How the Rabbit Digestive System

Works
The initial stages of rabbit digestion are the same as most mammals. When a rabbit eats,
the food travels from the mouth, down the oesophagus, into the stomach, and on to the
small intestine. The small intestine is responsible for absorbing the nutrients from the
food. As food travels along it, enzymes break the food down into individual nutrients that
are small enough to pass through the lining of the intestine and be absorbed into the blood
stream. Enzymes can't breakdown fibre, so in most mammals the fibre portion of the food
would travel on through the colon and be excreted as waste. However, in rabbits the
colon sorts the fibre into two types, digestible and indigestible.
Digestible fibre has nutrients locked away inside it, so the colon diverts it to the caecum
for processing. The left over indigestible fibre doesn't contain any useable nutrients, but it
is still essential to the digestive process, as it has helped carry the food through the
digestive system. Its job is now complete, so the colon forms it into the hard round
droppings your rabbit leaves in his litter tray and it passes out of the body as waste.
Meanwhile, in the caecum, a colony of special bacteria ferment the digestible fibre,
breaking it down to release the stored nutrients. The caecum can absorb some of the
nutrients but most need to go back through the small intestine to be absorbed. To achieve
this, the fermented fibre moves back into the colon, where it is coated in protective
mucus, before being excreted from the body as special droppings, called cecotropes or
cecal droppings. The rabbit eats these droppings (a process called cacography) so they
pass through the digestive tract again. In their new format, the small intestine can easily
absorb the nutrients.

2. The digestion of rabbits, guinea pigs, most other rodents, and several other mammals
has a unique aspect, and that is the formation of cecotropes. Through this special
mechanism, these animals can receive more nutrition from what they eat. This special
digestive process has been referred to as 'cecotrophy,' 'hindgut fermentation,'
'coprophagy,' or 'pseudorumination.'
What are cecotropes?
Cecotropes, also called 'night feces' or 'soft feces,' are the material resulting from the
fermentation of food in a part of the digestive system called the 'cecum.' Cecotropes are
nutrient-rich and are passed out of the body, like feces, but are reingested by the animal
so the nutrients can be absorbed. Cecotropes have twice the protein, and half of the fiber
of the typical hard fecal pellet. They also contain high levels of vitamin K and the B
vitamins.
How are cecotropes produced?
To help understand cecotropes, it is helpful to know something about how the digestive
tract of animals make them. As with humans, animals with hindgut fermentation have an
esophagus that leads to the stomach. From there, food enters the small intestine, where
absorption of the nutrients takes place. The food then passes to the colon. Little, if any,
absorption of nutrients occurs in the colon. In animals that have coprophagy, the large
fiber particles pass quickly through the colon and are excreted as typical feces. Through
special muscle contractions (reverse peristalsis) in the colon, the nutrient-rich portion of
the food is moved back into the cecum, a sac-like structure between the small intestine
and colon. This food remains in the cecum, where it is broken down by special bacteria
into absorbable nutrients, such as simple sugars, starches, and amino acids. At a certain
time of the day, depending upon the species of the animal, the material from the cecum is
moved into and through the colon and passed out through the anus. The animal then
ingests this material and it moves through the digestive tract a second time, and the
nutrients formed in the cecum are absorbed in the small intestine. Without this process,
many of the nutrients in the food would be lost and passed through the colon, and out as
typical feces. If rabbits, guinea pigs, and rodents are not allowed to eat the cecotropes,
they will suffer from malnutrition.
In a way, cecotrophy is similar to the process of ruminant animals chewing their cud.
Cows, goats, and other ruminants chew their food once, swallow it, and then the digestive
process continues in the rumen where the fiber starts to be broken down by bacteria.
When these animals chew their cud, the material from the rumen is brought up through
the esophagus to the mouth, where it is rechewed and swallowed. By repeating this
portion of the digestive process, ruminants, too, receive more nutrition from their food.
What do cecotropes look like?

Cecotropes are smaller, softer, and more moist than the hard fecal pellets. They are
covered with greenish mucus, which makes them stick together.
How often are cecotropes passed?
Cecotropes and the typical hard feces are passed at different times into the colon.
Depending upon the species, some animals pass the cecotropes at night, others at dawn,
and others throughout the day. This allows animals to ingest the cecotropes during
periods when they are not normally feeding.
3. Table 2. Dry matter requirement of rabbit

Physiological

Body weight

DM requirement

condition

Young
Adult
Pregnancy
Lactating
(7 childs)

(kg)

(% BW)

(gram/day)

1,8-3,2
2,3-6,8
2,3-6,8
4,5

5,4-6,2
3,0-4,0
3,7-5,0
11,5

112-173
92-204
115-251
520