t careful!

Hay is very important for gut function and teeth though so getting her into good habits now has big benefits. Try the ideas above too see if they help. As she’s a youngster you could also try alfalfa hay, it’s too rich for adults but fine for babies and very tasty so might tempt her. You could also try dried grass (sometimes kiln dried grass) again it’s extra tasty so might get her started.