COPROPHAGY IN RABBITS - AUTOINGESTION OF HARD FECES

The rabbit is a representative animal species that conducts coprophagy , i. e. the production and reingestion of soft feces. We, however, enc ountered a maternal rabbit eating its own hard feces. A detailed inves tigation was performed on coprophagy in the rabbit to elucidate whethe r rabbits actually reingest their own hard feces. It was found that yo ung adult Japanese White rabbits reingested their hard, as well as sof t, feces directly from the anus. It has been reported that rabbits rei ngest only soft feces because of their high nutritive content, but the present study domonstrates that rabbits also reingest their hard fece s despite their low nutritive content. It seems possible that copropha gy may be initiated by the colonic or rectal wall expanding effects of the fecal material itself.